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Painting something pink doesn’t make it good

A company that makes drill bits for fracking is painting them Susan G. Komen Pink — that specific intense shade that has become fixed in the public eye as the color of breast cancer research. Note, though, that this is entirely an initiative by the drill bit company, and there doesn’t seem to be a specific partnership, and the company doesn’t seem to be donating any money to breast cancer research, but are just painting all their bits a different color than usual, and tossing in a breast cancer pamphlet.

pinkdrill

This is a classic example of pinkwashing. The company isn’t doing anything substantial to help research, but are just slapping a coat of paint on their product — and even there it’s nothing different, apparently they painted them gold before, and are now simply swapping colors. This is also a company that from some of the most environmentally damaging activities ever, fracking, an activity that makes extensive use of carcinogens. I’m having a hard time imagining a more superficial and less self-serving way to try and improve your public image.

I read the Morris North Star, so you don’t have to » « How not to give an interview

Comments

  2. gardengnome says

    I think you mean more self-serving way but, nonetheless, how cynical can they get?

  3. Menyambal says

    It looks to me like the linked site thinks it’s wrong for a company that uses carcinogens to support cancer research. But Baker Hughes does seem to be sincere, and does seem to be donating.

    For the second consecutive year, Baker Hughes is donating $100,000 to support Susan G. Komen®, the world’s leading breast cancer organization. The year-long partnership with Komen is an extension of the company’s participation each year in the Komen Houston Race for the Cure, where Baker Hughes sponsor’s the Survivor Pin Celebration.

    This year, the company will paint and distribute a total of 1,000 pink drill bits worldwide. The pink bits serve as a reminder of the importance of supporting research, treatment, screening, and education to help find the cures for this disease, which claims a life every 60 seconds.

    http://public.bakerhughes.com/pink/

    http://www.bakerhughes.com/news-and-media/press-center/press-releases/2014-10-02-baker-hughes-expands-commitment-to-susan-g-komen

  4. twas brillig (stevem) says

    The pink bits serve as a reminder …

    Then case closed, Reminders are all that’s necessary, and are the most important aspect of cancer research: REMIND people that Cancer Is An Issue.
    It is simply the illusion of caring, while actually doing nothing about it. oh gosh, I gotta rant: It is no different than PRAYING for someone’s recovery from a major trauma. It shows one CARES while doin nuthin about it. So Baker Hughes is showing that they care (by pinking their f_ bits) while actually doing very little.

  5. frog says

    If Baker Hughes actually gives a shit, they should donate money to actual cancer research rather than “awareness” campaigns.

  6. says

    This morning on my regional radio news: Pennsylvania’s DEP is bringing criminal charges against a fracking company, and seeking to impose a record fine.

    The company’s response?

    “The timing is suspect, and the exorbitant proposed penalty is inconsistent with both past and recent agency practice,” Lewis Gardner, EQT Corp’s general counsel and vice president for external affairs, said in the company’s statement. “The DEP`s proposed penalty seems designed more for headlines than for the lawful enforcement of the Commonwealth’s environmental statutes.”

    In other words, they’re doing it for the clicks headlines!

    I suppose it makes sense that a state environmental agency would be staffed by a bunch of attention-whoring SJWs, right?

    It is kind of striking to note the similarities between the language used by a possibly criminally liable corporation and the language used by trolls mounting harassment campaigns.

  7. Usernames! → smart says

    Wait, what?!

    Folks, THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A “FRACKING” DRILL BIT: whoever did this doesn’t know what they are talking about.

    Fracking (fluid cracking) occurs after the borehole has been drilled – the drill bit isn’t even in the hole when fracking begins.
    * Shaped charges punch holes in the concrete casing and into the surrounding rock (usually shale, which has nice cleavage)
    * Fracking fluid (water + sand or grit + chemicals) is pumped at extremely high pressure into the hole.
    * The fluid flows into the fissures formed by the shaped charges and forces the cracks open
    * The sand/grit keeps the cracks from closing again
    * The chemicals do a myriad of things: kill bacteria, lower the viscosity of the oil, etc. They are also highly toxic.

    That being said, fracking is bullshit because
    * Much of the water is taken out of the water cycle “forever” (in human terms)
    * The water that is recovered is toxic
    * The whole process allows (and encourages) continued burning of fossil fuels, contributing to catastrophic global climate change.

    But

    * It makes a lot of money for the 1% (and the 0.01%…)

    So it isn’t going away anytime soon.

