Media has shaped the culture of cancer in the United States, and even more broadly, it has changed the country’s general sense of social responsibility. For my final project for Intro to Civic Media, I want to explore this further.
After someone close to me was diagnosed with breast cancer, I found myself drowning in pink ribbon products—pink t-shirts, pink pens, pink socks, a pink hairdryer.
The sale of pink ribbon products is a form of cause marketing. Breast cancer cause marketing can take many forms, but it is commonly understood to be when a business sells their product and promises to give a portion of the profit to a breast cancer foundation. There are a number of challenges that arise from this practice, one of them being that more and more people are giving to social causes by being a consumer.
Buying a consumer good is not the same thing as volunteering to directly help those affected by cancer. What’s even more problematic is when the a consumer good that is sold through cause marketing has chemicals that are linked to cancer in the product itself or in its production process or disposal process. Additionally, it is often unclear as to how much of the profits go to the cause and how much an individual buyer can influence the total amount given. For example, a business might have a set donation amount and each purchase after the defined total does not support the cause.
The marketing of consumer goods and services is only the beginning of the impact of the pink ribbon. Pink has become so closely associated with breast cancer that it appears along with every mention of the disease, whether done consciously or not. Pink ribbons, in conjunction with traditional forms of media and as a form of media itself, have changed the way we perceive the disease and what we as individuals can do about the disease. By examining the pink ribbon movement, we can learn about how media has influenced changing notions of what it means to give.
I am excited about learning more about this topic, but am not sure what the final product should look like. I know that I do not just want to write a paper. I want my product to be engaging and to have a visual component. I want it to enable and inspire people to take action based on what they have learned from my research. I welcome any ideas on what form this project should take!
(Side note: keep this issue in mind this month because October is known as ‘breast cancer awareness month’ to some and ‘breast cancer industry month’ to others!)