Conscious Corner Episode 4 – Vanity Reflects on her time at the Women’s March D.C. and the Annual AIDS United Conference

In this episode, host Vanity talks about two social justice demonstrations that she took part in. The first was the Women’s March in the nation’s capital in January of 2019. Vanity attended the first Women’s March in 2017 in Philadelphia, PA and was enamored with the amount of civic engagement she saw illustrated by the over 200,000 people in attendance as a result to the newly elected President Trump. In 2018, Vanity spoke at the Women’s March South Carolina and felt compelled to take up space at the march in 2019. Vanity speaks about encounters with a group of “Pro-Life Feminists” and relates that experience to the recent policy changes regarding women’s rights and access to abortions across many states of the U.S. The second demonstration was the AIDS United annual AIDSWatch conference, sponsored by the Elizabeth Taylor Foundation. Vanity first became interested in HIV/ AIDS policy after attending the 2017 Creating Change conference in Philadelphia, PA, sponsored by the National LGBTQ Taskforce. After attending a seminar on Disease Criminalization as it pertains to a communicable disease like HIV/ AIDS, she decided to research deeper into the effects of stigmatization of HIV on public policy. In the Spring of 2018 at the Office of Sustainability, she hosted a Social Justice Coffee Hour on Public Policy and Criminalization of HIV. After receiving a Student Leadership Award Research Travel Grant she headed to the AIDSWatch conference to soak up as much information as she could. Check out the article of her as one of the recipients of the Race and Social Justice Initiative Grant and learn about the intent of her research. Also, check out the episode for more details on her experiences at the conference.