  8. says

    Seriously, Usernames, it’s okay to talk about a “fracking drill bit” when what’s meant is the bit that’s used to drill the well that is then used for fracking. Using that phrasing, “fracking drill bit,” is not an indication that the speaker knows nothing about fracking, it’s an indication that they’re aware that they’re talking to a lay audience. Might as well take issue with using the word “fracking” instead of “hydraulic fracturing”. Or pick nits about whether “global warming” is a better or worse term than “climate change.”

  9. dianne says

    Oh, but they’re doing something very important for cancer research: providing research subjects. Where would clinical research be without patients?

  10. Menyambal says

    The linked story says

    Susan G. Komen, the largest breast cancer organization in America with more than 100,000 volunteers and partnerships in more than 50 countries, has teamed up with Baker Hughes, one of the world’s largest oilfield service companies …

    …. so there is a partnership. The association may seem wrong, but it exists.

    http://ww5.komen.org/bakerhughes.aspx also claims it.

    If the problem is that Komen has lost focus, or that it is only about awareness, not about actual research, I can’t argue that. But Komen seems to be active in fighting cancer – I say seems – and donating money is not automatically a waste.

    As for Hughes, they are donating and are doing something. Painting the bits pink is fairly trivial, and ceremonial, but it does raise awareness. I don’t see it as their only effort. Folks seem to be saying that Hughes did something completely pointless that was somehow meant to have great effect. I see it as an internal company awareness effort, for employees to learn from. Yeah, a few roughnecks are going to be befuddled, but they need to learn about breast cancer, too.

    I see the linked article saying that fracking is bad, but I don’t see Hughes deserving all the flak for the pink bits. I don’t care for the Komen foundation, myself, but they do seem to be a good a place to donate as any, and Hughes is donating.

  11. chris61 says

    I don’t support fracking but I do support Susan G. Komen. First, they do fund research (mostly I think in the form of small grants for researchers early in their careers) and second, public awareness is a very important tool in curing breast cancer. Like most cancers the only really effective cure is early diagnosis followed by surgery and early diagnosis requires public awareness. Also this Baker Hughes effort seems less cynical than a lot of partnerships SGK Foundation has entered into in that the Baker Hughes donation is not contingent on anyone buying these drill bits.

  14. Socio-gen, something something... says

    As CaitieCat said, the percentage spend on research by Komen is low — and has been dropping. Via Philanthropy.com from 2012:

    “A look at Komen’s audits over the years, shows that while the dollars going to research grants have risen, the share of total spending they represent has shrunk as Komen’s total revenues and expenses have grown. In 2005, for example, Komen awarded about $53-million in grants, roughly 26 percent of its total expenses before counting direct benefits to donors and sponsors, like T-shirts given away at its fundraising races. Last year’s [2011] $63.3-million in grants represented 15.5 percent of that total spending. In 2010, the percentage was 17.4.”

    There are much better places to donate if you want to fund research, including the the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, which directs 91% of donations to research and awareness, and only 2.5% to administrative expenses and 6.2% to fundraising expenses, according to Charity Navigator.

  15. magistramarla says

    I’m with SallyStrange. If I want to contribute money to cancer research I give directly to a university program that is actually doing the research.
    I was suspicious of the Komen foundation long before the Planned Parenthood debacle. Several of the teachers in our school ran in the annual race and tried to strong-arm everyone into contributing. I checked out the foundation and found that way too much of the money raised went to their executives, not to the research.
    I declined to sponsor the teachers, and instead made a small contribution to the cancer center of the local research university. I apparently made the right call.
    It isn’t that difficult to research foundations that are associated with medical issues. If people are actually being helped by the foundation and most of the money goes to research, patient education, etc., it’s a worthy foundation. If people are obviously getting rich from donated funds and a very small percentage of the money goes to research or helping patients, I stay clear of it.
    Lately, the best way to help women who need mammograms and other medical care is to contibute directly to Planned Parenthood.

  17. says

    Here’s the Board of Directors of the tracking company, Baker Hughes:
    http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=79687&p=irol-govboard
    Mostly older white men, two older white women.

    According to Business Week, the CEO is paid about $8,990,000 per year.
    Company revenues were about $22.364 billion in 2013.

