I’ve been in this debate on other boards, and I don’t think irishgirl’s basic premise is crap. I feel there IS a belief that those who survive cancer have ‘fought harder’ than those who lose the battle…even the very termnology used (winning or losing the battle) implies that the strong win and the weaker succumb to the disease.
I wonder how much of this is due to the rise of alternative medical models, especially those who proclaim that cancer is a mind over matter condition? I’ve heard of families who have have turned their backs on cancer sufferers because they didn’t want to get into meditation or qui-gong or even the power of Christian prayer, on the basis that they weren’t trying HARD enough to fight the disease.
And this doesn’t even include the naturopathic/homeopathic routes to healing, after the western interventionist style has failed.
And in my experience, most cancer survivors treat cancer somewhere between their first loose tooth and their graduation in important episodes in their lives. Also, in my experience, most cancer survivors get really pissed when people refer to cancer (in general, all inclusive terms) as terminal.
I totally agree, that is why I hold them to a higher standard of accuracy when televising a message over and over and over again. I think it is kind of sad that they are not sensitive to the community they are trying to serve. Perhaps I am not in the majority, but I know I am not the only one who takes that statement that way. I hadlittle to no emotional response to the ACS before that commercial, the commercial has left me with a net negative emotional response to the ACS.
I still agree with me, but I understand your POV. In striving for brevity and failing to proofread twice (I promise, I did proofread once) there are flaws in my title and OP…my bad.
Which ad is going to get people concerned enough to get off their duffs? An ad where someone gets cancer and survives, or an ad where someone nobly fights cancer and loses, leaving behind grieving family and friends?
The ACS can more fully educate people once the viewers are down at the relay starting point. As Jackmannii wrote, just because they educate doesn’t mean they have to do it all the live-long day.
As for whether someone is ever really over cancer or someone fights cancer or what have you-- the cancer experience is as individual as the people who contract cancer. There is no right or wrong way, just a myriad of paths from which someone chooses. The way I look at it, as long as you can still function reasonably well; everybody’s different, everybody is correct. The best way to deal with cancer is the way that works for you.
I guess my point, that I have recently arrived at, is that there are better ways to get the message across. Tenar had a decent suggestion. I feel that they need to acknowledge that there are survivors. Instead of this:
Say “with your help, we could see less of this and more of this” and then cut to a scene of a survivor going on with their life. While many of you don’t agree with my issue with this ad, is anyone offended by the recognition that there are cancer survivors?
So you’re pitting them because you wanted them to add “or someone who has overcome cancer”? Am I understanding correctly?
And isn’t the fact that they’re trying to raise money for the fight against cancer more important than whether they could have worded an ad better? Obviously the American Cancer Society is well aware that some people survive cancer. Just as you are well aware that some people die of cancer, despite your poor choice of words in saying “Cancer isn’t terminal.”
Oh yeah, that makes total sense. I’m going to organize a walk to support the COMPLETELY RECOVERED. Just so they know that they’re not alone in their perfect health.
I certainly don’t have a problem acknowledging there are survivors. I visited a survivor every summer, her name was Grandma.
Your suggestion for an ad isn’t bad at all, I know other things have been advertised thusly. But if I had to choose, with higher repetition (short ads can be squeezed in more often, earlier) and most people motivated per airing, as my criteria, I’d choose to tug on heartstrings, in the most direct, simple manner possible. Bang for the buck, never overestimate the intelligence and/or attention span of your audience, so to speak.
Longer, more subtle ads, that educate and encourage can be late night PSA staples. When you have an event to advertise, you need a lot of short and punchy ads in the earliest time slot possible. These are the things my professors taught me and if my profs said it, it must be true!
True, and perhaps it’s because I was an adult when it happened, and perhaps it’s because it was only earlier this year, but every time I see a zit now, I panic, wondering if it’s another squamous cell carcinoma.
Yes, for a month, I tried to pop my tumor. I thought it was a zit. Now i am totally paranoid. It’s gone, I’ve been given a clean bill of health, didn’t have to undergo radical treatment or anything, but - yeah, it was psychologically scarring.
But, like I said, perhaps thats because of the recent nature of my episode.
Hey, I got a kidney removed 5 weeks ago due to a tumor. Guess what - I’m cured.
Does that mean I’ll never get cancer in the other kidney? Nope. Are there any guarantees? Nope. Why did I get it? No one knows. Just bad fucking luck.
