breast cancer awareness month

[merchimerch]

Since October is almost over, and I haven't really said anything about breast cancer awareness month, I thought I'd post an article that I thought was really powerful on the subject of the pink ribbon campaign, and the saccharine quality of many of the mainstream ribbon campaigns. This article is from Harpers, by Barbara Ehrenreich, and is long, but really thought provoking.

I think she is right in her point that while all the pink items that encourage us to shop for a cure may raise awareness (which is good), they still haven't broken down a flawed medical system (and arguably society) which still has a very skewed manner of dealing with women and their gender specific diseases.

This is one of my favorite quotes from the article, which is her writing about her reaction to a gift bag that she received after treatments: "The infantilizing trope is perplexing. Centrainly men diagnosed with prostate cancer do not receive gifts of matchbox cars"

http://www.bcaction.org/PDF/Harpers.pdf

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

wow. That was quite an article. I hadn't thought about it that much... I had no idea that mammograms are not as effective as I'd been given to believe. And it's such a good point that the whole culture wipes away the dealing with mortality aspect of it... and truthfully, we're all going to die anyway. The question is how much horriffic treatments would extend your life and whether or not it's worth it.

Thanks for sharing!