    They’ve had some trouble with the law:

    In April, 2007, Baker Hughes pled guilty in U.S. federal court to violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), including bribing oil-related industry officials in Russia, Uzbekistan, Angola, Indonesia, and Nigeria.,[6] Under the settlement, a unit of the Houston-based company pleaded guilty to violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) for payments made between 2001 and 2003 to a commercial agent retained in 2000 in connection with a project in Kazakhstan. After bribes were paid, Baker Hughes was awarded an oil-services contract in a Karachaganak, Kazakhstan field that generated $219 million in revenues from 2001 to 2006.

  18. Bernard Bumner says

    I’m not familiar with the charity, but does it really look that bad?

    There are much better places to donate if you want to fund research, including the the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, which directs 91% of donations to research and awareness, and only 2.5% to administrative expenses and 6.2% to fundraising expenses, according to Charity Navigator.

    If you extract the same figures for Komen from Charity Navigator, then they show 82.8% of donations expenditure on progam expenses, 6.3% on administrative expenses, and 10.7% fundraising expenses.

    It doesn’t look too bad, many charities have much higher administrative and fundraising expenses as proportion of revenue. They appear to be providing funding for a lot of practical measures aimed at reducing the impact of the disease; education, screening, and treatment programs. They are transparent that research is not their primary area of funding.

    The function of Cancer charities should not only be to research the diseases – ideally, there should be a diversity of activities in the voluntary/charity sector, including treatment, support, and education. These are usually not well provisioned by the state.

  20. chris61 says

    @18 Bernard Bumner

    I don’t think Komen is bad at all. Of course if you want your charity dollars to go exclusively to supporting cancer research rather than community outreach programs or promoting public awareness then there probably are better organizations to donate to.

  21. demonhauntedworld says

    I question the utility of vague “awareness” campaigns.

    Is there anyone not aware of breast cancer at this point?

  22. The Mellow Monkey says

    Bernard Bumner @ 18

    I’m not familiar with the charity, but does it really look that bad?

    I’m familiar with the shittiness of the group, but I’m willing to accept that there are people who don’t know why it receives criticism. And if they don’t know why, how could they find out? Would it be difficult to find detailed criticisms? So I googled “why is komen terrible.”

    The first five hits I got:

    How The Susan G. Komen Foundation Lost Its Way

    For example, the organization has refused to acknowledge the link between the chemical BPA and cancer even in the face of piles of science establishing a link, presumably because several of their large donors just so happen to manufacture products that rely on BPA. In 2010, they spent more than $1 million suing smaller charities that used the phrase “for the Cure” in their names or in their events. The organization said that this was to prevent donor confusion. One fundraising program encouraged socially mobile cancer fighters to battle cancer themselves by mailing in Yoplait tops in order to prompt the company to make a 10-cent donation. Postage at the time was 37 cents; Yoplait prices varied.

    Susan G. Komen: Always the Worst

    “We’re Susan fucking G. Komen and we own the cure. What is this, trucker hats? A walk-a-thon? Fuck you! If we see you trying to raise a dime for breast cancer talking about ‘the cure’ we are going to be back to break your windows. You cure cancer our way or not at all.”

    Turns out “not at all” is also one of the chief beneficiaries of the money Susan G. Komen raises. The percentage of revenue Komen sinks into cancer research – remember this is by design “For the Cure” – has declined for the past decade, from 26% annually to 19%. Breast cancer mortality has not declined in decades. Administrative expenses are on the rise and remain murky at Komen. The charity receives top ratings from accountability organizations, but its financials are hardly transparent, with its overhead falling into broad categories.

    We need to get to the bottom of this. Might I suggest a congressional investigation of Susan G. Komen? Under those circumstances the organization will have no choice but to sever ties with itself.

    All of this plops squarely in the lap of the Brinkers, a right wing political and business family responsible for the organization and responsible for hiring people like Karen Handel as the VP at Komen. Handel is the former Georgia Secretary of State, a tea party conservative and an outspoken anti-abortion politician. She was appointed in April.

    Susan G. Komen — A Bad Charity Long Before Their Planned Parenthood PR Nightmare

    In 2010, according to the Harris Interactive Polls, Komen was ranked as the second most trusted nonprofit in America. Susan G. Komen for the Cure was a fund-raising giant on the charity scene, envied by many and emulated by a few hundred Mom and Pop charities (Kites for a Cure, Par for The Cure, Surfing for a Cure and Cupcakes for a Cure, as well as many others). Rather than demonstrating their charitable heart, Komen had another mission: take down anyone who dared use “for the cure” in their name and destroy them by filing trademark lawsuits until these small organizations were crushed under the weight of Komen. And where did Komen get the money to hunt down these little charities? You, me and our donations make three. Or a million. According to Komen’s own financial statements, the costs of these lawsuits added up to almost a million dollars a year.

