The first letter is away

Yesterday the letter finally came in the email for David to check over in regards to his discrimination case. ACON said it was coming two days before so David ended up ringing them and was told the letter was being finalised and would be sent shortly.

David is one of these people of which the computer revolution has passed him by. He just has no interest in it. Says he can save a life though which is more important. Hasn't even got an email address FFS! WTF? I've had a bit of a shocked/horrified conversation with him about it, and that he really should join the 21st century, but he just doesn't care. So he's using my email address currently in all the dealings about the case. I don't mind, glad to help him out in fact given how fucked over he was. And no, it's not the "peterhiv" email. He doesn't have a smart phone either, but that I really like as neither do I; last thing I want to do is spend every bit of my spare time fucking around with a bloody phone.

Anyway so I'm sitting next to him in the lounge and check the email a bit later after he rang ACON about it, and there it was. Opened the file and handed him the computer (working through the WiFi) with his letter there on the screen to read. He looked a bit stunned that it could be viewed so easily without the PC being plugged into anything.

The letter was well written and thought out. He said it was all fine and I replied to the email "Fax away". ACON would have faxed it to his work yesterday afternoon.

Again, not going into detail, other than to relate a very general point mentioned in the letter. That being that HIV is still stigmatised in Australia and what had happened to David continued that stigma. And discrimination often follows stigmatisation. David was made to feel exactly that; like he was at fault, that he'd done something wrong. I explained to him that he hadn't, and in fact had done everything right. He even got a blood test a few days after it happened which came out with an undetectable viral load.

Fortunately in Australia there are very strong laws about this sort of thing, with some of the legislation directed specifically at HIV+ people.

I'd like to be a fly on the wall when they all have a staff meeting about this. Further to the staff aspect of it, David says they have to do the equal opportunity anti-discrimination thing every year, so they have absolutely no leg to stand on if they said they didn't know. I used to get that presentation at my old work too now and then. The laws are very strong.