As HIV began to decimate the lives of Black gay men in the 1980s, Cornelius Mabin Jr. Founder and CEO of ARKANSAS RAPPS, began mobilizing members of Little Rock’s Black gay community to develop a survival plan in the living room of his small two-bedroom apartment. Without any financial assistance or official meeting space to respond to the existential threats of HIV and homophobia, Mabin and other Black gay men organized to save their own lives despite the neglect in government and media that fueled misinformation, fear, and AIDS hysteria of the early ’80s. Before then, Mabin says spaces in Little Rock were almost non-existent for Black gay men to share their hopes, desires, and traumas. But that would change.
Fast forward to 2014. The work that began in the late ’80s in a residential space is now a 501( c)3 community-based organization providing an array of HIV services and support inside an official building. One of their most popular programs, “Welcome to the Living Room,” is a nod to ARKANSAS RAPPS (an acronym for Reaching Affirming Positive Progressive Systems) early beginnings.
“I was asked by the [Arkansas] Department of Health to do an outreach program,” Mabin says. “They asked me what I was going to call it, and I said, well, I’m going to call it the Living Room. I realized that the living room was not just merely a space where we were meeting. We were finding spaces to live in as individuals, as people,” Mabin said. “We needed a place where we could breathe and really live. We all needed living rooms to live in.”
A weekly discussion group and HIV intervention model, “Welcome to the Living Room,” gives Black gay and bisexual men an opportunity to talk about cultivating healthy relationships along with the impact of homophobia on social determinants of health. Attendees can then utilize ARKANSAS RAPPS, the sole organization in the state led by people living with HIV, as an immediate resource toward harm reduction.
“My ultimate goal was to make sure that if we we’re going to be a part of the solution, then we were going to have an organization that was specifically and unapologetically led by Black men living with HIV, which is groundbreaking for Arkansas because there’s no other organization in this entire state that exists [like this one] except for us,” Mabin said.
And while the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated a 12% decline in new HIV acquisitions from 2017 to 2021, the highest rate of new HIV diagnoses continues to occur in the South, with MSM accounting for 71% of new HIV diagnoses in 2021.
“Despite having access to all the tools in our toolbox—PrEP, antiretrovirals—we continue to see new infections amongst that population,” Mabin conveys with a tinge of frustration.
As one of the only HIV/AIDS organizations in Arkansas focused specifically on serving the holistic needs of Black gay, bisexual, and queer men, Mabin tells GLAAD that ARKANSAS RAPPS is equipped to meet the sexual health needs of the community in ways that even he couldn’t have imagined at the genesis of the organization.
“We are now able to link people directly into care through our partner Avita Care Solutions as well as through other support [Q Care Plus and 340 B Program]. Now we can get you into care, help you get access to insurance if you need it, and depending on your economic situation, we can even pay the premium,” Mabin said.
“I couldn’t imagine I would be able to create a system that now directly says, if you need care or insurance, if you need assistance, we are here,” he said.
Mabin, who has been living with HIV for 30 years, tells GLAAD that National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, celebrated each year on February 7, is a time for reflection and for public health professionals to issue a call to action. This year’s theme is “Engage, Educate, Empower: Uniting to End HIV/AIDS in Black Communities.”
“We’re going to encourage [HIV] screening at our facility, which we do each and every day,” Mabin said. “It will also be a day to commemorate those we’ve lost, but also [an opportunity to] look to the future. The future is not bleak. We have access to care and want to be a beacon of care for those who need it.”
Mabin has committed himself to the “ministry” of this work for over four decades, and while the passion for saving lives remains, he’s clear that retirement is on the horizon. The need to prepare the next wave of HIV leaders in Arkansas is more urgent than ever.
“When I think about myself coming from that small living room to now where we have a 3,000 square foot building, and we have this ability to link into care and to pay premiums. Who would have ever thought that could happen? I’m hoping to identify someone who can step in and take what we’ve built and continue to build and go forward until there’s a cure.”