HIV advocate and Rainbow Pride Foundation board secretary Christopher Lutukivuya has urged journalists to handle personal stories of people living with HIV/AIDS with care and accuracy, warning that even well-intentioned coverage can be weaponised and further marginalise vulnerable communities. Speaking about his own experience, Lutukivuya said media misrepresentation after he publicly came out in 2013 turned an attempt to help others into a source of intense public scrutiny and personal harm.
“What began as an effort to support others quickly turned into a source of public scrutiny,” Lutukivuya said, recalling how headlines and social media reactions often misrepresented his intentions. He described how one individual “made me the villain of coming out publicly as a gay person living with HIV,” and said friends drifted away as a result of distorted coverage. “We may have done the honest thing by telling our story… but the words that came out of the mouth that wanted to help was weaponised in a way that further marginalised the key affected population,” he said.
Lutukivuya said the experience left lasting psychological effects and changed how he engaged with public advocacy. For 11 years he limited public appearances, choosing instead to continue advocacy work within safe spaces. “One of the things I’ve noticed is most of the time we come publicly like this, and at the end of the day we are being psychologically affected by the responses that come towards us,” he said, underscoring the personal toll of exposure and backlash.
His comments are framed as an appeal to journalists to balance storytelling with responsibility. “When you’re doing your reporting, make sure that it’s realistic, that you do no harm to the community in which you are reporting. Accuracy of information matters,” Lutukivuya said, urging reporters to consider how narratives can be interpreted and the potential consequences for those they profile. He warned that attention and the search for fame can overshadow the original purpose of sharing lived experience: to inform, support and empower others.
The call for ethical reporting comes against a broader regional backdrop in which both press freedom and journalist safety have been high-profile issues. Media organisations and advocates across the Pacific have recently highlighted challenges ranging from political pressure on newsrooms to physical attacks on reporters. Lutukivuya’s plea, however, focuses on how stories about marginalised individuals should be covered even when journalists are free to report — advocating for sensitivity, verification and an awareness of downstream harms.
Lutukivuya said his aim is to strike a balance between truth-telling and protecting vulnerable communities. “Most of the time we look for fame, especially those who are putting out their stories on the media, leaving aside what really matters,” he observed, calling on media personnel to prioritise accuracy and the wellbeing of those whose lives they tell. His testimony offers a cautionary example of how coverage can both elevate and endanger advocates, and urges the media to adopt ethical storytelling practices when reporting on HIV and other sensitive personal journeys.
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