Let me tell you what it’s like campaigning for Cervical Cancer. First, I explain that the cervix is separate from the uterus, the urethra and the vagina. Then, I discuss HPV, while people silently judge me. Revelations about my sexual history cross the minds of my audience before they hear how conservative I truly am. Finally, I share that 100% of us, at sometime have had a strain of HPV in our bodies. 80% of us have a recurring strain. I blow minds with statistics, I break hearts with the stories of those that have left this earth and finally, I beg for people, to see BEYOND THE PINK.
Pink Fatigue. It hit me in the beginning of 2006, when I had my own battle with cervical cancer while carrying the breast cancer gene. I wasn’t able to be a part of a club of pink ribbons, march in stride with other women or even buy a waterbottle with an inspiring logo. I was, alone. Then, it was everywhere. Everywhere I looked, pink assaulted my eyes as to remind me, that my breasts were more important than my cervix. I looked into Komen, I saw the hypocrisy of misused funding and decided that although I would actively speak out about cancer, I didn’t need to tolerate PINK. I didn’t need to tolerate using a color to represent women that were all together, NOT PINK, but stronger. I didn’t see the need to girly-up a serious cancer.
And that’s what we do- we TOLERATE pink. We spend more for the golf balls with the pink ribbon, because 10% goes to breast cancer research. We send yogurt lids in the mail to support breast cancer research when the stamp costs more than the Yoplait will ever donate to research, anyhow. (Lids for A Cure only donate .10 cents per lid.) We smile politely when someone mentions how PINK has empowered them. We cheer on those at Race For The Cure and wonder, “Where IS the cure?” We don’t really think beyond the bastardized representation of breast cancer anymore…. PINK, do we?
I just can’t function in a world of pink, anymore. We have misused and SOLD OUT to a hope that PINK will save us when really, all we need to do to save ourselves is to ask the tougher question of, “Where is all that money going?” It’s the same for any large non-profit. We look at the administrative costs and the fact that while MILLIONS, (sometimes billions are coming in the door,) people are still dying of diseases because they cannot afford the care. This to me, is disgusting and represents Non-Profit-Elitism. Then I heard about the Susan G. Komen foundation USING funding to sue other cancer organizations. Over $1Million dollars in funding while low-income women STILL cannot receive adequate care because mammograms are still unaffordable. So, please… forgive me because PINK turns my stomach in a way that no amount of cheer or empowerment can fix it.
“We were certainly taken aback by it,” she told HuffPost. “We have partners running these kite events around the country. What if one of them uses, say, magenta? Is that pink? I mean, where are we going with this? We just want to raise money for cancer. What we don’t want is to have our energy misplaced by having our charity partners trying to police the good work that we’re doing.” (Huffington Post Article)
Let me tell you what it’s like to try and save women from other, “non-pink,” cancers while Queen Komen reigns over all: It sucks. No one has any funding left, or brainspace to comprehend an organization that actually discusses other cancers. Our brains are so focused on ‘Saving The TaTas,” or “Racing For The Cure,” that other women suffer and are branded not as important, because breasts reign supreme in these parts. The cervix, is an afterthought and ironically, the cervix, (when healthy,) is actually a bright and cheery pink. If I had a cervix left, it would be revolting. My cervix lays in a rejected body part medical wasteland somewhere, unattached from me and alone.
Cancer is cancer. The cells grow alike, whether in the breast or in the cervix. Cancer is spread because of our environment, diet, stress level and genes. Cancer, doesn’t discriminate between the rich or poor, sick or well. But some, organizations DO. Some organizations however, would humble Komen with strength and authenticity in a time when PINK overwhelms.
I spoke at a gala this weekend for the SAS Foundation, a non-profit organization based out of Appleton, Wisconsin. During a glass of wine, I spoke with an attendee and she mentioned, “It’s sad that while anyone can point out the breasts, no one knows anything about the cervix.” I agreed and we watched the slideshow on the television about a woman who lost her life, years prior. The heartbreaking story of how SAS was founded begins with a tale of a women who never missed a Pap Smear and for 3 years was misdiagnsed. The ending hasn’t happened as 3 of her most passionate friends took up her battle and started to educate and empower women around them. Two men and a woman lead this incredible organization with such heart and perseverance. This tale is the same as mine, except while the beautiful must of the founders, lays in the ground, I walk above. Comprehending how close I could be to that fate has me angry that in a day and age while one organization raises billions, others struggle to pay for the necessities necessary to save actual women’s lives.
I tweeted tonight at the incredible campaign opportunity unfolding that I’ve been given for Cervical Cancer and gynecological cancers. Someone responded that my ‘anti-pink’ sentiments were tearing her down. I sat for a while and reflected that this debate was the same of abortion or anyother debate. Can we love and support women’s bodies and their choice to choose abortion while being ‘good’ and ‘moral’ people? (I think we can.) Can a formula feeding mother understand the benefits of breastfeeding, yet still choose to do formula and be a good mother? (I think she can.) Can I be so against what has happened to pink and breast cancer but still be PRO-breast health? (I think I can.) Somehow, in the anger and frustration of debates, these points are almost always lost.
