You may have seen the latest magazine cover from the always classy YOU magazine in your local store, and perhaps like me you also did a double take – thinking, wow, good on you celeb – you’ve made a huge stand by promoting Cancer awareness and shaving your lovely hair. Until, upon closer inspection, you notice the word shaved is sitting very comfortably between inverted commas.
The celeb who you, for a fleeting second, had an ounce of respect for, hasn’t in fact shaved her locks, instead she’s had them photo-shopped out to promote awareness. Mind you, her plucked brows and long lashes remain perfectly intact – as does her flawless skin, pouty lips and carefree smile.
That is not the face of Cancer we all know, and quite frankly, I found the entire campaign very disrespectful, and although not malicious (I’m sure) it very clearly just wasn’t thought through properly.
I get it – we all hate Cancer – it sucks and it causes grief and sadness wherever it goes – so to promote awareness is well and good, but with that awareness needs to come action. I would have liked to have seen the money for the shoot go towards fixing up a CHOC ward, investing in new technology or going towards finding a cure. perhaps it did if so, I will eat my words.
A good friend of mine, Don Packett, has decided to take action and not just sit back and moan like me. He’s started a Twitter and YouTube campaign called “Kaal Kop 4 Cancer” and has pledged to donate R1 for every single share of his video. That means, if he gets 1 million shares, that’s 1 million Rand that will go towards research, medicine and changing the face of Cancer.
Now, Don needs to save some money for his rather expensive bird watching habit – so if you want to stand up and take action with him, check out his Twitter bio, YouTube clip and then pledge*. Every rand makes a difference.
Let’s stand up, spread the word and take action against Cancer. It CAN be beaten.
*You can also email Don to pledge, or just to ask to rub his newly shaved tennis ball fuzz. kaalkopforcancer@gmail.com
