There’s a classic Onion piece on this topic:
I’ve seen a tow truck in the Cary, NC area that’s painted pink. I’m not sure if it’s part of a fleet or not. Fortunately, since it’s not a flatbed, neither one of my vehicles runs the risk of ever having to be Towed for the Cure.
Like armedmonkey, I’ve never understood the “pledge money and I’ll walk!” thing. When I was in elementary school, we had an annual “Walk-A-Thon” with the same concept…pledge money, and I’ll walk [number] of laps. Has this method actually been shown to bring in more money than simply telling people why the money is needed?
I think the reason some people assume walkathons to be more appealing than any other charity drive is because it’s not just a hand out. You’re giving to someone who actually gets off their ass and does something for your money. Shrug. Makes sense to me.
Or not. Do you actually go with the person and count laps? Probably not. And the people who ARE counting the laps have a vested interest in making sure your little pledge hits the max. It’s a complete lack of accountability. For me, I want transponders on the walkers, NASCAR-style scoring loops embedded in the course, and KPMG auditors on site.
It’s called pinkwashing.
I own breasts, and I agree with the OP wholeheartedly.
The OP was way too kind, for my tastes. Once the NFL players take the field adorned in pink, I’ll spend all of October gritting my teeth and trying not to break things. I have no idea how breast cancer became the world’s most popular cause over the past 5 years.
In a word? Marketing.
Both of the “effort” itself and in the value to retail sales, coupled with near-zero consumer resistance (maybe even positive acceptance, making that a… negative negative?)
“Pink… it’s not even a queshion…”
Breasts are popular. Breast cancer gets spinoff popularity.
Sure, it’s marketing, but that doesn’t asnwer why its been so successful, and why so many people have responded favorably to it. I think it has everything to do with organizations wanting the public to see them as sypathetic towards women. Slapping some pink on the box/uni/whatever is just a really, really easy way to do that. Sooner or later, there will be a backlash. I’m just really surprised it has gone as far as it has.
Well, I expanded a little on the one-word answer; marketing does have to “work,” of course and in this case I think pinkwashing sits at a perfect center of elements.
This, too. Another “positive element” lifting the boat.
ANewLeaf has a point, too: while breasts are still a bit blush-worthy as a public topic, they are also attractive to both men and women and thus easier to show public appreciation of, even in this slightly backhanded way, than colons or lungs or prostates.
Backlash? Probably not. A tide going out? Certainly. Can’t come too soon for me. It’s going to be a long month.
Just opened my news page and got treated to a picture of a pink KFC bucket. I wonder if the pink washing will turn out like Halloween and Christmas, in that retailers will start putting themed items on the shelves months in advance.
Agreed, but apparently, the prevailing sentiment is that only adult women matter (well, specifically a rather sexual part of said adult woman). Forms of cancer that are more widespread among gender and age groups just don’t matter as much as “save the boobies!”
Incidentally, that slogan is IMO disgusting. Doesn’t matter if the woman attached to that breast dies as long as the boobie is preserved to drool at/play with, hmmmm?
QFT. If you (generic you) actually care about some cause, then DO something more than buying some feel-good trinket with the fashionable “see how conscious I am” labeling. That’s just slacktivism and lazy.
The first “Save the Boobies” style group, “Save the Tatas” was founded by Julia Fikse in 2004. While it’s possible that objectifying women was the reason she chose that name, I’m guessing there are more likely possibilities.
I don’t really feel the outrage here, but on the other hand my primary cancer-related charity giving is through the American Cancer Society’s Relay For Life, which fights all forms of cancer.
Perhaps that’s because you actually make charity donations. The “outraged” here obviously donate nothing; if they simply found breast cancer promotion tasteless, they could express that feeling by sending their money to one of the many, many other good causes out there.
But they don’t…
(And a few are expressing their well-known misogyny.)
Whether it was intended as objectifying or not, it came out that way, with the emphasis being on preservation of the body part, with no mention of the attached human being, which conveys the message that said human being doesn’t matters as much as that body part does.
Wow, impressive flying broad jump to smugly nasty conclusions there! You have no reason to think that those who find the whole “save teh boobieeez!!!” bit irritating do not donate to charities they feel are more deserving.
Also, several female posters (myself included) are in the “this is annoying and obnoxious” camp, so the “misogyny” claim is IMO just a knee-jerk buzzword to try to shut down discussion and dismiss opinions you don’t want to address.
(bolding mine, for emphasis)
And you know this because… 
FWIW, your assumption is wrong, in my case.