A-LISTS community by randy hope
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RAGE monthly | SEPTEMBER 2011 | SEPTEMBER 2011
AIDS WALK & RUN SAN DIEGO: GETS SOCIAL!
AIDS Walk & Run San Diego takes social networking to a whole new level and unites families, friends, couples, colleagues, and teammates with a common goal in the fight against HIV/AIDS. In a day and age when some may attribute 5K with the number of friends they have in web-based social networks, approximately 8,000 people are set to gather in Balboa Park on the morning of Sunday, September 25 for the 22nd annual 5K walk.
Although everyone walks for different reasons—30 years after the
discovery of what’s come to be known as HIV/AIDS—the urgency for community members to participate is just as strong now as when AIDS Walk San Diego first began. Not only does the battle to combat the fear, prejudice, and complacency surrounding the disease rage on, the call to increase awareness about the ongoing HIV/AIDS epidemic and the need to raise vital funds for the agencies and programs that serve thousands of San Diegans living with HIV, is louder than ever. In the era of social media, organizers are reaching out across the various networking platforms to get the word out and get people involved. “This time of year has a sad synchronicity,” Delores Jacobs, CEO of the San Diego LGBT Community Center recently posted on Facebook. “The HIV/AIDS Planning Council meets to try to establish a budget in case there are even more cuts next year, there are more people living with
HIV/AIDS, and fewer and fewer federal resources to keep pace with the continuing epidemic,” she said, explaining the importance of the upcom- ing event. “AIDS Walk San Diego does its best to try to ensure some local funding for all those San Diegans living with HIV/AIDS,” Jacobs said. Facebook, is not the only such social media tool organizers are utilizing
for the 5k walk however. Well-known in the local community and widely popular on Facebook,
San Diego’s very own Kurt Cunningham appears in one of several You- Tube videos, that have recently popped up to encourage community involvement and tell personal stories about the San Diego tradition. “AIDSWalk San Diego has been around for as long as I’ve been in San Diego,” Cunningham explains in his clip. The former AIDSWalk San Diego staff member said, for him it’s always been a way to honor friends. “Before we were walking around with a T-shirt with their face on it, or a sign with
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