Journelism

Jon Vincent, Influenced by Friends’ Deaths from AIDS, Raises Awareness with Websites, Clinical Practice and Developmental Programs

After witnessing the deaths of numerous friends, professors and mentors in Chicago, Jon began volunteering to help raise awareness about HIV and AIDS. In 1996, he moved to the Boston area, where he worked his way up in the field to become Manager of Prevention and Education at the Fenway Institute.

Jon doesn’t come off as a gay guy. With a short but stocky frame, he speaks quietly without the accent that becomes noticeable on many extroverted gay men. But it may be that Jon’s quiet demeanor is caused by the torment he suffered watching close friends, professors and mentors die of AIDS.

After he came out while attending the Art Institute of Chicago to get his bachelor’s degree, his friends and family accepted it fairly well. “I don’t think I was fooling anyone,” he laughs. But the situation soon turned deadly serious.

In the late 1990s, the community of gay artists, scholars and students that Jon was involved with quickly began to diminish. “The artists’ community I functioned within was seriously decimated by HIV,” he recalls quietly. “I was an 18-, 19-year-old gay guy at the time, trying to figure out how to meet people, how am I supposed to hook up and have sex with people, how am I going to make connections with people, where do I fit into the world? So I started to meet these guys, a lot of them older, professors, graduate students, artists that I looked up to. I would get to know these people and they’d die.”

Intensely concerned with the situation, Jon decided to pursue a career educating the population about HIV and AIDS prevention. After a quick stint in the film business and as a bartender, he began volunteering in Chicago to raise awareness. In 1996, he moved back home to the Boston area and landed a part-time job as a volunteer coordinator with the AIDS Action Committee in Boston. Even though he has had a long run in the public health industry, Jon meant to achieve his career differently.

Always wanting to get into this field of work, Jon had planned an ambitious academic road that included getting a degree in public health and obtaining a job at an organization such as STOP AIDS. But as these things often happen, his road was quite different. “I got a part-time volunteer job at this place and became emotionally connected to the work, met a boyfriend and it was harder to leave. I had planned to take a more academic route but am not particularly discreet that I came into this work through grassroots as opposed to academic channels.”

In fact, having those grassroots and direct connections within the field proves an asset in Jon’s primarily doctor-populated workplace. “I try to keep it honest and directly connected to the people we’re serving as opposed to things that are more theoretical.”

Managing two websites designed to educate the gay population about HIV and other major sexually transmitted diseases in the Massachusetts area definitely comes with challenges. Jon labors to make sure the information “sent out into the ether” is neither factually wrong nor misleading in any way. But that’s the least of his worries.

Working one day a week with clients as a counselor, Jon finds challenges in dealing with people in the LGBT community who are going through exceptionally rough times in their lives. He also keeps himself directly connected to the people he serves through the installment of a new program called Health Navigators, where he assigns a high-risk client—often someone dealing with substance abuse or transgender issues—to a stable professional at Fenway Health who has had personal experience in the field. “My connection might be because my friends died and I’m a gay guy; that makes you connected to HIV. Instead of calling upon people with heavy credentials, we call upon people who understand.”

On top of all his public-health work in staying rooted to the community, Jon also proposes grants and develops new programs. “It’s difficult,” he shares. “Our researchers do this stuff and it’s experimental. We take what we’ve learned from our researchers and other places, putting it into direct action and service work.”

Overall, Jon encourages everyone to stay rooted in and connected to their communities. “That’s where my ethical center comes from. You’ve got this group of people who are realizing this social and civil freedom, and all of a sudden this cosmic anvil from outer space falls on them, and just… they deserve so much more and it’s impossible for me not to think about that all the time.”