HIV Divides Lesbians In South Africa{large image warning}

http://www.buzzfeed.com/lesterfeder/hiv-divides-lesbians-in-south-africa-9a7s



Shortly after dawn on April 13, dozens of women gathered on a sandy street between shacks of raw wood and corrugated metal in the Khayelitsha township outside Cape Town, South Africa. Many wore the t-shirts of Free Gender, a local black lesbian rights organization. They were there to bury one of the group’s members, Nomawabo Mahlungulu, who was known to her friends as Wawa. She died of AIDS on March 30.

Just after 7:00 a.m., the undertaker brought Mahlungulu’s body from where a family member had watched it through the night, in keeping with Xhosa tradition. A group of men carried the simple wooden casket down the narrow lane to her family’s house, which had metal walls painted a pale pink. An unframed 8-by-10 snapshot of Mahlungulu hung opposite her casket. Mourners crowded into the windowless room, which seemed to grow darker as the hot sun climbed in the sky. Many others spilled into the alleyway, dancing during the songs that punctuated the speeches and sermons in Xhosa.

The speeches contained a good deal of recrimination, and not just for the members of Mahlungulu’s family who had shunned her. The deep stigma against HIV in South Africa has a particular bite among lesbians, and many who knew her believe this cost her the support network needed to help her fight the virus.

Mahlungulu had been HIV-positive for ten years and had been active with the national HIV-rights organization, the Treatment Action Campaign. Yet she had mystifyingly stopped keeping up with her medical treatment.