Pink Ribbon
Blues: How Breast Cancer Culture Undermines Women's Health
Gayle Sulik
Oxford University Press, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-19-974045-1
402 pages
Pink Ribbon Blues is a
difficult book to read, but I'd like to see it become required
reading for any student in sociology. Gayle Sulik has taken some
brave steps to bring into focus, not only a sacred cow, but the
elephant in the room -- corporatization reaching even into one of our
most well respected charity organizations.
Every chapter has
well-researched and copious footnotes. For those of us used to
reading books that let us look through someone else's eyes and hear
the stories of individuals told, it does seem a bit on the cold
academic side, but the picture that emerges as the book goes on is
far more chilling. I believe all the documentation in this case is
critically important, because when an author takes on a non-profit
not only with some serious political and socially well-connected
associates, but with a host of high-powered corporate sponsors and
donors, she needs to have her facts straight.
Pink Ribbon Blues describes
an environment that is disturbingly similar to “regulatory
capture,” a situation in which corporations become very close to
those who regulate them, in an attempt to keep from being too closely
watched. The increasing popularity of the highly visible “Race for
the Cure” and the “pink ribbon culture” that it has spawned,
provides a platform, as well as a huge potential market, for
corporate, medical, and pharmaceutical interests. It seems that
“pink ribbon culture” may be slowly mutating into a culture that
could be harmful to patients and survivors of breast cancer.
