Tuesday, January 12, 2010

The Status of "Colours"

Last week, an interesting phenomenon took place. A variety of colours had made an appearance as the status message on Facebook. White, Black, Red, Pink…in fact the entire spectrum was represented in the status. And the key point - only the females had this status. The male “Facebookers” were left wondering what this was all about. The truth came out soon. The ladies had kept their bra colour as their status message. This was done to promote awareness of breast cancer throughout the world. Someone had thought of this interesting way to promote this good cause. Chain mails ensured that this message went out far and fast. And soon there were colourful statuses everywhere.
But did it have any actual impact? Creating awareness about health issues is a great cause and needs support by everyone. No doubts about that. But how does posting the colour of your bra help in raising breast cancer awareness. In fact, it appeared more like an attention seeking exercise than anything else. Actually knowing the truth only gave a weird feeling. Imagine seeing the status, knowing the truth behind it and then seeing the person… Really weird.
I am not sure how much the cause has been helped by this subtle message but at least breast cancer has been mentioned in the public domain quite a few times because of this. A much better awareness movement is the Jane McGrath Day celebrated at the SCG. The entire ground turns pink in the annual New Year test. The teams also sport pink caps which are later auctioned off for the cause. In my opinion, a far better way to raise awareness. Talking directly always helps.

P.S. No one has been able to trace the source of this idea. Could have been a guy who found an innovative way to make women reveal these details. Or could have been a genuinely concerned person who wanted to raise breast cancer awareness.

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