The first day of October marks the start of National Breast Cancer Awareness Month here in the United States, and with the increased awareness comes a wide variety of fund raising activities designed to help find a cure for breast cancer, from the National Race for the Cure to one of my favorite fund raisers, the blogger-centric Boobiethon! (The main splash page should be safe for work, but don’t go browsing through the gallery with your boss around.) For a $50 donation, you get access to the full gallery of pictures submitted by some of your (and my) favorite female bloggers, like Miss Cellania of Neatorama fame.
The galleries are all well and good, and it’s surely a nice reward for donating a little money, but don’t make that your reason for donation. Donate money because there are hundreds of thousands of women (and men) out there who have suffered and even died from breast cancer. Women like my grandmother, who had a mastectomy and suffered through months of painful radiation treatment. Women like my mother, who has a high risk of getting breast cancer. Even Richard Roundtree, the star of the epic blaxploitation film Shaft, has battled breast cancer.
We all know someone who has battled with this disease. We all know someone who bears the scars from surgery, or who has gone through the chemotherapy, or who has found a lump and waited nervous weeks for that all clear diagnosis. If you don’t know someone now, you will soon enough. Breast cancer is the second most common type of cancer in the world after lung cancer, and in 2005 it killed half a million people. Spread the word and raise money however you can. It doesn’t take much to start a movement.
Tags: boobiethon, boobiethon 2008, breast cancer awareness, breast cancer, breast cancer month, charity, cancer research, national breast cancer awareness month, race for the cure, fight breast cancer
