lumière des étoiles

Stupid Stickers
2004-10-10 6:01 p.m.

Good lord, they're everywhere. Yellow ribbon "Support the Troops" magnets. Not stickers, we discovered yesterday when we pulled one off a truck parked outside of a bookstore (don't worry, we put it right back), but MAGNETS. How disgustingly, conveniently non-committal. How sad that we don't want them marring up our pretty Volvos permanently or anything; how sad that one day, if someone still has one on their car, we'll say "that's, like, sooooo 2004!". How sad that they'll go right in the trash when the next sex-scandal rocks DC and we forget all about this War on Terror or whatever it's called today. How ironic, also, that the first one that I saw was on a HUMMER. I won't explain why that's ironic; instead, I'll let you do the math.

I'm as annoyed at those as I am at the proliferation of the pink breast-cancer awareness ribbons all over products in the grocery store, and I think it's for the same reason.

It's not that I don't "care about" or "support" our troops - I do. I do more than I think is psychologically healthy for me, and I cry sometimes when I see brutal pictures of young men crying or young women gathering up or praying over smoldering pieces of their best friends and fellow soldiers, numbness or shock on their faces.

It's not that I don't care about Breast Cancer or research, either. Breast Cancer runs in my family like a freight train, and claimed my grandmother and great-aunt - and nearly claimed my otherwise spry, jovial, and lovely cousin at 47, which would have left her two teenage sons motherless. And as someone who can scrutinize the medical industry through a feminist lens, I know that "women's diseases" have been grossly under-funded and under-researched, comparatively speaking.

It's that I'm extremely uncomfortable when major corporations can exploit something like our concern for breast cancer sufferers or dying soldiers to sell yogurt or stupid magnets (the profit of which I doubt even goes to some "cause" having to do with "supporting the troops") to sell their products. I resent that my empathy is a fucking MARKETING STRATEGY.

So the proceeds of this and that product go to Breast Cancer research? Or to patients without insurance or proper coverage? How much? All? None? .00005%? And is it just a bit convenient that the little pink ribbon will make people more likely to buy your yogurt/car/hair spray than your competitors'? Oh no? Oh I see, you're just slapping that little ribbon on to everything because you care, not because it will conveniently sell more products for you and at the same time give you a super-duper tax write off when you cut some organization a check for %.5 percent of your profits for the month.

I think it's all just so misleading - and I don't necessarily blame the consumer here for a change. We're being manipulated, and it's nearly impossible to find out exactly where that dime from your $1.29 yogurt is going and how it's helping breast-cancer research. You'd never know that by looking at the label, though, all it tells you is that you're so thanked for your support.

Save the hate-mail, by the way, I already got yelled at for saying all this about those ubiquitous little ribbons - whatever the color or symbol. In fact, I was called a "hypocrite" since I have an AIDS ribbon pin on my school bag. I didn't bother to say that I made it myself and hadn't taken it off since I put it there three years ago. Sheeeesh.