Okay, that’s just fucking creepy. Some SK-related ad is now right above the comment box. Grrrr!!!

Fuck them. They’ve been more about branding than breast cancer for years.

Thanks to Jane, for opening up the real truth on the veal pen, and the SGK group. Their brand is shit now, I hope they fall off the edge of the donor world. Tomorrow would not be soon enough.

I am with Tom65, fuck them.

And just in case my point was not well made, let me just say, fuck them. also.

Would it be bad form if I addressed my thank you to “Karen Handel You Twunt!”

I would hate to break protocol.

I’ve already made Komen aware and I’m culling through my clothing for items with pink ribbons to send back to them.

Yep. It’s a common fate. No matter how high minded and no matter how noble of mission an organization begins with, eventually it almost always devolves into a fund raising machine in which their original mission becomes secondary, tertiary or even further back in priority.

Right you are: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/07/komen-foundation-charities-cure_n_793176.html

If you’re on Komen’s mailing list, you can get off it and tell them why here: http://ww5.komen.org/Contact.aspx

Yep, and Cece is leading that faction but she gets to meet all those powerful people.

My sister told me she wanted to buy my mother an orchid to support SGK. I told her not to buy anything from them, scammers. I realize she must have gotten my mother a pink timer with a ribbon for the stove. I will follow your lead and send it to them. Good idea.

Fuck them.

Will PP actually send the note to this obno? Have they agreed to this? I’ll still give to PP and have done so in the past but it would be really nice to actually send a message to this wretch. Also how does this get better publicized? Susan G. Komen gets USG grants to work overseas. Does the Obama Administration know about this new “public policy”? In terms of visibility and the community of women (partners and spouses) who have experienced breast cancer (including my wife – fortunately she is a survivor) is huge. Breast cancer doesn’t discriminate between reactionaries and progressives and any and all between. So deciding to support/not support PP had no relationship with breast cancer but with reactionaries long – term war against the poor, including poor women.

Actually, Margaret, instead of sending anything to them, I think I will propose it as an Occupy event. Tell everyone to bring their shit and we can have a big bonfire.

Thanks for that contact. I immediately sent them an e-mail.

First of all Bogg, if ya didn’t know it, Susan Komen Cure has a history that’s been widely documented on the intertoobz as yet another scam of a 401,c,3 funneling funds upwards to pay for executives and fundraising . . . . just look for their dollar raised and dollar given to the cause ratio.

They are hucksters, and have been living off of women’s worst fears for decades now.

Second, thank you VERY much for branging out the info of their Senior VP Hater as you did . . .

Anyone who gives a dime or runs a race for this org is either sadly uneducated and misinformed or just plain ugly.

Charlatans, the whole org, top to bottom, selling huckster bottled promises and hope to the illiterate masses who buy their stuff off the back of the wagon.

Harumph.

I have the experience of my college PR advisor and mentor, a cancer survivor herself, who was Ph.D and more about healthcare and women’s issues . . . it was she who hipped me in the early 90′s about the faux Pink Ribbon Race For Your Wallet.

I dont’ have links at my fingertips, Pups, but I’ve know about this evil predator on our women, weakest and poorest citizens and such for decades.

Perhaps this TBogg most excellent diary will help explode some shit about this horrid org.

Congress and the IRS should be investigating THEM!

N yep, as someone pointed out, the Pink gets fed funding for peddling anti abortion policies in the guise of cancer cure and prevention over seas.

Prolly stocked with pallet fulls of Baby Geebuz Figurines and New Testy Bible’s . . . *spits*

TBogg, Love the title!
Other pups–thanks for comments addressing fund-raising charlatan-ism and hypocricy. Think the idea of a great Occupy bonfire to ‘burn the pink’ is an excellent idea. Sadly, except for a 4-pack of Activia with the pink ribbon, I don’t have any contributions. Expected (without ever doing the investigation) that Komen was just another big-name money machine for executives & administrators–preying on fear (and perhaps guilt?)–like the American Diabetes Association, et al.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-hamsher/calling-on-ellen-degenere_b_391183.html

Jeezuz L. Christ riding a battering ram. What the fuck are these people thinking? If they really want to become teabaggers, they’re not required to screw up sane peoples’ lives in the process. They can just sign up at the local teabagging chapter. Hell, they might actually get to meet Michele Bachmann, or something…

And speaking of assaulting women’s rights, there’s this little tidbit…

It never ends. They won’t be satisfied until women are not allowed to leave the house. Bastards.

