October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Over the last few years, merchandisers have created a variety of crude ad campaigns to raise money to combat breast cancer. For example, who could forget the "I Love Boobies" bracelets? And this morning on Facebook, I was greeted by a poster that had two "racks" (deer antlers), one small and one big. The ad read: "Save the ta-tas. Big or small we love them all." Barf...
Some may argue that I am uptight for being offended by these slogans. Others may say these catchy and humorous posters draw the attention of people who would otherwise be oblivious to the cause. Based on a fairly educated guess, I can only infer that by "people otherwise oblivious to the cause," they are namely targeting men. Let's be real here; grown women do not use this terminology. And although the producers of these ad campaigns will undoubtedly raise both money and awareness for the cause, this year's presidential campaign will truly dictate the future of women's health.
Raising money to combat a deadly disease is noble, but the incendiary efforts to gain attention through crude and misogynistic advertising is offensive. Women in this country have been fighting the official "War on Women" for almost two years. This widespread usage of words like "ta-tas" and "boobies" does little for womankind's attainment of any true level of respect or equality. If anything, these words conjure up images of Hooters waitresses.
The blind acceptance of the obnoxious terms used in popular breast cancer awareness campaigns create the assumption that they are female-approved. But are they? Some females I've spoken to didn't necessarily like them, but felt if they raised awareness and money for breast cancer research, that was all that mattered. Really?
By continuing to condone the use of this terminology in breast cancer awareness campaigns, women send the message that we're okay with the objectification of women and our boobies. Seriously. If you really want to make a difference in women's health, I would start by paying close attention to the upcoming presidential election and by carefully selecting your candidate, because what good are advances in breast cancer research if millions of women still lack health insurance, cannot afford to pay for treatments or afford preventive care?
Governor Romney voted to defund Planned Parenthood under the pretense that Planned Parenthood distributes birth control like candy (and on the tax payers dime, too). Not true! Birth control at Planned Parenthood is not free, but subsidized and based on the income of the customer. The only people getting it for "free" at Planned Parenthood would get the pills for free elsewhere because of Medicaid coverage. What Planned Parenthood does is provide women with affordable care, contraceptives and breast cancer screenings.
"The actions I'll take immediately is to remove funding for Planned Parenthood." Aside from his quote's glaring grammatical error, I can only wonder about Governor Romney's logic here. Who does this anti-Planned Parenthood group consist of?
The group is likely to consist of men like Representative Joe "women-don't-die-during-child-birth" Walsh, who is currently spreading his ignorance and spending his time pushing his agenda of a no-holes-barred removal of abortion access from the entire US population.
Does this group of men really expect women to vote for and/or believe in them? I wouldn't trust them with my dog, let alone my uterus. The truth is this. If you really want to "save the ta-tas," then you should vote for President Barack Obama on November 6th.