Mykki Blanco is coming clean about a long-held secret. In a Facebook post on Friday, June 12, the rapper, poet, and performance artist revealed that he's been living with HIV for the past four years.
"I've been HIV positive since 2011, my entire career," he wrote on his official page. "F–k stigma and hiding in the dark, this is my real life."
He went on to explain his reason for confessing. "I'm healthy, I've toured the world 3 times but I've been living in the dark," he wrote. "It's time to actually be as punk as I say I am." In a follow-up comment on his own post, he added, "No more living a lie. HAPPY PRIDE."
Blanco's revelation was received well by fans, who voiced their support on Facebook. He responded to many of the comments personally, writing things like, "It's a law of physics u cannot be in the light and the dark at the same time."
To one fan, who called him "a hero and a warrior," he wrote, "Hiding, being afraid of stigma is exhausting, we are souls, not images." To another, he added, "It's just today for everyone else knowing, but it's been 5 years for me…I just can't be an image living in fear, having people call me brave and it being a lie. Thank you for your support."
Blanco (real name: Michael Quattlebaum Jr.) has been a vocal proponent for LGBTQ rights in the past. His most recent mixtape was 2014's Gay Dog Food.