About my New Novel, ALLE IDOTER DUMMER SIG
Frankly, I doubt that anyone will be able to translate this one, for that it seems too specific to time and space; therefore, here's a short run-down of the book and why I wrote it
What does AIDS stand for? All IDIOTS DO STUPID. It's a joke I remember from the schoolyard back in the Eighties. The message was simple then: use a condom or die—especially if you’re gay. But what’s happened since then? After the virus became treatable, and in Danish, we started writing hiv and aids in lowercase. That's what I've tried to explore in my fifth novel with the Danish title ALLE IDIOTER DUMMER SIG.
2009: I make out with a guy at Chantal's House of Shame. As we bike home to mine, he asks me if it's true that I'm HIV positive. He's also from Denmark, and apparently someone up there has told him about me. I'm high so I don't think too much about it—just say yes. He says he thinks it's super hot! When we get home he bends me over my desk and says he wants to fuck me bareback. I don't get it, but I tell myself that as long as he's topping me, at least the risk is small.
The book is set in Copenhagen. A freshly graduated student is cruising across the Common with a brand-new neck tattoo. An escort bolts from the SAS hotel with 500 euros and a stolen gram of coke. Two boys wait in homemade crop tops, hoping for the bouncer to let them into Den Anden Side. One city, three decades, three lives that intersect. All IDIOTER DUMMER SIG is a novel about boundaries being crossed, traumas passed down, and one of life’s big questions: to fuck or not to fuck.
2010: My then-boyfriend and I are in the basement of Ficken3000 together. He wants to fuck me, but we don't have a condom. He tells me he just read somewhere that as long as you take your pills regularly, it means you can't transmit the virus. I haven't heard this before, and either way, my whole body tells me that that it would be wrong to let him fuck me without a condom.
As a child of the ’80s, I knew sex could kill me before he even knew what sex was. In that light, it’s not so weird that HIV and AIDS keep turning up in my writing. Most recently, I shared my experience with testing positive in Romeo & Seahorse. But there’s still a need for a bigger story. Everyone knows the one about death soaring through the gay community in the 1980s. But the sequel—what came after—is still largely untold. It exists only within the community, spread by word of mouth, and with no shared point of reference.
2011: I'm in Zagreb to do a performance at a Pride party. I make out with a boy. He's much younger than me, but he has come onto me quite aggressively, so I assume he knows what he's doing. We're both drunk and end up in his room in his grandmother's flat. He lies down and his stomach and spreads his legs for me. I'm used to from Berlin that if someone wants to use a condom, it's their own responsibility to say so, and I'm close to just sticking it in. But then he looks back and asks “you're not sick, are you?” And though my health is fine and I know it would be perfectly safe, I don't know how much he knows. So I say it's probably better we use a condom—just in case.
The story follows three generations of young gay men. From 1993, when the virus was still deadly but also just part of life; through 2008, when it became clear that effective treatment also prevented transmission, but there was still lots of stigma around; and up to today, where PrEP is an effective way to protect yourself against infection. The timelines intersect throughout the book to show how—despite progress—trauma is still passed down between generations.
2012: A friend asks on Facebook if I want to cuddle. I go to his place, and for the first few hours, we really just cuddle and talk. It's wonderful, I really enjoy being close with this guy. Though of course we also end up fucking. Suddenly, he pulls out and tells me he just felt the condom break inside me. He asks me about my status, and I tell him I'm positive and undetectable. He keeps apologising because even though he knows that rationally this is as safe as it can get, his body is in total panic mode.
Even though safer sex is no longer a life-or-death issue, many have suffered from confusion and lack of information. I was shocked in my research to learn how many young gay men—even in their early twenties—had left school believing that sex would kill them if they did it wrong. Statistically, gay men are still at least twice as likely as straight men to suffer from addiction, self-harm, or sexual violence. And the Danish TV documentary Sex Without Consent (2022) also showed that in cases of violations within the gay community, many perpetrators had themselves previously been in situations where they felt like the victim.
2016: I'm at Herrensauna in Bertrams, making out with a guy from Helsinki. His immaculate skinhead look makes me take him for someone experienced. But on our way back to mine, he tells me he's only twenty, and this is his first time in Berlin. He already started sucking my dick before he asks about STI's. I tell him I'm positive and undetectable. He has no idea what this means, just looks terrified and asks, WFT, if I'm trying to kill him. I explain it to him, and he does end up apologising for his ignorance. I tell him it's not his fault, but still he says he better go.
The novel explores this link—between
sexual violations within the gay scene and the fact that in 1993,
young men were still contracting a deadly virus they knew perfectly
well how to avoid. Both come down to self-care and
boundary-setting—something that can be painfully difficult in the
sexual encounter, whether it's tenderness or affirmation we're after.
In this way, the story of HIV and AIDS—from the 1980s and up until
now—is not just an important piece of contemporary history; it’s
also directly connected to pressing questions about consent and
violations
2022: I'm having sex with a friend, our first time
together. We are usually very physical with each other, and there's
been sexual tension for a while. Still, it's a little awkward. We
don't talk while we do it, yet still we both end up with big
satisfied grins on our faces. A few days later, he texts me. He just
read a story I wrote, loosely inspired by my meeting with the
Finnish skinhead. He has a feeling it's based on my own experience and
just wants to know if it's true—that I'm positive? It's not that he
thinks I did something wrong per se, but somehow he still feels weird
about it. I tell him that I totally understand.
ALLE IDIOTER DUMMER SIG is also a book about space and
time. About the bodies, the city, and the language we're trapped in.
It's easier for me to tell you why I'm writing than what I may
accomplish through it. But according to my editor, the novel captures
how language has shifted and evolved over three decades. Through
markers of time: slang, hangouts, and music iconic to each era—Sonic
Youth, Britney Spears, Charli XCX. And it shows how language over
time can help process a generational trauma like HIV.
2024: I'm in bed with a friend. We haven't fucked yet, but we keep teasing it. He stops and asks about STIs. He's not from Berlin, and he's trans—not part of a scene where I'm used to expecting HIV awareness to always be up to date—so I'm prepared that we'll have to stop when I tell him. That he'll need time to do his own research. But when he asks me if I'm on PrEP, and I tell him I'm positive and undetectable, he just smiles and says, “even better”, and I can't tell you how much this fucking warms me.
.JPG)
