From the first moment my wife discovered
she had breast cancer, there was a deafening silence from the men I know. Even
ones whose wives, mothers or girlfriends had breast cancer seemed to have
received a gag order from some Central Cancer Command and did little more than
mumble about the experience. Not one to shut up for any known reason, I started
this blog…That was four years ago – as time passed, people searching for
answers stumbled across my blog and checked out what I had to say. The
following entry appeared in August of 2011.
My wife was
watching TV during one of her after-chemo days, when some daytime TV jabber
show popped on. I don’t know which show it was (she didn’t say), but subject of
discussion was the question above: What would men like better: bigger boobs or
nicer hair?”
Now don’t get me
wrong, television always goes for the spectacular, often ignoring truth or
reality. I KNOW they were trying to get a rise out of the audience, increase
ratings and sell Lexuses and tampons. I KNOW they think they’re being cute,
creative, and provocative.
This time they
ended up being hurtful and in bad taste – I mean “plumber’s butt crack with a
bad case of gas” bad taste. And not just hurting feelings, attacking 1 in 8
women in the US (the number who will be diagnosed with breast cancer some time
in their lives) or 2.5 MILLION women (who are breast cancer survivors.)
Not only that,
it intentionally and maliciously attacks males as being too shallow to see
anything beyond boobs and hair – when the simple fact is that most men DO see
past boobs and hair.
It’s sadly
humorous that were this show to target any other group of people, the American
Civil Liberties Union and various other watchdog groups would be all over them.
But because it
is attempting to make women with breast cancer who have had their breasts
disfigured with lumpectomies; who have had one or both breasts removed by
mastectomies; who have lost their hair through chemotherapy or radiation
treatments – feel worse about themselves than they already do (and men to feel
shallow and self-centered with absolutely no hope of changing) – the show is
okey-dokey with its producers, advertisers and media executives (not to mention
the show hosts and audience members).
My question
then, is this: “What the heck kind of world do we live in?”
I guess the
obvious answer is this: “One that doesn’t give a rodent’s waste end about
viciously attacking vulnerable people.”
Harrumph…yeah,
I’m struggling.
Have a nice day.
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