Yes, I definitely see your point about the media grabbing onto disparaging sensationalism (& maybe accidentally getting some good information out in the process). And I see all the good points above about media erasure of ACT UP and other direct action.
But, oh dear, a good (gay) friend of mine (not that young, even, 31) just asked me to "remind" him, "what was ACT UP again?" He asked me if it was a 12-step group. --Compare that to this direct quote from Larry Kramer in his ACT UP oral history interview: "I have no doubt in my mind, those [HIV, AIDS] drugs are out there because of ACT UP."
Isn't there a danger in the very people whose community benefits from those drugs not knowing where they came from? Is it purposeful ignorance based on some sort of despair (wanting to pretend we aren't really outsiders after all; we're mainstream now, the government will take care of us)? And maybe it's also just fear (what 22 year old wants to think about real mortality issues)? --We all know who Rosa Parks was, so why are people closing their brains to the equivalent in the struggle about AIDS? Isn't the price for that ignorance pretty high?
Have we really reached an era when queer folks feel fine relying on mainstream media for information about our origins, community, safety and all of it? I never even considered that an option! --Is this lack of awareness of the origins of something so crucial to gay/other queer/many peoples lives, really all the fault of the media?
I was young for an ACT UPer and I'm on the "not young" end of club life, so maybe this is just my first experience with that cliche feeling: "Kids these days! They take so much for granted! They have no idea the sacrifices we made so they could have their fun!" --It's just that obliviousness in the new generation (even, apparently, people less than a decade younger than a lot of ACT UP) doesn't seem to me to be a "funny little phenomenon" that we can afford in this case.