Draft of thank you note to Karen Handel that accompanies donation to Planned Parenthood:

Dear Ms. Handel,

This is to memorialize my donation of $100 to Planned Parenthood in your name. $100 is a small amount, but you know (or should know) that spectacular outcomes are built from many people making small efforts. For example, when it was revealed that Sarah Palin cut funds for rape kits (which include emergency contraception) from the town of Wasilla’s budget, over $750,000 was donated to Planned Parenthood in her name.

I believe that you played a major part in the decision to not fund breast cancer screenings at Planned Parenthood. I also believe that your actions betray a preference to advance your own political agenda over the mission of the Susan G. Komen Foundation. As such, this shows that you are incapable of fulfilling the duties of Vice President for Public Policy. You should resign immediately.

With utmost sincerity,
etc, etc

Try the last two sentences of this: http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2010/10/sink_pink.single.html Not even a quarter of every dollar donated.

These, mind you, are the same people who warn with hysterical, importunate screeching about the scary Muslims taking over because, well…Just look at the women being forced to wear those things on their heads or (Jeebuz forbid) full veils. Scary… Let us pray.

And right after that, get in the kitchen and make me a fuckin’ sangwich, goddammit..

If we “ladies” get too uppity, the burka is going to start looking really good to them.

In some of the more extremist Christian (or Mormon) circles, we’re just about there already…

Buncha dumbasses..

A huge clue that Susan G Komen For the Cure was not really helpful with regards to curing or preventing breast cancer has been ALL THE CRAP they merchandise or foist that is actually contributing to breast cancer prevalence. So much of the stuff is made of materials that are known endocrine disruptors… endocrine disruptors are a contributing cause of breast cancer.

Please do NOT burn this crap because it just makes it more toxic and liable to cause breast cancer… among other things.

This is evil. I hope people who gave to Komen will give the same amount to Planned Parenthood instead. Eliminate the middle woman.

I remember SGK having right wing links at least a decade or more ago. I think this has been part of their stealth agenda for a long time. Have never contributed to anything sponsored by them for that reason.

Good to see it “coming out” in such a big way.

I spend most Tuesday afternoons in the recovery room of the local PP with women post procedure. PP is struggling all over right now and we will be seeing many of their clinics closing. The Obama admin. has been aiding the demise of PP, perhaps not as directly as they allowed ACORN to be killed, just slower.

Women are being screwed many times over by even the “good guys.” I have little hope this will turn around unless and untill we lose a lot more ground and wake up.

The Think Before You Pink campaign has a good rundown of the opportunistic scumbags wallowing in the wake of the Susan G. Komen-generated wave of gullible consumers. The hard part will be to convince various aunts and other well-meaning relatives, that, no, just because they buy the dildo with the pink ribbon they will not single-handedly (or double-fisted, if that’s how they roll) cure cancer.

The best are the lame pink-ribbon-festooned plastic products that are known to cause cancer — hypocrisy much, SGK?

I always wondered if SGK had any clue how much cancer is random or not preventable….

I have read that a lot of the money raised at the walks goes to fund the walks. As a breast cancer survivor, I do not support SFK. I won’t wear one of those stupid pink ribbons ever, never, ever. If you want to support cancer research give money to the researchers.

The pink ribbon shit always struck me as a nice little way for big orgs to act like they’re making a difference — the annual pink weekend in the big leagues, etc. — while funnelling money to the non-profiteers in the upper echelons. “Pinkwashing” is what Think Before You Pink rightly calls it. Barbara Ehrenreich’s piece from 2001 is also worth a read.

The ads are targeted automatically to the content. No planning involved, and no ability to choose among advertisers. Ignore it.

Damn I LOVE these Firedogs !

whole lotta shaking of heads and confusion abounds over this move (and a not so small tsunami of enmity) — they have swung the door of oh so well deserved scrutiny wide the fuck open ! Incoming !

