The ACLU Is Suing Tennessee Over HIV Disclosures

My apologies for being away for so long. My wife had an out-of-town family reunion this past weekend, and I have been playing catch-up ever since.

Apparently, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has found a new cause with which to vex any right-thinking person within the boundaries of the United States or on the face of the earth. The ACLU is suing the state of Tennessee over sex workers disclosing to partners whether or not they are infected with HIV. The Daily Caller notes that the ACLU posted an announcement on X on Tuesday, declaring its intention to sue:

BREAKING: We're suing Tennessee for their “aggravated prostitution” statute that targets people with HIV with harsh punishment and lifetime sex offender registration.

This law is unconstitutional and disproportionately affects Black and transgender women.

— ACLU (@ACLU) October 24, 2023

The law elevates engaging in sex work from a misdemeanor to a felony based on someone's HIV status – a protected disability.

— ACLU (@ACLU) October 24, 2023

The law that has the ACLU up in arms says that a person cannot knowingly transmit HIV to another person through “intimate contact” without that person essentially giving informed consent. The Caller also reported that another law on the Tennessee books prohibits someone who knows they have HIV from engaging in prostitution. So, in summation, it is against the law in Tennessee to put someone at risk of contracting HIV without warning them. And for some unfathomable reason, the ACLU finds this objectionable.

Back in the day when I was planning on becoming a priest, I briefly lived in San Francisco to study under a priest who was a family friend. At the parish, members of the church talked about how exhausted they were from attending so many funerals for victims of AIDS. I met people with AIDS while living in the city. No matter how uptight, white, and to-the-right one may be, no person of conscience would wish AIDS on a fellow image-bearer.

But in the name of progressivism, in the interest of breaking through boundaries, and in the name of black and trans people, the ACLU wants those laws scrapped. Chesterton’s fence and the dictates of public health and human decency be damned! There’s a patriarchy to be torn down here! Stand aside! We need progress, you know!

At the risk of being accused of man-splaining, straight-splaining, or, worse yet, straight, white man-splaining, may I make what I believe to be a salient point?

There have indeed been advances in medicine that allow people to live with HIV, and the disease may one day even be curable. Does that excuse giving HIV to another person? What sane person wants to be exposed to HIV? If the doctor tells you that the spot on your skin is probably nothing, but you should still have a biopsy, do you stop by the liquor store for a bottle of Prosecco to celebrate? To my knowledge, no one has ever died from a broken leg. But show of hands: who would like one? Anyone?

Aside from the recklessness displayed by the ACLU, the hypocrisy is galling. The very people who would advocate for the abolishment of these laws are the same ones who, during the pandemic, wanted everyone to be triple-vaxxed and would howl if anyone left their home in anything less than a Level A HazMat suit or one of those old deep-sea diving helmets. They are the same people who glared at you if your mask slipped a centimeter below your nose while you were thumping melons at your local supermarket and screamed bloody murder if you inadvertently intruded 1/8 of an inch into their social distancing zone. So, COVID-19 is bad, even deadly. HIV? Not so much.

One would think that the ACLU and the other acronym entities out there would be more concerned with the health and safety of black and trans women, rather than championing a cause that could well lead to more disease and more death, especially among black and trans sex workers. But as is so often the case with the left, the rhetoric and the chaos are more important than life itself. Anyone’s life.