Let’s look at cancer, since I’m a “survivor” and have read a lot about it in the short course of my illness.
Cancer isn’t one desease, it’s a whole lot of them. If it was one desease, then the results would be the same, no matter where the cancer grows, depending on treatment.
In the “western” world, close to 50 % of the population will get cancer some time during their life span.
If we somehow irradicated cancer, the gream reaper would still need something to finish us off with - look for sharp increase in cardiac deseases.
Because statistics are slippery. We’re healthier, live longer, are less prone to violent deaths / fatal accidents. Cancer is showing up more, because there is more life where it can have time to show up. Which is a good thing - that we have more life, that is.
In my own specific case, the tumor probably started growing five or ten years ago, without me ever noticing. I never noticed it, and it was only found because I had kidney stones, which in turn made the docs discover the tumor (Large as a golf ball). Total time from detection to surgery: 6 weeks. I never “fought” cancer. It was there, they cut it out. I’m fine - apart from a whopping 12" scar, which is giving me some problems. Surgery fucking hurts.
I’m not sure I understand your rant. ACS is trying to raise money to pay for research to “fight cancer”. Cancer will never be irradicated, but I’m glad I didn’t get this tumor 20 years ago. The research done by ACS and their fellow organisations in many other countries surely made me a “survivor”. If they’re using some scare tactics to make people fork up some cash… well I’m not too upset about that.
I’m passing on what I’ve been told by my mother who works in Oncology and volunteers at our local Hospice, and what I’m taught in my lectures in Oncology, Palliative Care and the Psychology of Illness.
This IS the prevailing trend in healthcare-to use more neutral language.
It’s why we use “living with” rather than “suffering from”.
Or “wheelchair user” rather than “confined to a wheelchair”.
It may not seem like a big deal to you, and you may well feel that you’re happy with the term “fighting a disease”, but to some people it causes them a lot of pain, so it’s a term to avoid unless expressly told otherwise.
The ad says something to the effect of you can join a team already formed or start your own to support someone who is fighting cancer or in memory of someone who has fought cancer."
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Tenar says:
Sure, they really SHOULD change it to something like "You can join a team already formed or start your own to support someone who is fighting cancer or to HONOR someone who has fought cancer.
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The “memory” vs. “honor” wording is already apparent in all the Relay’s for Life I’ve been a part of in recent years. There is opportunity to purchase luminaries either “in memory of” someone who died from cancer or “in honor of” someone who has either survived or is currently under treatment.
There are also people like my maternal grandmother, who’s missing 1.5 breasts from her body, due to cancer. A guy my sister knew is now missing half his right leg, from cancer.
Sometimes cancer leaves scars, be they physical or emotional, and to varying degrees. Sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes it kills people, sometimes it doesn’t. If an ACS walkathon commercial were to go through every possibility, it would be too long.
My family has a team in the local Relay for Life. We started it the year my brother died from pancreatic cancer, almost exactly one year after my mother died. Also of pancreatic cancer.
The Relay for Life DOES celebrate cancer survivors. The relay opens with a ceremony honoring the survivors, after which there is the survivors walk. They take the first lap around the course, with people clapping and cheering them on. It is a celebration. It is a joyful celebration of life… and of the indomitable, unsinkable and unquenchable spirit of people who fought the fight and WON it. We honor these people because they fought the good fight…and won. For now. I hope forever, but cancer has a nasty habit of returning to challenge a person, or a family, again.
The American Cancer Society, as I understand it, puts the majority of it’s funds toward research. They do support people fighting this disease, but mostly they are trying to find a way to eradicate it. Which is not very easy, since it isn’t really ONE disease. Each kind of cancer is different, requiring different kinds of treatment. I watched my mother and my brother die, fighting all the way. I do not want anyone, EVER, to have to go through what I went through. What my father and my siblings and my brother’s wife and children went through. Do I celebrate cancer survivors? Of COURSE I do. Fervently. But even the survivors aren’t assured that it won’t recur…and fund raising for the ACS isn’t about celebrating success…it is about attempting to find a way to PREVENT CANCER…new, or recurred.
The ACS needs funds to support their research. They do this by fund-raising. They aren’t asking for ballloons and cake to celebrate the survivors, they are trying to ensure that the survivors have the medical means to combat cancer if it comes back to bite them.
I really don’t understand why this bothers you so much.