Colleges should ban blood drives from campuses because such drives violate our non-discrimination statements and needlessly limit the blood supply in a time of great need. Period.
What's wrong? Stop reading and go start the ban! Why are you hesitating? Would it make it easier if the blood drive was held in a Chick-fil-A? Probably so, huh?
Last week, I received a deluge of e-mails calling for colleges and universities to sever their ties to Chick-fil-A on the basis of the food chain's donations to anti-gay groups and recent proclamation that they are indeed against gay marriage.
Christine Quinn, New York City Council Speaker, wrote a letter to NYU President John Sexton urging him to remove the vendor from campus. The argument? That Chick-fil-A "denigrates a portion of our population."
Campus Pride, a non-profit organization for LGBT and ally college students, sent out multiple mailers encouraging colleges and universities to take action against Chick-fil-A including ending food service contracts that include the chain and pulling out of conferences, events and sports games in which Chick-fil-A is a sponsor. The argument? That "no college or university wants to be associated with hate."
Where, then, is the same passionate level of discourse around blood drives?
The FDA, under the leadership of the CDC, comes onto our campuses and rejects our gay students directly -- far more directly than Chick-fil-A, I might add -- by telling them that their blood is not valuable, that it can't save lives. That this practice is discriminatory is not up for debate. That this practice violates our non-discrimination statements is undeniable. These students are then turned away with a sticker saying, "Well, I tried to donate blood...", feeling dejected, marginalized, and, yes, denigrated. All because of an arcane policy that in no way reflects current medical practice and is, yes, very much connected with hate.
And yet, the call to arms on this actual life-saving practice pales in comparison to the uproar over the place of anti-gay waffle fries on our campuses. The leadership on this issue is simply not there. And that should be no surprise.
Arguing for a ban on blood drives just plain sucks. It is an unenviable stance that earns you scorn, ridicule, and a healthy dose of "what is wrong with you?!?" looks. But lets keep in mind the twin goals of both creating inspired action that would actually result in astronomically more blood donors as well as the preservation of our non-discrimination statements. Trying to assert those goals, however, is like telling people you're against puppies. Cute, hypoallergenic ones. That only want to snuggle.
So, instead, our leaders argue for the FDA to reconsider their ban. Recently, the state legislature here in Vermont passed a non-binding resolution "urging" the FDA to "reassess" their ban. This non-binding urging, a legislative expression of sentiment, was hailed as "trailblazing."
Trailblazing!
Trailblazing would be banning bloodmobiles from government-owned property. Trailblazing would be arguing against a compromise one-year deferral period that perpetuates a stigma that has been rebuffed scientifically and medically.
A few years back, San Jose State University suspended their blood drives on campus "guided by the clear mandates of our non-discrimination policy." Sarah Lawrence College sports a similar ban. But these schools are the outliers with few (if any?) peers standing beside them.
Some organizations offer strategies on addressing blood drives on campus, anything from writing letters to the FDA to making stickers. But nowhere is "Sponsor a dialogue on banning blood drives from campus" listed as a strategy. It should be.
Look, donating blood saves lives. Eating waffle fries doesn't. I get that. But we're in the business of sending clear messages to our students. It is the utmost in hypocrisy to shout at the top of our lungs about a discriminatory food vendor even as we invite bloodmobiles to our campus with open arms.
If you have ideas for inspired actions to create life-saving change to blood donation guidelines, I'm all ears... and veins.
I bet most people aren't even aware of this discrimination, so raising awareness is the first step but I think right now its out of context to assume its hypocritical.
For the record, the FDA sets the policies that blood banks adhere to.
There is real science here, and there is no consensus on the degree of increased risk from MSM blood. Until there is, and it indicates an acceptable degree of risk (whatever acceptable turns out to mean), the FDA is obligated to err on the side of safety for the American people. Whether you like that or not, or anyone likes it or not, that's what they're doing, and they're doing it with a fair amount of research to back them up.
Don't sensationalize an already difficult issue with accusations of discrimination.
