mtvU, MTV's Peabody and Emmy Award-winning college network, and the Kaiser Family Foundation, in partnership with POZ Magazine, launched "Pos or Not," www.posornot.com, on April 30. It's an online game that challenges stereotypes and breaks down the barriers that may prevent people from talking openly about HIV/AIDS, getting tested and using protection, according to PR Newswire.
People from across the U.S. - half of whom are living with HIV and half who are not - share parts of their lives for "Pos or Not" by divulging their HIV status to help dispel myths and misconceptions about HIV and AIDS. By playing the game, mtvU hopes people will confront their own HIV stereotypes as they guess whether a profiled participant is positive or negative based only on a photo and a few personal details.
The participants who are positive explain the circumstances in which they learned of their HIV status - including after the birth of a child, calls from ex-lovers and long-postponed HIV tests. HIV negative participants share how the disease has touched their lives, claiming boyfriends, girlfriends, mothers and best friends.
A friend of mine who is featured in the game explained how media myths about AIDS led him to believe he wouldn't get HIV. "Prior to my diagnosis (in 1997), I believed the media's representation of AIDS being a disease of gay white men. Since I'm a gay black man, I did not view myself as being 'at risk,"' he writes.
"Pos or Not" will be presented at the fourth annual Games for Health Conference May 8 - 9 in Baltimore, Md.