Jerry

This afternoon, before I watched today's episode, I told Katie that I was certain that I wouldn't have much to say about this one, because how can anyone be sarcastic about a story about AIDS and bigotry?

At the end of the hour, I had three pages full of notes in my Oprah notebook (or "Opebook," as Katie dubbed it). One full page more than the Judds got. I don't know what that means for this post, but I'd set aside a few minutes if I were you.

What you need to know first of all is that I had to pause this one at 2:17 into the episode, because I was almost convinced that I wouldn't be able to make it the rest of the way. The backstory is this: 23 years ago, a guy with AIDS jumped into a swimming pool in Williamson, West Virginia. He didn't have open, festering sores, and he wasn't carrying Super Soakers full of infected blood; it was hot outside, and he wanted to swim. But apparently everyone in town knew he had AIDS, and the panic was immediate. People jumped out and ran, and eventually the mayor ended up closing down the pool for "safety concerns," and this became a national story.

It was Oprah's second season, and she went to Williamson and held a town hall meeting. People reacted in this town hall meeting pretty much exactly the way you'd think people in small town West Virginia would react to a gay dude with AIDS in 1987; they brought all the Christian compassion they could muster, and they screamed it at this poor man, Mike Sisco ("person with AIDS," as Oprah's original show dubbed him in his on-screen title), just oozing all that Christian love and understanding we've all seen so prominently displayed at every rally to which Glenn Beck has ever attached his name.

How Mike Sisco sat in that room and took that sort of treatment from people is beyond me. Have you ever been in a room where every single person hates you, and the majority of them believe you should be quarantined? I'm not making that up; Oprah asked for a show of hands on that very question, and well more than half the audience shot their arms in the air like, I don't know, a gay guy with AIDS was trying to touch them.


There were some standouts in this raging mob, namely in the form of one Mr. Jerry Waters. I'm actually amazed that Mike Sisco lived as long as he did, since it appears to me from the video that he's lucky he didn't get beaten to death by Jerry after the town hall meeting ended. Jerry took offense to a doctor telling him that he was reacting this way because he was afraid; everyone knows real men aren't afraid of anything! And the way Jerry expressed his rage at the doctor was to yell that he wasn't afraid, he was just "repulsed by [Sisco's] disease and repulsed by [Sisco]."

Oh. That's better, Jerry.

Jerry wasn't alone in that sentiment, and Oprah was kind enough to let us see several other clips of people yelling about people with AIDS being quarantined, or expressing the belief that people with AIDS don't deserve the same rights as the rest of us. There was a lot of hate in that room, and it seems like the only person who stood up to defend Mike was one of his sisters, Tina, who wore a wig and went by the name "Liz," in the hopes of disguising herself enough that her children wouldn't suffer from this even more than they already had.

If you're thinking this is a sad, awful representation of American society, you're right. If you're thinking that it wasn't going on all over the place back then, and isn't still going on in quite a few places to this day, you're absolutely wrong. That's the problem; we can look back and try to see how far we've come in 23 years, but there is still enough hate out there to make me believe that, were it not for all the dated clothing, we might have been watching a live version of Oprah's show instead of one that was taped in 1987.

In the present day, Oprah started by interviewing Sisco's three sisters. The one who sat in the middle, whose name I didn't catch, I immediately pegged as gay. It took Oprah eight minutes to get to that revelation. You've been doing this for 24 seasons now, Oprah. Try to keep up.

I'm trying to make jokes because it's just plain devastating what this family had to go through back then. Sisco died on August, 4, 1994, and the family tried to bury him in the plot next to where his mother was buried. But the cemetery wouldn't allow Sisco to be buried there, so they had to exhume the mother and move her to another graveyard, where Sisco was allowed. We are talking about a newly defined level of insanity/cruelty there.

