Monday, November 01, 2010

The Great Cancer Myth: Introduction

I do not worry about getting cancer. I have it. I have cancer in my colon. I have cancer in my prostate. I have cancer in my lungs. I have cancer in my bones. I have cancer in my entire body, from the day I was born, till now, and until the day I die. It is not a monster hiding in my closet, waiting to jump out and get me. It is a part of me that I no longer fear. I have it, yes, but it does not have me, by design or my action, and I live each day to keep it that way.

The idea that cancer is something I may get, and if it is detected in sufficient time (by some expensive gizmo) I might be saved, is nothing more than one of the greatest medical miscarriages ever perpetrated on modern humankind. The truth of this is magnified for Blacks, as the group suffers disproportionately from the disease. In this series I will talk about cancer and how we have been taught to view it to our health detriment, and for others to financially exploit.

This miscarriage, which has blossomed into the ‘cancer business’, was introduced to us with good intention wrapped in medical ignorance, but those intentions and ignorance have long since been replaced by greed. What drives this business is the lust for money, return on investment, or whatever the investor community wants to call it. The desire to profit from that thing which scares us the most, dying, is at the base of this trillion dollar economic engine. It is high time that we started calling it what it is, an industry. When I see pink buckets of KFC being sold in the alleged fight against cancer, I say enough already.

And I hate that word cured too. The public has been sold that cancer can be cured - it cannot - it can only be crudely stalled in particular situations, via crude procedures. Truly curing cancer, that is, ‘fixing’ cell replication processes to eliminate errors, is infinitely more difficult than curing the common cold, or malaria. The last time I checked, both of these ‘simpler’ maladies were still going strong, even while their cures would be worth zillions.

Just know, as I start down this road, I challenge the producers of the fight, not the actors. I have tremendous sympathy for those battling cancer, and also for those who are tools of this pretense of a good fight. However, I refuse to let people, who should know better, off the hook, just because some are clever enough to wrap their charade in a pink ribbon, colored wristband, or non-clever bucket of fried chicken. Stay tuned…

James C. Collier

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4 comments:

Joe P. said...

The NFL does the same sort of thing, with their players wearing pink shoes, wristbands, and whatnot during October. But don't the odds of breast cancer survival go way up if it's found early?

The company I work at, Scimed Solutions, makes gene discovery software. We make the "tools of this pretense of a good fight"; yes there's a long way to go, but I think eventually science will get us to that point. We're definitely not there yet, though, I agree.

James C. Collier said...

Joe P., I support detection, but not at the expense of true prevention. Tragically, early and expensive detection has supplanted prevention, due to the profit motive. Cancer will never be cured because cell replication errors are inevitable to their life cycle. The current error rate is way better than six-sigma, so it ain't really even broken. Cancer is a symptom of weakened immune function, largely having to due with lifestyle, nutrition and sedentary behaviors - whose correction returns very poor profit margins.

Anonymous said...

Your theory is Heligan head fake doctor...http://denmarkvesey.net/2010/05/fight-breast-cancer-stay-away-from-doctors/

Joe P. said...

I agree, James, prevention is DEFINITELY the best way to go. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Sadly, people don't feel motivated to take care of a problem until it's actually happening, plus it's so much easier to sit around, eat unhealthy, and not work out. Sad but true :(