Facebook Bra Color Exercise-Did It Really Benefit Breast Cancer?
Posted: Tuesday, January 12, 2010
by Abigail Richards
Recently, Facebook users were bombarded with different colors of the rainbow in an effort to inform and raise awareness for breast cancer.
As a Facebook user, I have to admit that I took part in this exercise not really thinking about the ramifications or even what I was doing at the time. However, as talk continues, I have to admit I see no purpose in this exercise.
There is not a day that goes by that I am not brought to prayer for her. Her story is one of those heart wrenching, sick to the stomach type of stories. Her body, slowly being eaten away by cancer.
Because of that, I do think awareness is essential. I do not think the Facebook exercise was a way to do so. I don't think it really does anything for Breast Cancer. There are other ways on Facebook such as posting a pink ribbon or joining one of the causes.
In this case, I think it was a way for women to flaunt their bra colors to unsuspecting men who ended up getting caught up in it as well. Husbands, do you really want other men picturing your wife in the bra color they posted?
Now, there is talk about having men do the same by posting their underwear color size or type to raise awareness for prostate cancer. I for one do not want some woman knowing what color my husband's underwear is let alone if he wears tighty whiteys or boxers or briefs.
I understand this was done in fun, but don't masquerade it as a good cause. Do you really want to know what color bra your best friend's wife has on or worse his daughter?
Second, there was never any real announcement that it was to raise awareness for breast cancer. Would it not be more beneficial to set up and outside site and share the link that would take donations for the cure for breast cancer?
I think this exercise was misguided. Maybe posting a heart or the name of someone you know battling cancer would be more beneficial and real. Instead we reduced the illness to a bra color in which many survivors are forced to give up.
Lets take a stand and end this now. I do not want to know what my guy friends are wearing at this point. In the meantime, really take a stand for breast cancer awareness. Buy a pink ribbon, post a pink ribbon, give a donation, etc. Visit www.cancer.org for more information.
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Top-level comments on this article: (3 total)Abigail, I agree with you 100%!Thanks Lorrie! Glad I am not insane!
Hi Abigail and sorry to hear of your friends plight. I recieved the same facebook message asking me to do this. I am all for awareness but I see your point. If this campaign had of been done right it could have done so much for breast cancer awareness.We only have to think back to a couple of months ago when a campaign was set up by facebook users to boycott the X factor winner Joe McElderry claiming the number 1 Christmas slot in the music charts up against Rage against the machine. Let us hope someone reads this well written article and uses the power of facebook to get the message across in more meaningful wayKeep wellKacyThanks Kacy for the very thoughtful comment! I forgot about the X factor campaign! great point! thanks again!
Interesting article, and a very important subject.I saw the Facebook thing and didn't really understand what it was all about at first, just people posting random colours (with a lot of "black" and "white").When I did manage to find out what it was about, breast cancer awareness, I thought hmm - it didn't really help there because it wasn't clear what was going on.However, as time passed, after lots of people had posted "what's all this colour stuff about?", the answer cropped up on countless threads, trended on twitter, and even got some press coverage.It may not have directly done much for awareness, but it did start a chain reaction (including inspiring you to write this article), and I think the "secondary" wave of comment and discussion genuinely has increased awareness of what is a horrible and all too common disease.As an alternative to other methods (posting pink ribbons etc) it would be a poor choice, but as an addition to them, I think it did help.But I do agree about the "perv potential" of people imagining the posters wearing their given colour bit worrying, but for me if it lead to increased awareness it was probably worth it.If it could lead to a better, more informative facebook campaign that would be fantastic!Thanks for writing, I hope your article gets plenty of reads!Thanks Ben!I agree it did end up getting a lot of press from it! I hope they do decide to make a more beneficial campaign! Thanks so much for commenting!
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