The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has produced a music video that joyfully educates gay men about HIV prevention options. Amazingly, it’s foot-stomping fabulous.
The song, “Collect My Love,” was released by The Knocks and it features vocals by Alex Newell, the young gender-bending singer who rose to fame by stealing season three of the television series, Glee (his rendition of “Boogie Shoes” on that show is a one-way ticket to our happy place).
In the CDC music video is newly released, Newell performs the song in a crowded, gay-friendly dance club. The atmosphere is ebullient and cruisy, with gay men making connections left and right. That’s where HIV prevention comes in. We have a hard time believing this would get made under the angry, antigay Trump/Pence White House.
The CDC is exceedingly careful to provide scientifically accurate messages, but has certainly never delivered these messages in such an innovative and entertaining way. The video incorporates both PrEP and the fact people with HIV can become undetectable — two important and often misunderstood issues being heavily discussed among the gay community right this minute.
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
The men featured in the video are youthful and attractive, but blessedly, they look like young men you might actually meet in a club, not unattainable icons from the pages of Men’s Fitness. In fact, there’s a plus-sized bear seen tearing up the dance floor who walks away with the video during his few seconds on camera. In our mind’s eye, that jubilant, self-possessed man is not going home alone.
Sure, the world conjured in the CDC video may not reflect all interactions among gay men as we know them to be. Stigma and judgment still exist and are practiced nightly in clubs throughout the country. But we wholeheartedly support this alternative, aspirational world, where gay men live joyfully and play responsibly. That’s the world we want to live in.
The video will be shared on social media and through CDC’s community partners. But why wait? Check it out, and share it with your networks. Discuss it. Start a conversation about the ways we can protect ourselves and our community.
And put on your boogie shoes.
fredo777
Great video. Informative, but also very cute in the presentation. And, Alex’s voice? G*dd*mn, he is an amazing vocalist.
Chris
well done. I wish information like this had been made available decades ago; but this is a good start.
Doug
Wow… this is awesome.
Alistair Wiseman
Hardly what the American Founders had intended for the U.S. taxpayer and our tax revenue.
Scribe38
@Alistair Wiseman: Public safety isn’t a governmental concern? The spread of a deadly disease that taxes public resources shouldn’t be addressed? Oh I forgot you belong to the party that won’t protect us from zika, while trying to demand women keep the babies after they catch it. Same party that fought against HPV vaccine…
As a nurse, I love and support this public education and outreach.
Alistair Wiseman
@Scribe38:
Public safety and education are one thing. Using taxpayer dollars on a preventable “deadly disease” that has been around 35 years in a “fabulous gay dance video” that promotes indiscriminate hook-ups so that gay men can fuck each other is not what our Framers had in mind for our tax dollars.
Brian
This is horrible. It’s a full-on stereotype bordering on homophobic. The CDC should be shamed.
As for HIV, take responsibility for your self-inflicted STD’s. Stop being sleazeballs for starters.
junk4sts
Thanks for this, Love the song and appreciate the message. I’m kind of surprised that anyone could really find fault with this, the message is clear, the delivery is engaging, the song is FANTASTIC, Alex Newell is great, and I can’t stop watching it! Love it.
Also thanks for the link to “Boogie Shoes” that performace is pure magic.
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ChrisK
@junk4sts: We have certain right wing trolls on this site that look for anything to complain about.