Rev. Elder Claude E. Bowen doesn’t recall the month or the day he received his HIV diagnosis over the phone 32 years ago—but he does remember the lack of concern in his doctor’s voice, being told his life expectancy would only be two years, and then living the next two years with reckless abandonment. And now, to his amazement, at 77, he’s still here—along with his friends who survived.
“After two years, and I wasn’t dead, I started rethinking,” Bowen said. “What the hell am I going to do?”
That was 1992. Today, Bowen’s advice to the Black gay, queer, and same-gender loving men he encounters in the metro Atlanta area that are living with HIV is to plan for retirement. Many brothers, regardless of age, gravitate to The Silver Living Project, a program funded by a grant from the Gilead Sciences and powered by THRIVE SS, an Atlanta-based non-profit organization dedicated to providing support and services to Black gay and bisexual men living with HIV over 50.
A Los Angeles transplant, Bowen tells GLAAD he doesn’t remember engaging in discussions about aging with HIV because doing so wasn’t a viable option at the time of his diagnosis.
“I have friends that sold their life insurance and spent it because they did not think they would live to see retirement,” Bowen, a retired Vietnam veteran, said. “I even had a couple of friends that quit their jobs early, and drew their retirement down, and then realized, “Wow, I’ve got to go back to work.'”
The introduction of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) was a game-changer, reducing HIV-related mortality in 1995 by 40,000 in the U.S., three years after Bowen’s diagnosis. Suddenly, a virus that was once considered a death sentence was now becoming a chronic, manageable condition. But HIV stigma proved to be as harmful as the disease itself, increasing the need for Bowen and others living with HIV, like Jack White, 40, to lean into the support system provided by The Silver Lining Project.
Lights and Lanterns
“I stopped taking my medicine at one point,” White said. “I just got tired.”
An Atlanta native and human resources professional, White was diagnosed with HIV at 18 in 2003. He participates in Lights and Lanterns, an intergenerational mentorship program for men under 50 living with HIV with the men of The Silver Lining Project. White has developed a special connection with Bowen, whom he often turns to for mental health support and spiritual guidance.
“He is someone who I can be raw and authentic with about myself, my problems, the situations that I’ve dealt with and found myself in,” White said. “He’s never been judgmental and always acted from a space of love. That’s one thing I appreciate about him,” he said.
White tells GLAAD that HIV stigma and the fear of rejection kept him from sharing his diagnosis with his mother for over a decade.
“It took me 16 years to tell my mom,” he said. We didn’t have the best relationship at that time. I was driving to her house, and I was crying… just the weight was on me, and I told her. And she said, ‘Son, I’m proud of you.’ And every time I think about it, it breaks me down.”
“Even as older people, we can learn from younger people, and younger people can learn from us,” said Darryl “DC” Branch, 62, Program Coordinator of The Silver Lining Project.
In 2023, we noted an alarming generation gap with the release of GLAAD’s annual State of HIV Stigma Report. Gen Z, the youngest generation in population surveys, is the most diverse and most out LGBTQ generation in history. However, according to our study, Gen Z is also the least knowledgeable about HIV—increasing the urgency for intergenerational conversations.
White, who is now entering middle age as a person who has lived with HIV for 21 years, says he is less fearful about the future than he has ever been.
“A lot of that fear has been taken away by the progressiveness of medicines and how people view HIV,” White said.” I no longer have to come up with a story to tell somebody I’m interested [in them]. So that fear for me has decreased a lot.”
Loneliness is a point of contention for Black queer men of any age, but often intensifies for Black queer men over 50—then add HIV—you run the risk of disappointment and transactional encounters.
“People in our community are very quick to say that older men prey on young men, but they never want to talk about the young man that sees the older man as an ATM machine,” Bowen said. “And if we’re going to talk about it, let’s talk about both sides of that coin.”
If it were not for the ongoing HIV epidemic in the Black community, perhaps there would be more intergenerational friendships among Black queer men. Many queer elders who would be responsible for guiding the next generation did not survive the first wave of the HIV crisis, which makes the intergenerational relationships developed inside The Silver Lining Project even more special and rare.
In a previous interview, Atlanta resident Darriyhan Edmond, 29, who has been living with HIV for ten years, spoke about his friendship with two men, Thaddeus Works, 58, and Nathan Townsend, 70, from The Silver Lining Project.
“Friendship doesn’t have an age,” Edmond said. “Sometimes, it’s the only thing that we have in common. They showed me that no matter our ages, it didn’t matter in our friendship because it was based on love and respect and just being there for each other,” he said.
“There is a protective level of respect that he has for us. He won’t let other young people cross the line,” Nathan Townsend said. “The minute he feels they’ve disrespected me because of my age, he’s the first one to go to them and say he’s still our elder.”
“We tend to think that these young men aren’t as smart as we think they are. Sometimes they’re smarter,” Branch said. “You have to have a conversation with them and talk to them like they’re people, not talk at them.”
Bowen tells GLAAD that while he desires a partner, he is currently single and focused on self-sufficiency.
“I believe the most fatal thing that happens to us as we get older—when we lose our independence, we begin to see ourselves as useless. So being able to take care of myself now is more of a priority than being in a relationship,” Bowen said before pausing to swipe his left hand across his chin—allowing the weight of the moment to linger in the air.
“Learn to love yourself. Know that you’re here for a reason. You’re not an abomination. You’re not a mistake. And live,”Bowen said. “I think that’s one of the best things you can tell a person—to live. Live to the point that you love all of who you are, and you will thrive.”