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Sparkle (4)
I want to share with you part of a conversation I have quite regularly. It usually begins when someone says to me, "Did you hear, such-and-such has cancer. Isn't it terrible?" and I might say something like,"I heard. Did you know I had cancer?" "Oh really? When was that?" "In July 2003." "Oh my God. Are you all right now?" "Yes, thanks, I am." "Did you have treatment?" "Chemotherapy and radiotherapy." "Wow, and you have how many children?" "Four." "Oh, that's awful. I can't believe it." And then, the inevitable. "And which breast was it in? Did you have to have a mastectomy? Do you have a prosthesis?" "Well, no, actually, it wasn't breast cancer." Blank expression. "Oh.......really?" Because everyone knows; the only cancer women get is breast cancer, right?
Please do not misconstrue me. I bestow well-deserved kudos of heroic proportions to the millions of men and women who have campaigned and still campaign to increase awareness of breast cancer worldwide. God knows, it needs to happen. Breast cancer is an insidious, sometimes disfiguring, always frightening cancer that can rob families of their mothers, partners, wives and daughters. Breast cancer is a horrific disease that, thankfully, we are learning more and more about every day, due to the billions of dollars raised by communities all over this planet, and thanks to ever-improving early screening and detection programs. The lives of breast cancer patients are not just being saved but also salvaged, thanks to greater understanding of the psycho-social effects of breast cancer on women, their carers and their communities, lives, livelihoods and relationships.
Having said that, I will return to the point, because everything I have just mentioned isn't actually my point. Increasing public awareness of breast cancer, it could be said, has been a resounding triumph overall. It could also be said that breast cancer and all the various products and services related to it now have such a high media profile that breast cancer has become almost commodified in itself. Associating your event or brand with breast cancer in some way is likely to increase your profits and positive consumer sentiment toward your product like few other actions could. Unlike a lot of very disgruntled prostate cancer advocates, I stop short of calling breast cancer the 'sexy cancer', but you have to admit it has all the hallmarks. When I worked in advertising, I learned that either fear or sex will sell just about anything. Somehow combine the two and you have an advertisers dream. The female breast holds a veritable hemisphere of marketing power in our society. However, unlike ads which are aimed at increasing awareness of the link between lung cancer and smoking, we never see a single image of an actual diseased breast. We save boobies for the beer ads. It's all about brand association, and the brand for breast cancer is the colour pink.
Long associated with all things pertaining to youthful, sweet, feminine innocence, pink has been universally substituted for any actual physical images pertaining to the disease of breast cancer. Pink ribbons, pink t-shirts, pink logos and cricket stumps and bandannas. Now, as I see it, two obvious problems associated with identifying everything to do with breast cancer with the colour pink are: 1) Not all women who get breast cancer can identify with the colour pink and what it represents - submissive, baby-like femininity. And 2) Not all people who get breast cancer are actually female. Some of them, more than you probably think, are men.
Here's another conversation I'd like to relay to you. My friend Gary has something resembling the following interchange every other day of his life. "Did you hear? Frank just got told he has cancer.""I heard. Did you know, I had cancer?" "No way, really?" "Yes, actually, I've just finished treatment." "That's terrible, mate, I'm sorry to hear that. What kind of cancer was it? Prostate? Bowel?" "Actually, I had breast cancer." Incredulous stare, awkward silence. Do men really get breast cancer? As a man, where do you go with a conversation after that? Because men most certainly do get breast cancer. And Gary has really nowhere to go with it, in just about every sense. Nowhere in conversation, nowhere in the community, and certainly nowhere for the most part in terms of supportive care and services for his type of cancer.
Many hospitals in this country (Australia) now have, thanks to the militant fundraising efforts of outfits like the McGrath Foundation, breast
