Privileging The PersonalMobilising marginalised identities and voices in the context of HIV health promotion with ‘hard to reach’ migrant and second generation Asian gay men in Metropolitan Sydney, Australia; a

resource development and community building initiative

Min Fuh TehCommunity Health Promotion Officer (Asian Gay Men’s

Project), ACON

“HIV is not a priority, work, study, life, settling in, finding love, these are!”

Nationally, Asian men make up the highest group in MSM/gay HIV notification after men of Anglo background, with an upward going trend sitting at 13.9% for 2009

Multicultural HIV and Hepatitis Service (MHAHS) 2010. Trends in NSW HIV notifications 1999-2010. (unpublished).

Country of Birth

Thailand

China, Hong Kong, Taiwan

Vietnam

Indonesia

Philippines

Malaysia

Singapore

(CDB, NSW Ministry of Health, 2011)

Myths & Assumptions

• Hard to reach• Apathy - Asian culture’s conservative…we

can’t talk about sex…why bother?• What is “Asian” anyway?

“Double Trouble”• ‘Minority within a minority’• Stuck between ethnic and sexual

worlds• Homophobia• Racism

Barriers preventing access to and uptake of HIV and health services

A need for culturally appropriate interventions addressing MSM of multicultural backgrounds

Reeders, D. W. (2010) Double Trouble? The Health Needs of Culturally Diverse MSM. Melbourne: Centre for Culture, Ethnicity & Health.

“Our work against the AIDS pandemic can only be won on the cultural level”

*Dr. George Ayala, Executive Officer of MSMGF, and Vallerie Wagner, of AIDS Project Los Angeles. “War Diaries,” Tisa Bryant & Ernest Hardy (ed.), AIDS Project Los Angeles (APLA) and the Global Forum on MSM and HIV (MSMGF), 2010.

Directory

A Cultural Vacuum

• Invisibility• A hunger to represent 70 volunteers: 9 different ethnicitiesPoets and artists, photographers, writers, community members/‘Models’

• From a resource creation community building/mobilising exercise

The Danger of A Single Story

Collateral Benefits

• With a $5000 City of Sydney community arts grant

We are able to work on issues as diverse as Homophobia, Racism, Invisibility, Role modeling, Health promotion messages, Identity work and art

Challenges