GLAAD not letting ABC and “The View” off the hook!

GLAAD will not be ignored!

Just days after it got NBC’s The Today Show to include gay couples in its dream wedding contest, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation has joined forces with the Black AIDS Institute, and the National Black Justice Coalition to ramp-up the pressure on  ABC and The View.

They want the network and the show to correct misinformation shared about African-American men and HIV infection during a conversation between host Sherri Shepherd and guest host D.L. Hughley. during the June 22 Hot Topic segment of the show and have taken out an ad in today’s Daily Variety to press their point.

GLAAD issued a call to action on June 24 urging viewers to contact the show and demand a retraction and the organization says that more than 3,000 people have participated so far.

Here are excerpts from a transcript of the offending segment:

Hughley: When you look at the prevalence of HIV in the African American Community, it’s primarily young women who are getting it from men who are on the down low.  That’s the thing.

Shepherd: The down low is black men who’ve been going out. They are having sex with men and they’re not telling their girlfriends or their wives that they’re gay and their husbands, as well. And it’s very prevalent with African American women because they come home and have sex with their wives or their girlfriends. And they’re not telling them that they’re gay.

Shepherd: It’s so big in the Black community with women because they’re having unprotected sex with men who have been having sex with… with men.

GLAAD states that the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has debunked the dangerous myth that Shepherd and Hughley cited on the program. Dr. Kevin Fenton, director of the Centers for Disease Control’s National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention talked about his research to NNPA News in October 2009.

Fenton said that the CDC “has looked to see what proportion of [HIV] infections is coming from male partners who are bisexual and found there are actually relatively few,” and goes on to attribute most infections to other factors.

So far, no response from ABC, The View, Sherri Shepherd or D.L. Hughley.

Stay tuned!!!