Mack’s Take: My (slightly less) dirty blood

By John Mack Freeman

I have always believed in being able to give what I’m able to give to help people who may not have what I have. But there is one incredibly common way of giving back to communities that I have never participated in, and it fills me with rage. I have never given blood. I, like most gay and bisexual men, am indefinitely deferred from giving blood due to FDA regulations that prohibit any man who has had sex with another man since 1977 from giving blood.

This week, Health and Human Services Advisory Committee on Blood and Tissue Safety and Availability recommended that gay and bisexual men should now be allowed to give blood after they have abstained from having sex for a year. This would bring the guideline in line to the required deferral period for women who have had sex with a man who has had sex with a man. While this recommendation will not immediately become policy, it is a step in the right direction.

However, I am less than overjoyed. As many have noted, this seems like a good PR move and a nice incremental change, but it will have little affect in increasing GBT male participation in blood donations. It also further perpetuates the myth that blood from gay and bisexual men is significantly more dangerous than that of the general population. This is clinging to stereotypes that were already starting to fray before I was even born.

This is just one small injustice that LGBT people around the world face, and in the face of the legal problems faced by African and Middle Eastern LGBT people, the violence that all too often targets the trans community, and the dozens of other slights large and small that plague the community, this is something that has always struck close to home. Maybe it’s because I have always surrounded myself with a family of friends who are eager to give back and to help their fellow man. And so on blood drive days, they all turn up to lunch looking a little paler and woozy while I am reminded that helping others in this way is not something available to people like me.

I like to think that I’ve mellowed over time, but in undergrad, it was not hard to get me worked up, and the little signs around campus declaring blood drive day would simply piss me off. One of my roommates was new to the school my sophomore year and had never heard my tirade about the homophobic nonsense of the blood ban, so I had to explain my attitude. He listened and told me that he just didn’t think about it. A few years ago he had tried to give blood and had been all prepped and ready to go before they even go to the question about his sexual activities. He didn’t know it was a problem, so the awkward moment that ensued, while handled as gracefully as possible, was still hard. And I can only imagine if I had been there how humiliated and dirty I would have felt if it had been me, with everyone around knowing that I had failed the test and was being sent away sans-cookie.

This ban needs to go away. Plain and simple. There is no reason for such a thing to exist. I’d be happy to give me pint.