    Why did Komen for the Cure give Nancy Brinker a 64 percent raise?

    Yet after more than a year of bad publicity and declining participation, Brinker herself seems to be doing just fine. As Cheryl Hall pointed out this weekend in the Dallas Morning News, Brinker made “$684,717 in fiscal 2012, a 64 percent jump from her $417,000 salary from April 2010 to March 2011.” That’s a whole lot of green for all that pink. Hall notes that’s about twice what the organization’s chief financial officer, Mark Nadolny, or former president Liz Thompson were making. And as Peggy Orenstein points out on her blog Monday, it’s considerably more than the average nonprofit CEO salary of $132,739.

    Of course, rewarding CEOs even as they’re bombing out is a way of life in America. Brinker’s salary looks like small potatoes next to, say, the more than, $13 million Hewlett-Packard gave Léo Apotheker just to leave. And Komen told Jim Mitchell at the Dallas Morning News that those figures for Brinker reflect a 2010 salary increase, and that they’re “misleading because of differences between Komen’s fiscal year and the IRS’ calendar year.” Good to bear in mind, but still — that’s a stunning raise to give a person, especially within an organization that has faced scrutiny for its dubious choices in the name of women’s health for some years now.

    The difference, more important, is that nobody’s doing any empowering fun runs for HP. Nobody’s honoring the memory of a mother taken away too soon, or struggling through the difficult waters of disease, in the name of, say, Citibank. Komen relies on the trust and faith of its members, members who have an intimate relationship with all the vulnerability that cancer provides. And with these latest revelations, it will be up to those members to decide exactly how they feel about what the money they’re raising for “the cure” is really paying for. One doubts they’ll be too pleased or too quiet about it.

    I guess it’s not that hard to find detailed criticisms after all.

  23. Socio-gen, something something... says

    Bernard Bummer @ 18:

    True. However, the difference lies in what is lumped in under the heading “Program Services”

    Let’s compare: In 2012, according to their 2012-2013 combined financial statement [PDF], the BCRF’s “Program Services” awarded $45 million in research grants (88% of overall donations) and spent just 3% to “raising awareness.” Contrast that with Komen’s “Program Services” in which less than 20% of their overall donations are given to research (which was $63.3 million in 2011, as it says in the quote in my comment @ 14).

  24. The Mellow Monkey says

    Excuse me: that’s my first four hits in #22. I seem to have lost one during my cutting and pasting.

  25. Christopher says

    To add to mellow monkey (and since this is a science blog)

    http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2012/02/10/komen-for-the-cures-biggest-mistake-is-about-science-not-politics/#.VDa_0632Vpg

    But these problems are minuscule compared to Komen’s biggest failing—its near outright denial of tumor biology. The pink arrow ads they ran in magazines a few months back provide a prime example. “What’s key to surviving breast cancer? YOU. Get screened now,” the ad says. The takeaway? It’s your responsibility to prevent cancer in your body. The blurb below the big arrow explains why. “Early detection saves lives. The 5-year survival rate for breast cancer when caught early is 98%. When it’s not? 23%.”
    …
    Then there are cancers that fall somewhere in between the two extremes. These are the ones most likely to be helped by screening mammography, and they’re the lives that mammography saves. How many? For women age 50 to 70, routine screening mammography decreases mortality by 15 to 20% (numbers are lower for younger women). One thousand women in their 50′s have to be screened for 10 years for a single life to be saved.

    So let’s recap. Getting “screened now,” as the Komen ad instructs can lead to three possible outcomes. One, it finds a cancer than never needed finding. You go from being a healthy person to a cancer survivor, and if you got the mammogram because of Komen’s prodding, you probably become a Komen supporter. Perhaps a staunch one, because hey—they saved your life and now you have a happy story to share with other supporters. Another possibility is that the mammogram finds a cancer that’s the really bad kind, but you die anyway. You probably don’t die later than you would have without the mammogram, but it might look that way because of a problem called “lead time bias.” The third possibility is that you find a cancer that’s amenable to treatment and instead of dying like you would without treatment, your life is saved. Here again, you’re grateful to Komen, and in this case, your life truly was saved.