I had hopes for Jerry, that maybe 23 years later he'd come to his senses and realized what a cock he had been to this poor guy who did nothing but try to go swimming in a public pool. So when Oprah asked him if he was still repulsed by gays, I convinced myself that Jerry was going to be the stand-up guy I knew he had become in the intervening two decades.

[BIG SIGH] "As a heterosexual, the gay lifestyle is not something that I would certainly want to be a part of. Let's put it that way. But am I repulsed? No."

Jerry. Buddy. I was trying to help you out, and give you the benefit of the doubt. You blew it, dude.

Let me give Jerry (and everyone else) a little info right here: If you don't want to be a part of the "gay lifestyle," if you don't want to have anything to do with gay people, then don't. No one is forcing us on you. Just live your lives, let us live ours, and everything will be okay. Please don't act like gay people are all going around trying to figure out how to get Jerry fucking Waters to just join our team already. We don't like you, Jerry. We don't want you around. No one invited you to be "a part of" the "gay lifestyle." So get over yourself.

It only got worse from there for ol' Jerry. He wanted to make sure we all know that he has no problem with anyone, as long as they're not affecting him. Oh, so you voted in favor of gay marriage when given the chance, did you, Jerry?

Oprah brought on the doctor who had so royally offended Jerry on the original show, and Jerry seemed just as annoyed this time around. I can't help but point out here that the doctor is black, and I'm not big enough to assume that Jerry wasn't somehow affected by having a black man call him a coward. Maybe I'm being overly sensitive in ascribing racism to the man, but it's not like homophobia is all that different, so I don't think I'm making a huge leap.

Jerry showed some really big balls when he told everyone in the room that if the show were taped today, it would be "somewhat different," but "in context," he would probably say a lot of the same things he said back then. Just maybe with a little less passion this time.

Good thing, Jerry. Everyone prefers a stoic bigot.

This dude should have walked into that room, where the sisters of this man he berated mercilessly sat there waiting for him, and he should have dropped to his knees in front of them and begged for forgiveness. Nothing short of full-on fucking groveling would have been appropriate, and even then it might not have been enough. Instead, Oprah asked him he felt like he owed the family an apology, and Jerry let out another giant sigh and said, "I am sorry for their loss."

Oh, Jerry. Seriously. Fuck you.

Jerry continued that "apology" by questioning why Sisco would move from Dallas, where he might have had a more accepting "gay community," to Williamson, a small town in West Virginia. His sisters pointed out that Sisco was sick and likely dying, and he wanted to come back home to his family. The doctor spoke, and I actually yelled out, "preach it, doctor!" when the man said, "Why does the understanding have to be limited to the gay community?"

Huh, Jerry? Why?

Oprah continually let Jerry off the hook, right until the very end. Sure, she got her opinion in, I guess, but this guy probably walked away from the show thinking he was smelling like roses. Especially because of exchanges like this:

Oprah: Jerry, you kinda regret it.

Jerry: [smug as can be] Oh, sure. Who hasn't said something they regret in the last 23 years?

Oprah: [smiling] You said it on the Oprah show. 

Giggle, giggle, and we go to commercial break. Great. You're so rich and powerful and influential, Oprah, that this dude says something heinous on your show, goes on to live his life comfortably for the next 23 years, comes back to answer for his sins, gets to say his "apology," and all you can do is giggle with him?

Oprah talked to a few other people who were there that day, like Bob Webb, who actually did offer an apology to the family (while still making sure to point out that he doesn't approve of the "lifestyle"); Nina Blackburn, who apologized in that half-assed way where you say you're sorry "if" something you said hurt someone else; and Eugene Thorn, a gay, HIV-positive man who grew up in Williamson and was generally a waste of time as an interview.

But the show was about Jerry, without a doubt. And I would say that he could finally offer an apology to Sisco when they meet in the afterlife, but I'm pretty sure Jerry is going to a different place than where Sisco is (hopefully) currently residing.

Oprah ended the episode by looking at the camera and saying, "Mike Sisco, this one's for you."

Shut up, Oprah. I don't want to cry again.