TBogg, I am with you – I simply can’t believe how fucking stupid a move this was

True. We are stuck with the reality of the market driven Google ads thingie. You can’t pick who or where the ads come from. It seems to have something to do with the content of the blog at times. I have seen ads from NRA when we are talking about gun control.

oh, and one more time Hamsher years ahead of everyone else on what’s really up !

Bless You Sister wherever you are

In Connecticut, we knew for years about SGK’s ugliness. Nobody wants to hear it. What did anyone expect from a group associating with the likes of Hadassah Lieberman? Her Bush-buddy hubby, Senator Joe (a point-man on lying about Iraq, along with his buddy Chris Shays) gleefully killed meaningful healthcare reform which would have benefitted the non-wealthy.
If only I weren’t such a compassionate forgiving person, I might could wish that someday rat bastards like this get to watch all their progeny die choking on their own vomit. Thankfully I’m not like that.

I am poor and under-employed. And I just sent $10 to Planned Parenthood in honor of Karen Handel.

What a dumb move. I didn’t know all the s*** alluded to here, but have suspected SGK was one of those more into fund-raising than research for awhile. Therefore, have no pink ribbon stuff to contribute to a bonfire garbage-toss. Also, severely under-employed (as in not), so, sigh, I guess I’ll add PP (with note to SGK) to my donate-asap-once-I-get-a-paycheck.
I did work some last year, so should be getting something of a tax refund…if my third W-2 would just show up–I can allocate some of that.

Even so, it seems like hiring this woman and making this move is overreaching for a group counting on large numbers of women’s donations. How could they see this as smart?

The whole “Pink Ribbon” campaign is a fraud, anyway. Read “Pink Ribbon Blues” by Gayle Sulik and “”Bright-Sided.How Positive Thinking is Undermining America” by Barbara Ehrenreich. The Komen Foundation has been living large off of the efforts of millions of women duped into thinking they are making a difference. For shame!

I have a screenshot from a few years ago of a news story, “Israel Bombs Beirut Airport As Tensions Rise”.
Right below it is an ad for “Discount flights to Beirut!”

Komen might want to change their logo to “Pink Ribbon of Caring Sweet Fuck All”

If you’re on Twitter, you can also shame them that way.
See @komenforthecure or https://twitter.com/#!/komenforthecure

I suggest that if you have any of the pink pins, spray paint them black and wear them prominently upside down and when people ask what the black ribbon is all about, tell them.

Google Nancy Brinker, Susan Komen’s sister and founder of SGK foundation. What she got from the foundation was a foot into the Bush administration, including an ambassadorship to Hungary and the position of Chief of Protocol at the White House for a year. Bushie appointed her to a bunch of boards including the Kennedy Center.

I did read on another site that Hadassah Lieberman is an officer–VP or something for SGK at a salary of between $300,000 and $500,000 a year.

I know Jane has a lot of contacts in Hollywood. She might want to contact Rita Wilson who is a big Komen fan. I know for a fact that when KitchenAid first became involved with Komen, she purchased 5 pink stand mixers as gifts for her friends to support the cause.

I think it would be helpful to offer people who want to donate to breast cancer research a viable alternative. People will overlook a lot of shit if they think the mission of the org is important. There are plenty of other breast cancer research groups out there and it might assuage guilt about jumping ship from SBK if there was a way to contribute to breast cancer research.

I’m curious about the paid ‘officer’ positions people are referencing. Corp officers in most nonprofits are members of the governing board–not employees–and most states have laws against nonprofit board members receiving financial compensation. I imagine they found some creative way to get around it, but as they are a 501(c)3, their financial information, including employee compensation, is public record. It would be interesting for an enterprising investigative journalist to comb through their 990 and provide an overview of how they are using all the donated funds they receive. I’m all for appropriately compensating nonprofit employees, but there is a distinction between being a day-to-day manager (executive director, for example) and being a member of the governing board that meets quarterly and has little daily responsibility for the org. If SBK is paying their board, even if it’s not illegal, it certainly doesn’t look good.

I have always felt the Susan Komen Foundation is more self than other serving. Both before and after my own breast cancer. Never contributed nor participated in their activities.