    Right now, breast cancer screening sucks. It’s not very effective, and if you measure it solely based on the number of lives saved versus healthy people unnecessarily subjected to cancer treatments, it seems to cause more harm than good. For every life saved, about 10 more lives are unnecessarily turned upside down by a cancer diagnosis that will only harm them. In a study published online in November, Danish researchers concluded that, “Avoiding getting screening mammograms reduces the risk of becoming a breast cancer patient by one-third.”
    …
    Between 2004 to 2009, Komen allocated 47% of it $1.54 billion toward education and screening. Much of its education messaging promotes the same false narrative as its ads, which means they are not only not furthering the search for a cure, they are harming the cause. By implying that the solution to breast cancer is screening, Komen distracts attention from the real problem, which is that way too many women (and men) are still dying of breast cancer, and screening is not saving them. We still can’t prevent breast cancer, because we don’t know what causes it.
    …

  27. says

    Much appreciated, the link and citation support for my hasty comment earlier. I was on the way to the legal aid office for my disability application appeal, and on my phone with a very limited data plan, so I went with the last numbers I could remember seeing, and I’m glad they were pretty close. Thanks to all who added links and citations.

  28. Bernard Bumner says

    @Socio-Gen,

    Yes, but that is really a difference in emphasis.

    @ The Mellow Monkey,

    Of course I looked at some of those things – that wasn’t what I meant. I wasn’t clear, but actually I meant I’m not familiar with their charitable activities and what they actually spend money on. I was only posing the question about their finances, and they don’t look that bad when compared to many other charities.

    The salary to the CEO seems like something of a red herring – remuneration, even in the charity sector, is commonly paid in proportion to turnover. I also instinctively feel uncomfortable with the idea, but if that is the going rate then I’m sure that there will be analysts queuing up to tell us why the sector would collapse without those levels of pay. Actually, I found articles making the defence that it wasn’t excessive in the sector for that size of revenue.

    The idea of Komen aggressively protecting their brand is not so much a question of right or wrong – clearly that is their right. But it is shitty behaviour, and bad publicity. I wonder how much revenue they protected versus that lost through reputational damage. Still, I do wonder what the size of that potential loss of revenue was where people were consciously aping the brand – it is very sad, but charity fundraising is massively competitive. You’d always hope that large organisations would take a common sense approach before legal action was threatened, but presumably even charities have to draw lines somewhere. If they have trademarks, then they also have to protect them in order to maintain them, and I’m not qualified to assess the cost to a charity of not maintaining a brand.

    Like I say, it seems like shitty behaviour to me. No argument there.

  29. The Mellow Monkey says

    From Gregory in Seattle‘s link in #26:

    By placing the responsibility for our crisis in diet on the consumer, they reveal a disturbing lack of insight and understanding related to social inequities in this country. This is shameful.

    In addition, the claim that the partnership focuses on healthy options is outrageous. A menu with one or two salads does not a “focus” make! And it is equally outrageous that they claim to be educating people to make healthy food choices by encouraging them to eat at a fried chicken franchise.

    KFC is currently embroiled in a suit related to their chicken’s high levels of PhIP, a byproduct of the grilling process listed on the state of California’s list of carcinogens. While there is much that isn’t known about PhIP- Komen’s representative acknowledged that the NCI has not established safe or unsafe levels for its consumption – it seems both ridiculous and unethical to frame the breast cancer epidemic as something “curable” through repeated consumption of these ingredients. In terms of prevention, we cannot imagine feeding people carcinogenic grilled chicken that raises the risk of heart disease and breast cancer and then expecting them not to become sick.

    So to recap:

    Susan G. Komen For the Cure focuses on “awareness”, screening, and corporate partnerships rather than actually putting much effort into the cause they cite in their very name. Other charities that say they’re working for a cure will be sued out of existence, to protect the trademark Komen has on the name For the Cure which is, in fact, not really being used towards finding a cure. A million dollars a year from donations are spent on funding these attacks on other charities. The science that might save lives, the improvements in life and nutrition that could help vulnerable populations, and a whole lot of what we know about carcinogens is roundly ignored, in order to improve those sweet, sweet corporate partnerships.

    Komen is in the business of sustaining itself and protecting its brand and is, in fact, doing measurable harm in these pursuits.

