Immediately upon accessing their website, having read “Welcome to cancerland”, I saw the links for “shopkomen.com” and “find an event”, I also noticed the abundance of what Barbara Ehrenreich calls “pink kitsch”. One important thing to note is that men diagnosed with breast cancer may feel alienated by the focus on women and femininity. Unlike the Komen website, BCAction does not have any pink at all, doesn’t have testimonials or catchy phrases like “breast cancer touches us all. It’s a journey we take together,” or pictures of “survivors”. It’s important to note that as a (third-wave) feminist organization, BC Action rejects the phrase “survivor”, echoing Barbara Ehrenreich.
BCAction focuses on systemic interventions to reduce the number of women who develop breast cancer, die from breast cancer, and to eliminate communities bearing disproportionate burdens from breast cancer. The Komen foundation works to “save likes and end breast cancer forever by empowering others, ensuring quality care for all and investing in science to find the cures.” Their approach to their mission is raising awareness, fundraising, and addressing breast cancer through research, community health care, global outreach and public initiatives. This reflects their alignment with biomedical and scientific institutions.
BC Action tries to be inclusive to heteronormative as well as non-heteronormative femininities. Those who identify with this culture want to address the “effects of inequalities, mobilize anger against the institutions of biomedicine, services and treatment activism.” This feminist culture of action also questions the use of the term “survivor”, addresses gender disparity within institutions, challenges medical and scientific authority, and critiques systemic forms of sexism and classism. This organization fits in the Klawiter’s “culture of action” that focuses on the environment. They look for ties between the environment and cancer rates and holds corporations accountable for actions which may cause cancer – and they make this information available to the public – such that they can make their own decisions.
Komen celebrates normative femininity and is Klawitzer’s “remaining” culture of action. The Komen foundation represents the mainstream breast cancer culture, one which has faith in science and medicine and is aligned with these institutions. They promote biomedical research and early detection and emphasize this over finding the environmental factors that may be causing cancer, which is BC Action’s primary approach. Within this culture of action, are events like Race for the Cure which is a celebration of normative femininity and in this realm “shopping is activism.”
One of the striking differences between the two websites is that on the Komen website, the ways to get involved are to donate, participate, be involved in corporate partnership, or “shop Komen,” reflecting more of an emphasis on fundraising. This is quite different from the ways that BC Action suggests that individuals become involved, which includes making educated choices and becoming empowered by learning more, petitioning and activism, becoming involved as a volunteer, and fundraising.
Despite the many criticisms that can be made of the Komen Foundation and the mainstream breast cancer movement, I do think that it’s really important to acknowledge that this is an organization that is accessible to many mainstream women and much of this appeal has to be with having a sense of community and solidarity for those who do not identify with feminism, and for this reason cannot simply be discounted. Breast Cancer Action offers an important resource to those who do and do not identify with normative femininity and may feel alienated by mainstream organizations like Komen. Although their stances differ substantially, “social justice for all” is necessary, but finding a cure (however far out that may seem) is also so important in reaching BC Action’s goals to reduce the number of women who develop breast cancer, die from breast cancer, and eliminate communities bearing disproportionate burdens from breast cancer. I would argue that although the ideologies of these organizations are very different, their goals do not have to be seen as mutually exclusive.