Less pink...more think

Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

Martin Luther King

 

A couple of things have happened to provoke some thought that I felt I should put down. Firstly its Pink October and as we reach the end of this somewhat controversial breast cancer awareness month it has got me thinking. A friend of mine sent me an excellent link (and well worth a read) which is a blog by a woman who like me and my friend is terminally ill with metastatic breast cancer. Her blog is called "But doctor I hate pink". It is an honest look at the realities of breast cancer and it challenges the notion of breast cancer being the "curable" one. I have mentioned before that I am uncomfortable with general public perceptions of breast cancer and I feel strongly about the way in which the media, to my mind, trivialises it. Through various campaigns we have been drip fed the notion that catch it early enough and it's all ok. REALLY! I caught mine early and I am definitely not ok. This cancer will kill me.

 I was further forced to think about all of this when at chemo clinic this week I met a woman who has recently been diagnosed with bone mets and is undergoing treatment. She was diagnosed 17 years ago with breast cancer and had a double mastectomy. In the intervening years as she put it she "fell under the radar". Her cancer is advanced and she is troubled by the fact that she didn't look into her health problems sooner. As a woman with no breasts she didn't attend for yearly mammograms and so the spread of her cancer went undetected until now. She seemed to blame herself. I too blame myself that I didn't demand to be seen sooner when I was experiencing problems due to recurrence after treatment. I wonder if I would be cancer free today had I known the right questions to ask. Had I demanded a mastectomy in the first instance would I have a different outcome. Who knows, maybe, probably, who knows. What I do know is that women die of breast cancer and I will be one of them. Another thing that I think I know is that Pink October has a tendency to brush such realities under the carpet.

To my mind the very pinkness of breast cancer awareness is in itself a from of trivialising it. I remember buying my first red( I much prefer red it connotes danger doesn't it) ribbon for AIDS awareness. It didn't feel like I was adorning a playful little cute ribbon. It felt like a real, grown up statement. Now this of course was a very big political issue due to the stigma attached to it and I have always felt that it was very worthwhile to raise awareness of it. More than 20 years later things have changed. The breakthroughs in medical advancements are incredible and the shift in public perceptions pretty amazing ( not everywhere I am well aware). So why is pink October so different? Many people have commented on the hijacking of the campaign. The glamorising of it even. Does it make people feel good whilst actually being able to indulge in consumerism. Probably. Without doing any research I am just thinking of what Pink October said to me over the years. I cant honestly think of much. That's how seriously it gets the message across about the reality of this disease. When I think about it my mind conjures up images of parties and rose wine and high heeled shoes. Good god, how frightening. My point in all of this is that if this is the medium for the message then as in the words of Marshall McLuhan does the medium become the message? If so then is it any wonder that we don't take our diagnosis quite as seriously as we might?

I mentioned that October 13th was Secondary Breast Cancer awareness day (note DAY). It came and it went and for those of us not living with this condition it passed with very little awareness. Some argue that we are the ones who the public would rather not know about. We will not survive. We are not the happy ending. I am inclined to agree. we don't present as a positive outcome so therefore don't fall into the fluffy feel good category. Having Pink parties would perhaps seem a little crass in the face of us who are dying. I could write forever about this stuff, BUT my point really is this Whatever it is that desensitises us to the realities of breast cancer we have to address it for what it is. We have to recognise the dangers and take our heads out of the pink clouds.