  30. John Horstman says

    We should be careful to distinguish between donating money to Susan G. Komen for the Cure and donating to breast cancer research, as Komen spends more money on paying its very-wealthy board and CEO and corporate promotion events and brand advertising than cancer research or treatment. According to their own figures for 2009-2010, 21.3% was spent on administrative overhead, reported segmented between administrative overhead for the organization at large and administrative overhead for fundraising events, while 20.9% actually went to cancer research programs. Additionally, 39.1% went to “Public health education”, which in this case is a categorically dishonest euphemism for brand promotion for Komen and its corporate partners, including for-profit hospitals and clinics that perform breast cancer screenings, which do not, of course, actually prevent cancer (and as noted above may not even be particularly effective at identifying cancer). Less than half the money they raise goes to help anyone with cancer or who might develop cancer.

    Donate to better charity organizations. Hell, donate directly to research universities. Don’t donate to Komen; its primary purpose is to make money for the wealthy and pinkwash corporate images.

  31. says

    Menyambal#3

    It looks to me like the linked site thinks it’s wrong for a company that uses carcinogens to support cancer research. But Baker Hughes does seem to be sincere, and does seem to be donating

    ‘Baker Hughes’ is not capable of being sincere, being a legal construct without sapience or emotion. I do not believe for a moment that the decision makers at Baker Hughes are in any way sincerely concerned about anything other than a potential slick PR move to try to burnish their image. Nor, incidentally, am I impressed by a $100,000 donation from a company or individuals with as much wealth as these assholes control. Furthermore, pissant philanthropy to blind people to the fact that you’ve ravaged infrastructure, devastated the environment, and destroyed thousands or tens of thousands or even millions of lives has been a favorite of shitheads with more money than morals since the days when the Legions marched the Via Domata to battle the Gauls, and hasn’t gotten any better flavor in the intervening millenia.

    But Komen seems to be active in fighting cancer – I say seems – and donating money is not automatically a waste.

    Also, fuck the Komen Foundation as well; they’ve done nothing to convince me that the internal problems leading to that fiasco where they gave Karen Handel the helm, and shit like partnering with the likes of Baker Hughes, especially for such piddling amounts of money, is not helping even a little bit.

  33. carlie says

    The NFL goes pink for October, but gives a tiny amount to charity.

    In fact, the NFL’s claim of 100 percent proceeds from auction and 100 percent proceeds from retail has translated to an average of just $1.1 million every year since they partnered with ACS six years ago. That’s less than .01 percent of the approximately $10 billion the league made in revenue last year. And almost five times less than what ACS’ other partners, such as Walgreens, manage to donate to the same program—a program that, again, gives zero dollars to cancer research.

  35. chris61 says

    @21 demonhauntedworld

    The question isn’t so much awareness of the existence of breast cancer but awareness of the symptoms, awareness of how to navigate the medical system to get a diagnosis and appropriate treatment (which in some medically underserved communities can be a huge problem) and awareness of community resources available for both medical and non medical expenses that breast cancer patients may face. You should go to their web site and take a look at some of the grants they fund.

  36. says

    For the second consecutive year, Baker Hughes is donating $100,000 to support Susan G. Komen®, the world’s leading breast cancer organization.

    for a PR campaign, that’s fairly affordable. And yeah, that’s pretty much what it is: PR, to make themselves look less cancerous.That’s become the prime purpose of Komen: making things pink as part of PR campaigns to increase sales and/or improve image, at comparatively little cost to the involved businesses.

    And that’s aside from the part where what little does get donated ends up not really being used to help fight breast cancer.

  37. HappyNat says

    Komen is a lot like PETA in my book. Sure I agree with their basic principles, but they have both lost site of the goal and instead focus on publicity. The brand has become more important than the stated mission or the organization.

    It does make me sad with Komen because when my mom was a survivor she bought in heavy to the pink ribbon shit. Hats, shirts, pins, teddy bears, you name it. I have some good memories of walking with her in the Komen walk for the cure. It meant a lot to her and I didn’t think much about it at the time. She died in 2006 and I wonder what she would think of them now. She is the first one that taught me to question things, but could get caught up in the dogma of beliefs (i.e. god and republicans) so I don’t know if she would have seen through this facade.

  38. psanity says

    That $100,000 donation from the fracking guy will pay about one-fifth of an executive salary at Komen. That org is a bad, bad charity, and they rake in the dough with their manipulative tactics. I tend to be deeply suspicious of “charities” with very high exec salaries — watch out for exploitation of donors, clients, and low-level employees. Goodwill Industries is another one.

    And, I hate pink, anyway. Always have done.

  39. dianne says

    Does anyone else think the hot pink tipped drill looks like the monster in a horror movie?