An All-Time Low: For Rudeness and Insensitivity

Ladies (and gentlemen, although this is almost exclusively a woman-only blog): I think we need to add a new contest category, in addition to October's annual How LOW Will Komen GO? Contest.

(Entries for next year's "How LOW?" contest are already flowing in--unbelievable ones. I, as you know, will be in Japan, managing my blog from afar. Amorette will be with me, for a week, anyway. I hope. Big Little Bento Artist: She needs to go to the source of all bentos.)

So, back to the topic. A reader posted a comment to my blog that, as far as I am concerned, has won the prize for Rudeness and Insensitivity. Not to mention: Not a Real Human Being.

Without further ado, the comment:

Someone just said to me yesterday (when she found out that I had had breast cancer) that "everyone has breast cancer" (herself not included) and it's not a big deal anymore! I can't stop thinking about that comment...isn't that so insensitive?

That was from Sharon.

And my reply:

Sharon--that was incredibly rude. And not true.

I would say, don't even try to figure out what her problem is. And the problem is HERS, not yours, that I can say with some assurance.

Do you have to ever see this person again? Do you want to work on a snappy comeback? Just let me know if you do--the readers of this blog (and I) are great at put-them-in-their-places comebacks, so just let me know.

In addition, let me say, Sharon, that I am really sorry someone said this to you.

My only thought is, in order to get it out of your head, there are a couple of things you can do:

1) Give her an award, as we are doing here.

Next time you see her, say something like,

"Hey, remember that remark you made to me about everyone having breast cancer and breast cancer not being a big deal anymore?--Well, I've submitted your comment for an award, and you have won the First Annual Award for Rudeness and Insensitivity to Someone With Cancer. I hope you're proud."

Oh, and here is her prize:

Prize

Sara found that one, and e-mailed it to me just this morning. I'm sure that will become part of next October's anti-pink rant ...

Sara, Amorette, Lisa, Jacqueline, Teri, and other friends out there: Anything to add?

Or,

2) Leave it to us. Send me her e-mail address, and I will award her the prize directly.

I realize as I write this that I have a couple of contests going. The other one was for the rudest e-mail I have received (to date).

What can you do with people like this? I have several strategies. One is humor. Another is to push back. And my best strategy is to "keep the shields up." I'll be blogging more about that over the next couple of weeks.

Read more:

It's Not All Valentines: Christian Hate Mail

Snappy Comebacks Wanted

@ Jeanne Sather 2007.

Comments

[Amorette (on her mom's computer)]

Would that make it the booby prize?

I saw some of those mush-in-the-hand stress balls that were shaped like breasts, complete with nipple and aereola. I bought one, just to prove that they exist (learned my lesson with Benign Girl, bigtime). Now I have to keep it away from the cats- they like to play with it.

Does she think "everyone" has breast cancer because she sees the pink ribbons everywhere? If that's the case, Komen really shot us in the collective foot there, didn't it?
Desensitization through saturation. Classic!

Even though the lady's vaguely correct in that cancer is more and more prevalent these days, she's 100% wrong on it not being a big deal. The growing number of cases is an enormous warning signal with clanging bell and flashing lights.

I have a sticker on my fridge, a quote by Tony Follari that I like. "If you poison the environment, the environment will poison you."

[jeanne]

WHERE did you get that stress ball? Would you e-mail me a photo so I can post it? When you get time.

It is the booby prize, indeed.

Who is Tony Follari? I don't know him, but it's a great quote.

[Amorette (on her mom's computer)]

Got it at the same flea market where I first discovered Benign Girl, and where I picked up the phones. Some woman had a table of them. It felt very weird and took a lot of bravery to go over to that table...I felt like I was feeling-up the display.

I'll take a pic tomorrow morning when I've got good light.

I have not the foggiest who Tony Follari is, but I like his quote :) I found it in a catalog, on a sticker. I ordered the sticker and some sheet-magnets so I could make my own magnet for the fridge.
Worked out very well.

[Jacqueline]

OMG! first i was raging but then i was laughing my ass off buy the time i got through the "prize'.

i'd also have to say: never feel badly about responding to such ignorance with a harsh response. it's as they say in physics? "for every action there's an an equal or opposite reaction". and then there's my saying "if you can dish it out you'd better be able to take it"- i love that one.

oh, and if breast cancer is becoming so "normal" will my screening reports read "abnormal" should they show NO signs of cancer? now i'm confused.

[Carver]

Hi Jeanne,

I wish I could say that I was surprised by the insensitivity but I'm not. I can't believe how many people say "at least it's just skin cancer" about melanoma before they find out that it can spread anywhere. To an extent I thought people were better educated about breast cancer but insensitivity doesn't surprise me. I recently heard that a mother with melanoma who had a bumper sticker about melanoma awareness overheard some other mothers in the carpool line say, "why does she have that on her car. She's just trying to get attention. Her melanoma was removed a year ago." What got me was instead of getting mad the woman felt bad. She felt like everyone was going to think she was trying to get attention. Makes my blood boil. I can't think of pithy come backs for any of this. I tend to spit out facts and figures or occasionally say, I can't believe you just said that. Take care, Carver

[jeanne]

Jacqueline and Carver--thanks for joining in. I got an e-mail from Sharon saying that she feels better now after having us take this seriously.

