Pink Ribbon Blues: How Breast Cancer Culture Undermines Women's Health [Hardcover]

Gayle A. Sulik (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 28, 2010 | ISBN-10: 0199740453 | ISBN-13: 978-0199740451 | Edition: 1

Pink ribbon paraphernalia saturate shopping malls, billboards, magazines, television, and other venues, all in the name of breast cancer awareness. In this compelling and provocative work, Gayle Sulik shows that though this "pink ribbon culture" has brought breast cancer advocacy much attention, it has not had the desired effect of improving women's health. It may, in fact, have done the opposite. Based on eight years of research, analysis of advertisements and breast cancer awareness campaigns, and hundreds of interviews with those affected by the disease, Pink Ribbon Blues highlights the hidden costs of the pink ribbon as an industry, one in which breast cancer has become merely a brand name with a pink logo. Indeed, while survivors and supporters walk, run, and purchase ribbons for a cure, cancer rates rise, the cancer industry thrives, corporations claim responsible citizenship while profiting from the disease, and breast cancer is stigmatized anew for those who reject the pink ribbon model. But Sulik also outlines alternative organizations that make a real difference, highlights what they do differently, and presents a new agenda for the future.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

In this eye-opening story about the ubiquitous pink ribbon, medical sociologist Sulik reveals the dark side of the “breast cancer awareness” movement. She argues that breast cancer has become a “brand,” complete with its own logo and self-serving corporations. Zeneca, which makes the treatment drug tamoxifen, has, for instance, always put money into the 25-year-old National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Sulik—no fan of the October celebration—calls it “the official platform for pink ribbon culture to advertise treatment, promote early detection, encourage fundraising, and promise eventual eradication.” Despite the sea of pink, no cure is in sight and treatment and detection efforts remain flawed. The Institute of Medicine reported that 75 percent of positive mammograms are, upon biopsy, false positives, and that mammograms miss 25 to 40 percent of tumors that actually are cancerous. Americans don’t even know how much of the money they spend on pink products goes toward legitimate breast cancer research. In the end, this well-reported book (Sulik interviewed hundreds of sources) will make readers think twice before they shell out extra bucks for a pink mixer. --Karen Springen

Review

"Treads an interesting middle ground between the academic and the journalistic as she analyzes giant hunks of information and opinion, and also interviews patients to illustrate her points." --Abigail Zuger,M.D., New York Times

"In this provocative and eye-opening critique, medical sociologist Gayle Sulik, Ph.D., makes the case that breast cancer culture is increasingly frivolous and commercialized-with patients paying the price." --Catherine Guthrie, Better Homes and Gardens

"Given the pink ribbon's symbolic success, what's wrong with it? Sulik argues that pink ribbon culture focuses attention on the wrong things and does it in a way that is not really contributing to progress toward preventing and curing cancer. It buries medical controversies, ignores environmental causes of cancer and insurance problems, and does not increase access to treatment for underserved populations. Most of all, she is critical of the collusion of pink ribbon culture with what has become a multibillion-dollar cancer industry. I highly recommend Pink Ribbon Blues to anyone interested in medical issues, the social construction of patienthood, gender, and the body." --Judith Lorber, Gender & Society

"Gayle Sulik takes us behind the pink curtain to a peculiar culture where sentimentality takes the place of scientific evidence, personal transcendence fills in for political action, and lofty platitudes replace actionable goals. Pink Ribbon Blues is the Frommer's travel guide to the country of breast cancer." --Sandra Steingraber, author, Living Downstream: An Ecologist's Personal Investigation of Cancer and the Environment

"Gayle Sulik has written an excellent book that sheds new light on the construction and implications of breast cancer culture in American society. Her extensive research and thought-provoking analysis challenge current beliefs of what breast cancer means for diagnosed women, survivors, and advocates. This book is a must-read for all players in the breast cancer culture and anyone interested in women's health."--Kathy Charmaz, Professor of Sociology, Sonoma State University

"In Pink Ribbon Blues, Gayle Sulik has brought sociological, feminist and media theory together for a deep and broad analysis of the consumer world of breast cancer. She has complimented all of that with a deeply humane and personal engagement with the women who are living with breast cancer in a world where the pink ribbon culture constantly needs disruption and questioning. BRAVO!!!!!"--Janet Gray, Director, Program in Science, Technology and Society, Vassar College; Board Member, Breast Cancer Fund

"In this thoughtful, eye-opening and searing examination of the pinking of breast cancer, Sulik shows how pink culture lurches from selflessness to selfishness, giving new meaning to the ferocity of survivors and she-roes."--Devra Davis, National Book Award Finalist, author of Disconnect: The Truth about Cell Phone Radiation and Your Health (2010), and The Secret History of the War on Cancer (2009), Founder, Environmental Health Trust, and Visiting Professor, Georgetown University

"It's about time! We've been needing this book - a smart, critical, thoughtful analysis of pink ribbon culture and the damage it is doing. Thank you Gayle Sulik!"--Barbara Katz Rothman, Professor of Sociology at the City University of NY, most recent book, with Wendy Simonds, Laboring On

"Provocative..." --Library Journal

"Breast Cancer Awareness Month has become a distracting sideshow, a situation that sociologist Gayle A. Sulik explores in compelling depth in her new book, Pink Ribbon Blues."
--Katherine Russell Rich, Slate

"You may never think pink again about breast cancer after reading Sulik's sobering and lucid critique of what she calls 'pink culture'... Sulik's call to 'take a road less pink' demands to be heard." --Publishers Weekly