Accusations of discrimination would not have merit if gay men were the only at risk group. Accusations of discrimination would not have merit if all of the other at risks group were subject to the same lifetime ban. Unfortunately, according to real science, neither of these is true. Not even close to true.
The goal is not to sensationalize. Nor is the goal to get the FDA to absolve anyone of guilt. The goal is to re-examine the entire blood donation process so get as many safe pints of blood as possible.
MSM men are not the only at risk restricted group, and yes, not all of the policies make sense (for example, hemophilia is not sexually transmittable, so there is no reason to ban people who have had sexual contact with hemophiliacs). I'm sure you recognize that some at risk groups are more at risk than others, and they are provided with a corresponding length of deferral.
You disagree with the degree of 'at risk' the MSM population is, that's fine, there should be a continuous reassessment of all deferrals. Please recognize that that doesn't translate to the FDA's decision being inherently wrong because you disagree with the numbers some studies have produced and choose to selectivity promote the studies with numbers you agree with.
Until there is a consensus it would be irresponsible, both professionally and ethically, for the FDA to change their deferral policies.
You made a big point regarding the "state legislature ... in Vermont [who] passed a non-binding resolution "urging" the FDA to "reassess" their ban". The state legislature was convinced by the studies they read, and want the FDA to reconsider their stance. That's all they did. The FDA concluded that the Vermont state legislatures should stick to legislating and stay out of science because the FDA feels they're wrong. The New York state legislature passed a similar resolution a few months ago, so your research abilities leave something to be desired. I'm particularly aware of it because back then I was a member of the University Senate for the City University of New York, and after several months of discussion on this topic we ultimately failed to pass a non-binding resolution to ban on campus blood drives in CUNY (a school of ~540,000). Individual campus governments have banned the use of school funds, others have issued non-binding resolutions to encourage blood drives to take place off-campus in regard to their respective campuses.
Please read the FDA Workshop on Behavior-Based Donor Deferrals in the NAT Era. There are numerous studies from around the world with similar conclusion over the past decade. They all boil down to there being three key points, a) Window-period; b) False-negative results; c) Quarantine release of an infected unit (operational error). The result of each of these *in practice* raises the likelihood of infected blood being transfused. The FDA, whose sole purpose is to ensure the safety of what we put in our bodies, does not consider the additional risk to people to become infected with HIV appropriate.
Inherently, I rebel against the LGBT and Ally community being a one-issue-dominated group and instead am hoping we can take some of the energy we're seeing around Chik-fil-A and replicate it to other (potentially life-saving!) causes. But I also have to remember that the news cycles are one-issue-dominated behemoths, so one step at a time may be the the only way to go!
I'd never protest the idea of donations, but I'll gladly protest the messages they're giving, and have:
http://www.popingay.com/post/24962554993/theres-a-long-history-of-bad-blood-between-myself
What is disturbing is anyone would call for a boycott from those who can donate for such a political statement. I am sorry. This is disturbing.
This is a call for colleges and universities to step up to figure out how to reconcile their non-discrimination statements with an activity that inherently discriminates. To me, this is far from a common sense application, particularly given the current blood shortage. The goal, as always, is to open up the process to as many people as possible, many of whom are knocking at the door of the blood mobile ready and willing to safely give viable blood.
In no way do I think the Chick-Fil-A issue or FDA blood donation policy issue are the same. And I also think it's fine for people to be outraged and take action toward the oppressive remarks stated by Cathy at Chick-Fil-A. Personally I think it's disheartening to so so much emotion toward the statements and private donations of a company and not see this same energy toward an actual institutional policy that directly impacts so many more people-- both LGBT people who are not able to donate and the number of people that could benefit from their donation.
It isn't funding 5 MILLION dollar assault against LGBT families which include a group who teach being gay must be CURED...(the rubbish discredited 50 years ago as being a lie, and HARMFUL. It NEVER changed a person's sexual orientation, at most it made self loathing gays celibate. Another group suggests gays should be EXPORTED like they would hunt us down, pen us up (does this sound F___ing familar? all it needs is one way railroad cars and pink triangles), then they would ship us out of the country we are CITIZENS. They also funded the KILL THE GAYS in Uganda.