I'm having a hard time believing the "just skin cancer" comment and the response to the bumper sticker--what bitches! But, you know, many cancer stats don't include skin cancer ... That doesn't help, if the NCI or whatever is not including skin cancer when it gives figures for lifetime cancer risk and so on ...

Amorette--I need to deputize you. Whenever you see weird cancer or breast stuff, like the squeeze ball, please buy it for me. Unless it's expensive ... Like this booby prize is $53, but I think I'm going to order one anyway. I'll get a lot of mileage out of it.

[Amorette]

No need to deputize me. Although I got mine for a dollar, they're all over the Internet.

http://www.prankplace.com/stresschest.htm

But from now on if I see anything else like this I'll pick one up!

[Libra1014]

I haven't heard the "everyone has it" moron comments (yet) but I have heard "wow, you look greaaaat! You still have your color and you're not all gaunt..." Um, YEAH. Thanks! My onc. surgeon gave me a good comeback for those who choose to open their mouths and drop a cloud of dumbass on you: "I'm sure you don't realize how insensitive that sounded" and walk away. 90% of the time they won't FOLLOW YOU to say something ELSE stupid. I also heard a fellow BR CA survivor actually got asked, "how did you get that!?" Her reply was classic: "it was on sale at Wal-Mart" Her hubby suggested a good one, as well: "no one else in her family wanted it, so she decided to take it". My motto about this? Cancer sucks. So do people. Ya just have to laugh! stupid humans...

[jeanne]

Libra--those are great comebacks! I think I will write them on my arm in permanent ink, or maybe borrow the tattoo equipment they have in the radiation oncology dept.!

I agree--you have to laugh. Otherwise, you'd be crying all the time, and, although I am a fan of a good all-out cry once in a while, I prefer to laugh.

[Sara]

I've been thinking about this for a couple of days. Truth be told, I have made remarks this insensitive, and persisted in thinking the ignorant thoughts that gave rise to them -- until educated. Believe me, I have been very, very grateful for the education.

Not everyone is coming at this from the same place. It gets very tiresome having to educate others constantly, and thoughtless comments can really, really hurt, but at the same time, this is one of the things we are supposed to do as humans, teach each other. Otherwise there wouldn't need to be more than one of us.

The very best way I have found to counter one of these ignorant statements -- and the easiest I have found to receive when I have been wrong myself -- is with a question: "What makes you think that?" It's a gentle but direct way to open a dialogue.

As much as I joke about throwing pink pudding at people -- and really, I want to, but I would be very selective about my targets -- I really do think most people mean to be kind and supportive. They just don't know how. And some of the people we want to throw pink pudding at most are the ones who most obscure the truth of disease in favor of the romance of Courage and Progress. But that's not most people. Most people want to know correct facts and behave kindly to sick people, and they are terribly afraid not only of the day when they, too, might become ill, or someone they deeply love, but also of putting a foot wrong. And in this country, we have been acculturated to value John-Wayne-style heroics over sincerity in the public eye, so when someone we care about even a little bit has to face something sincerely horrible and terrifying, a lot of us don't start out with any tools to help them.

The simplicity of just being there and listening doesn't seem like enough. It's not what gets featured in your "Sneaky Cancer Weepy" movies. It doesn't seem heroic or effective, because it doesn't resolve the matter in two hours or less.

I'm in favor of kicking people in the shins (literally and figuratively; it depends on whom, and when) for spreading untruths and for using my or my friends' misery to increase their own profits or strengthen their own brand. Very much in favor. I'm in favor of shooting pink pudding at people who think "saving the tatas" is what the fight against breast cancer is or should be all about.

However, I am also in favor of spreading facts and in encouraging all of us to continue trying to teach each other how to be kind and supportive of each other.

The best way to pick your battles, I've found, is to get very good at identifying your real enemies. The best way to start is with a question.

[jeanne]

Sara--An excellent argument, well presented.

I will confess that I spent years (don't forget, I'm past the nine year mark living with cancer) trying to do this. Educating people, listening to the most incredibly wounding comments and trying to give the speaker the benefit of the doubt, trying to read behind the ignorance to what the speaker might have meant.

And now, after all those years, this is my position:

Protect yourself first. It is not your job to educate the known universe about cancer.

If, and when, you can, try to change these attitudes. Doing so by example works best.

Some people are ignorant, not unkind, and if you ask a question, you may be able to change their attitudes and save the next cancer patient they meet from this kind of attack--because it does feel like an attack.