Edit addition: But this may be another example of conservative and evangelical strategy, at least here in the south, to infiltrate and eventually take over leadership positions in tradtionally socially conscious non-profits.

It’s interesting – my wife has been virulently anti-Komen for the better part of a decade now, because she became aware that they were not really interested in _preventing_ breast cancer as much as _profiting off_ it. I suppose it’s like anything else; if your income depends on selling something, you want to make sure that the market keeps getting bigger (or at least doesn’t shrink). The political side of things comes as a surprise to me, but I have to say that it’s not a big surprise. Birds of a feather and all that.

Thanks for the info, TBogg & commenters. Unsurprised. I contribute annually to Planned Parenthood anyway, and I’ve long avoided SGK like the plague bc I knew most of the money went to some greedy grubby skeevy scummy shitheads at the top.

It’s sadly unfortunate that so many women have been taken in by this disgusting Ponzi scheme. That said, I’ve had some female cancer survivors really dump all over me when I’ve explained the factual reality about the SGK org & races. Too bad bc there’s lots of other good, decent org’s to donate money to for curing cancer, etc.

I’d suggest that that is Obama and most of the democrats at this time: Killing progressive organizations just like republicans only slower.

Killing progressive organizations just like republicans only slower.

Yes. Such as the Democratic Party.

But I think we victims must in part assume some responsibility. My more elitist and affluent liberal friends years ago lost their taste for activism and instead feel now that we have all these rights in law all that is necessary is to keep up their annual contributions to the non-profits.

The conservatives have found easy hunting targeting our soft underbellies.

Not only do many non-profits exist solely to raise funds to pay their directors, but they’re super snotty about a) their faux missions, b) the people they ask for donations from and c) treat their line level employees like shit.

Ever interview with one of them? As an event planner, I’ve done so quite a few times. The last thing I’d ever want to do is praise for-profit businesses, but at least most of them are polite to you when you meet with them. Most non-profits will just sit there insulting you to your face. And that’s before they quote you the slave wages (Komen pays line level employees about 25% – 40% below competitive wages), let alone stress you beyond measure with their petty, political bureaucracy.

Ditto when your organization hosts an event for them. Prepare to be treated like they’re doing YOU the favor by accepting your free stuff. And will let you know how inferior it all is and how displeased they are by the free event, that they did nothing but show up for and collect $$$ from.

I had a problem with the PP donate button (I’m a klutz), so I ended up making three $50 donations in the name of Karen Pantysniffer Handel…I hope she gets three cards!

I found this link to be an interesting read. What is it with all these RW misogynistic women?

http://butterbeliever.com/2011/10/22/i-will-not-be-pinkwashed-why-i-do-not-support-susan-g-komen-for-the-cure/

While campaigning Handel stated that PP received state funded grants for breast and cervical cancer screening which she would eliminate as well as a health program for babies.
Brought to you by the party of family, values and morals. Or whatever it is that brings a check in…..

Dear Ms Handel:

May your future be filled with irony.

Sincerely,
Happenstance

I just sent $50 to Planned Parenthood, and to Ms. Handel a nice thank-you note.

I just sent $50 bucks, too, and Ms Handel will get my note.

For those of you in the LA area, Planned Parenthood of LA holds its annual fundraising event, the Food Fare, on March 8, Link Here.

It’s a nice event and a good way to donate to PPLA and have some fun.

KOMEN’S CORPORATE SPONSORS:

http://ww5.komen.org/CorporatePartners.aspx

You know what to do.

Yes. Misogyny is the driving force of our world.

The pink KFC bucket is awesome!

Done. Feels good to give to the right people and annoy the asshats at the same time!

It’s kind of funny. Until this happened we gave to the Komen Foundation AND Planned Parenthood. Now we just give it all to Planned Parenthood.

PP just received another donation in honor of Nancy G. Brinker, Queen of Failtopia.

Nice work TB.

I was happy to donate to PP, but nowhere did I spy the option to
send a thank you card or email.

Feel left out and like I missed the chance to make a statement to
PP and the heinous SGK suck org.

Wha’ happened? What did I miss on the donor page?
Little help here!