"Many of [Sulik's] insights are striking and she pulls together a wealth of historical material and data... Recommended." --Choice

"This is the first book to provide a comprehensive ethnographic analysis of breast cancer culture in American society. It presents a thought-provoking and probing argument against the industry of awareness-raising and describes real ways to help breast cancer patients and their families. This book will be valuable for all those interested in breast cancer management and in women's health." -- Anticancer Research

"For Sulik, it is clearly time to 'rethink pink.' Well-written and extremely well researched, Pink Ribbon Blues demonstrates how pink consumption has transformed breast cancer from a stigmatized disease and individual tragedy to a market-driven industry of survivorship. Using a broad interdisciplinary approach and a range of examples, personal stories, and health statistics, Sulik traces the linkages between the disease and the 'pink culture' that has arisen around it. As well as being of interest to those with breast cancer this book would be useful for both academic and clinical audiences, in addition to serving as an excellent discussion text for courses in medical sociology and anthropology."
- Sukari Ivester, Sociology of Health and Illness

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 424 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; 1 edition (October 28, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0199740453
• ISBN-13: 978-0199740451
• Product Dimensions: 5.9 x 1 x 8.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #220,239 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #91 in Books > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Diseases & Physical Ailments > Cancer > Breast Cancer

More About the Author

Gayle Sulik Ph.D. is an author, medical sociologist, and health advocate whose research focuses on medical consumerism, cancer survivorship, health policy, and culture. Dr. Sulik received the prestigious National Endowment for the Humanities research fellowship in 2008 and is the 2013 Distinguished Feminist Lecturer for Sociologists for Women in Society. Her ground-breaking analysis of the culture and cult of breast cancer has stirred a grass roots reawakening. Visit Gayle Sulik's website at www.gaylesulik.com and read her blog at www.pinkribbonblues.org.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Pink backhoes! Oh, my! October 26, 2010

By C. Wagner

Format:Hardcover

We are indeed surrounded by the pink do-gooders. I even saw a pink backhoe on display.
Now, our brave author seeks to separate well-grounded hope from misleading hope. And, says Sulik, "The goal to eradicate breast cancer is not being realized." (p. 9.) Further, the advantages to screening have been exaggerated. (p. 20.)
My somewhat paranoid furniture stripper said that no one really wants to cure cancer because then the money would be gone. He is correct about the money being gone. Imagine, if a vaccine were created to prevent cancer or an inexpensive injection to cure cancer were developed, how many folks would be off their feed. There would no longer be a need for expensive research, oncologists, medications, treatments or miscellaneous paraphernalia. "The industry that benefits from increased use of mammography and pharmaceuticals is at the core of what has become pink ribbon culture." (p. 210.)
The author contends that exposure to common chemicals in the environment may contribute to high incidence of breast cancer (p. 60.) while the pink ribbon culture emphasizes the courageous survivor.
Again, many of the largest corporate donors to the pink culture derive huge profits from the treatment end of the business. This includes hardware and pharmaceuticals, and so forth...
Yet, breast cancer rates have risen (dramatically in my opinion) since 1940 (p. 159.) And, there is still no sure cure or prevention method.
Proper treatment and "cure" of the disease are essential.
However, to get back to my outspoken furniture stripper, this is not my priority. I have a wife and two daughters. I do not want them to be survivors. I want them to never contract the disease. I want to know what causes breast cancer. How can it be prevented? Can an effective vaccine be developed? How are U.S. cancer rates comparing with, say Germany?
I know there are geographic cancer hotspots. I know there are some buildings that produce cancer in their employees and at a high percentage rate. I know there are no serious investigations into these issues. I want to know the cause and potential methods to prevent all forms of cancer and the pink culture, that I have seen, has not been working in this arena. I do not want to see any more pink backhoes.
Sulik's books should be required reading.
Readers may also be interested in the "No Family History" by Sabrina McCormick.

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars This breast cancer "survivor" loved it. November 12, 2010

By MeredithK02

Format:Hardcover

I absolutely loved this book. When I was diagnosed with breast cancer last year, I didn't have the vocabulary to explain what I found so disturbing about the pink ribbon culture into which I was suddenly immersed. Gayle Sulik does a fantastic job of systematically laying out the flaws that plague the current pink-think, and I've come away from reading her book with a reading list from the books and articles she cites.

I've read critiques of many of the issues she lists, but never in such a comprehensive and well-researched unit. I started reading the book still bothered by my lack of verbal ammunition to articulate my gut dislike of the industry of breast cancer awareness, but I've come away with an arsenal. I especially liked a section of the last chapter, "Rethinking Pink Ribbon Culture," that deals with the question of whether the ends justify the means regarding the problematic (to put it mildly) nature of some breast cancer awareness campaigns.

I'd highly recommend this book to anybody who has been diagnosed with breast cancer, or knows anyone who has.

24 of 25 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars From the perspective of a registered nurse November 3, 2010

By RN

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I have an active background in cancer care and treatment, and frankly am getting a little tired of all of the Pink Ribbon Celebration. I'm uncertain about how much money goes to the cause and how much profit the manufacturers and marketers are making from this disease. I'm also concerned that other cancers are being put on the back burner, while all attention goes to the pink ribbon. Cancer is a horrible disease and a cure would be great, BUT, we need to put our money into research for the PREVENTION of cancer.

I was very interested in this sociological approach to breast cancer. The book answered many of my questions. The author is compassionate and has a strong argument about Pink Ribbon advertising and the cancer industry. I especially liked the chapter on medicine and learned a lot that I didn't know as a nurse.

The book was well written, and I look forward to future books from this author.