I sent the person that responded this:
“Pink doesn’t just represent breast cancer. Survivors do. Pink represents a money-making machine based off breast cancer. I can be pro-women, but anti-pink. I can be PRO you, but anti-the ridiculousness of selling everything from KFC chicken to waterbottles and giving a meaningless percentage to cancer research. Please don’t twist my tweets to think, “I hate your breasts.” I hate what breast cancer has become. It’s been bastardized. Mistreated. Spit on. Women die for pink, so the execs at Komen can get richer. While MORE women die without reason. You’re more than Pink, though- that’s the problem. Our breasts are not pink. They trivialize other cancers, to make breast cancer rule. I’m sick of pink.”
I don’t know what possessed me, but tonight I stood in front of the mirror, staring at my breasts. None of my body parts are more important than the other, yet there my breasts stood as a ticking time bomb, and what remains, (a small sliver,) of my cervix, hides inside. One body part almost killed me. Another holds a gene that will kill me. My body, is a mass of incredible strength and lovely curses. My passion for healthy women isn’t defined by cervix or breast, but taking the COLOR out of cancer prevention and sticking to the BLACK AND WHITE facts of the matter: I’m over the gimmicks. I’m over the shadiness and I want, a goddamn cure. I think that’s all anyone wants. A cure.
9 Comments
I recently learned about your site from a friend, and I’m thrilled to see another person intervening in what has become a sacred cow. It has been considered blasphemous to critique the pink machine or look at unintended consequences of how society organizes around breast cancer, but pink culture needs an intervention! I’ve been writing about this a lot on http://www.pinkribbonblues.org. I hope you’ll check it out. The cultural revolution has begun!
Onwards and upwards,
Gayle Sulik
I have been saying much of what you said here for years. When I say it people look at me like I have committed some form of blasphemy. It’s really sad. I really don’t know why we can’t fund cancer research as a whole instead of dividing up the body by it’s parts. I honestly think that we would have gotten much further if all those people working to end breast cancer got together with those studying lung cancer and stomach cancer and cervical cancer and testicular cancer and so forth and shared researched and talked about how how each of these cancers are the same and how they are different and why one body part gets attacked and not another we would be three steps closer to curing cancer. But boobs are fun and sexy and nice to look at and something everyone can get behind. When we as the last time any of us looked at a lung or cervix or stomach? Those body parts aren’t fun or sexy or nice to look at but if cancer attacks them it’s still a potential death sentence. I really don’t understand the mindset behind it all. I really don’t.
Wow, thanks for having the courage to post this.
Because I have an autoimmune disease (one that almost killed me), it also get trivialized because it’s not “the big one.”
I agree. I suffer from Lupus and it doesn’t get nearly the amount of attention that breast cancer does. No one in my “real life” really has a clue about it.
Jealous? Envy? Not at all. I support anyone and any cause of chronic illness…just not to the point where other just as deadly cancers and diseases get unnoticed.
I have seen first hand how Komen uses strong arm tactics to preserve their control of the cancer charity events, forcing another non profit charitable cancer group out of event space so they could monopolize exposure an entire weekend in the 5th largest city in the country. “Pink” actually makes me look for.alternatives and acts as a warning, as opposed to making me want to participate in something that is selfless. There are a web of “strings attached” in Komen’s so-called selfless acts. Great piece Kate.
I have to admit that before I had cervical cancer I always was drawn to the “pink” not thinking of anything else. I knew many women who were breast cancer survivors and many who had lost their lives to breast cancer. Then I was diagnosed with cervical cancer and it opened my eyes that not everything is “pink”. I salute all women cancer survivors and those who are battling the disease today and everyday for standing up and facing cancer head-on. We will be indebted to you for paving our way to an eradication of this disease- A CURE- and your stories will demonstrate that you were warriors and not all of you will be wearing “pink” People don’t miss the point cancer is a disease not a color. .Thank you for this post.
I agree with you whole heartedly about this. A lot of people think that just because an organization does something good that you can’t find issue with the way they do it. The end serves the means, if you will. However I think most human problems are ultimately caused by misappropriation of funds and if we could better organize those then more can be done to help more people.
Breast cancer is the most high profile cancer, my mother had breast cancer (and cervical cancer) and I know how terrible it is for those involved, The impact it can have on your identity and self worth is not to be mis-calculated, however the fact that stands that Cervical cancer is much more deadly and worry-some. I hope that when people read this blog and any other blog post that you may write about cervical cancer, that they realize that you aren’t pro breast cancer, you are against the pink washing ideology and the aggressive way that Komen protects their intellectual property, in cashes where they have no need to.
This was really thought provoking. I think many people, myself included, spend so much time focusing on the pink that we lose all sight of everything else. I have a pink ribbon tattoo, in honour of my late mother, but I am an ovarian cancer survivor, and my sister is a cervical cancer survivor. What have I have I done about that? Sadly, nothing. I talk to people about them, but it’s true, they don’t have the same “prettyness” so they get less attention. Thanks for this post, I’ve got some thinking to do.
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