If you haven't seen it, it goes something like this:
Stupid cancer. We all want a new car, a new phone. A person who has cancer only wants one thing... to survive. I know that a lot of you "who think you're too cool" probably won't re-post this. But a very little amount of my friends will. Put this on your wall in honor of someone who died of cancer, survived, or who is fighting against it now.
I have a lot to say about this stupid little bit. At first glance it looks fine, right? I mean, no one likes cancer, right?
I have disliked this piece ever since the first time I saw it. For the record, I dislike every one of these things that try to guilt you into re-posting it. For that reason I hardly ever re-post anything at all, and then only if it doesn't have a guilt trip attached to it. So it's really not that I "think I'm too cool". Insert eyeroll here.
But I've hated this one since the first time I saw it, which happens to be way before my own diagnosis. Can you figure out why? Really, before I go on, I would like you to try. Read it over, and let me know what you think. If you think I'm wrong, that's OK. Let me hear it.
Ok. For the record, I think I would want to survive AND a new car - LOL
ReplyDeleteIn general I don't like these statements designed to boil a complex issue down to a sound bite or a wall posting. I suppose it is well meaning and intended to call attention to a situation without having to invest much (thought, involvement , etc). But it seems to me it trivializes a very personal struggle. People who have not experienced a loved one with cancer project their worldly outlook upon the struggle - just survive. In my (all to frequent now) experience with family fighting cancer, the most prevalent 'want' in the cancer patient was to minimize its effect on their loved ones. This is admirable and the stuff that heroes are made of but it requires involvement and is not something that can be boiled down into a sound bite...
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