So, yes, Sara, I agree with you, with the qualifications above. Say something when you can, and assume that people mean well, but when you don't have the emotional energy for it, protect yourself in whatever way is necessary.

The snappy comebacks may make people stop and think, but they are primarily a way to get people to step back and leave you alone.

Jeanne

[Sara]

Yeah; I hear you. Remember, I was diagnosed in October 1989 with cancer I'd had and been staring at since 1979, and I've had my leg off since October 2003, so believe me, I am TIRED of educating other people, too. And I can't always find a laugh in all this, and some days I just want to scream and scream and scream at people (but instead I blog). However, I have to urge myself and others to be selective to be effective (ugh, that sounds so twee), effective both at getting people to understand and at protecting ourselves. I've actually had people yell at me abusively for not being "grateful" (among many, many other complaints a big-mouth like me collects over the years). A person yelling is not a person listening or learning, and is not a safe person to be around. The same is true of a person who has been shut down.

So, you're right. If you can find the time and the strength, go for kindness. If you are just pissed and this moron is getting on your last nerve, go to the snappy comeback -- but maybe not the $50+ "booby prize"; why waste the resources? (Wouldn't you rather just have a nice new hat?) And if you are just too tired of all of it, I really have to say I love best of all Libra's suggestion of telling people, "I'm sure you don't realize how insensitive that sounds." If you can lay a gentle hand on their arm and look wetly into their faces with a brave, brave little smile while saying it (just before walking away, of course), all the better. At least they stand a chance of thinking about it on their own.

I do think it's important to call people on their sh*t. I also think it's important to get them to understand why it's sh*t, whenever possible. This is because I have slung a lot of sh*t of my own in this life, but I have also learned a lot from the people who bothered to let me know that's what I was doing when I really didn't know.

[jeanne]

Sara--we are in complete agreement.

A note: the booby balls are only $1 a piece, so they are cheap enough to give away.

But I'm going to go with the "I'm sure you didn't realize how insensitive that sounded" line for awhile, and see how that works.

And I'll practice my sappy, wet eye contact.

Normally, when I make eye contact with someone and say something like "I have metastatic cancer. My cancer cannot be cured" they back off. I have developed a very powerful eyeball ...

Jeanne

[Sara]

Ha ha ha -- I do not want to cross that eyeball!

Part of the problem re breast cancer is that some of the people we most want to bombard with pink pudding grenades are those who keep advertising as though breast cancer is completely curable most of the time. I actually believed this myself unquestioningly up until about two or three years ago, when someone calling me on my sh*t made me go do some research and find out that it's just not that simple. While the pinksters are rah-rah-rahing it up, some people are getting cured, a lot of people are dying, and a lot of people are living as you do, with the disease, for years. When the most prevalent message is that if you die of breast cancer in this day and age you are either a freak or a failure because don't you know everyone is getting it and it's totally beatable now, this is what people think they know, and this makes them think that restating these kinds of wrong ideas is supportive -- and not wrong at all!

So for them (and their ilk across the spectrum of things that assail humanity) we have the range of responses. For the perpetrators of the fraud, it's pink pudding and plastic breasts all the way!

Or murals made of cheap pink (possibly carcinogenic) candy. That was brilliant.

[jeanne]

Thanks for the kind words about the pink M&Ms mosaic. I am going to photograph it again and get postcards made.

I'm also thinking that this is a solution for getting rid of old prescription drugs--make a cancer-related mural out of them! We can put on a show!

Of course, if this were a sensible world, people would be able to pass on the unused, unneeded drugs to someone who does need them but can't afford to buy them.

If you did that on your own, I think it would be a felony, but I know of one social worker, who shall remain nameless, who does this to get drugs for her clients.

[Karla]

I have a few insensitive doozies for you:

1. The friend who, when she found out I had breast cancer, told me about her other friends who had had it too, and who used their mastectomies as the opportunity to "get the boobs of their dreams." Whatsamatter, Bunkie...are you too small, too large? Well, here's your golden opportunity to get a boob job and write it off as a medically necessary expense! (Yeah, that was my first thought...breast cancer as Extreme Makeover, Chest Edition. Right.)

2. The boss I had at the time. It began from the day after I had been told I should get a biopsy to see if I had cancer. The next day I was proofreading something at work and overlooked an error. My boss chided me for not keeping my mind on my work. I told her (yes, HER) it was difficult when I was contemplating the need for a biopsy. What if I had cancer? Her reply: "Oh, I've had stuff removed before. It's nothing." OK, so now we have Breast Cancer Surgery as Tonsillectomy...lovely.

When it turned out I did have cancer, and I had the option of choosing a lumpectomy, I chose to take a few extra days off work, even though she didn't want me to (I had been in surgery a long time and was still feeling really out of it from all the anesthesia). I'm sure she would much rather I had returned to work bright-eyed and bushy-tailed the next day, but I said "To hell with it." I already knew the job was ending about seven months later, so what was she going to do? Fire me?