Sunday, February 12, 2012

Susan G. Komen Imbroglio

I was fascinated by the willful self-destruction of the Susan G. Komen For the Cure Foundation's reputation at the beginning of February. It is difficult to comprehend the political naivete of the foundation's founder, senior officers and board members. What they managed to do was shine a very unwelcome and unflattering spotlight on the foundation that heretofore was all about breast cancer.

I found about about Komen's decision to defund breast health services provided by Planned Parenthood via a post on Facebook. I followed the link and signed the Moveon.org petition protesting the decision because (1) I support the important women's health services provided by Planned Parenthood clinics nationwide, and (2) I believe breast cancer research fund raising should be apolitical.

It has been disheartening to read the Komen responses to the controversy, which run the gamut from simple-minded to mendacious. It was actually embarrassing to watch Komen founder and CEO Nancy Brinker in an interview with MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell in which she changed the reason for the defunding move on the fly. First it was because Planned Parenthood was "under investigation," then it was because Planned Parenthood's funding was only a "pass through" service.

The "investigation" is, in fact, just the latest harrassment tactic by virulent conservative politicians, fronted on this occasion by Rep Cliff Stearns (FL). Komen sources say the new funding rule that allowed Komen to discontinue supporting organizations that were "under investigation" was specifically designed to cut funding for Planned Parenthood's breast exam services, and no other recipients of Komen funds who were "under investigation," (and there are several) were affected.

Nancy Brinker blithely changed the reason in the Andrea Mitchell interview, to say that Komen wanted to focus on organizations that were directly involved in breast cancer research for funding and not simply "pass through" services. Planned Parenthood performs breast exams, and in the cases where there is concern, sends the women to a medical facility equipped to perform mammograms, with voucers for free or discounted exams, in some instances paid for by Komen funding. Paying for those exams, or partially paying for those exams, for women who cannot afford them, is the "pass through" service Komen does not wish to fund.

The bottom line is this: Komen should be able to disburse its charitable contributions as the foundation sees fit. And contributors should be able to see what Komen does with its contributions before deciding whether or not to support the foundation. I don't think anyone can argue with either of those statements. And suddenly people are seeing what Komen is doing with their donations.

Komen cut off funding for Planned Parenthood and the reaction was swift and vocal. Despite the claims by right-wing conservative talking heads, I have not seen any evidence that Planned Parenthood went on the offensive, taking to the media to stigmatize Komen. What I saw was a grassroots, bottom-up response via social media, which was reported by the media. The protests waged for only a few days before Komen reversed its decision. Or said it reversed its decision, because the proof will actually be in the next rounds of disbursements they make.

Throughout the controversy, Komen maintained that they received a lot of support for their initial, de-funding decision. It is curious that, if they received so much support, they went ahead and reversed the decision anyway. Maybe that is one more falsehood, in an alarming series of apparent falsehoods issuing from Komen's ineffective damage control effort.

Komen also denied that staunch anti-Planned Parenthood advocate Karen Handel, hired on as VP for Public Policy late last year, had anything to do with the decision. Handel stepped down a week or so later, claiming that she had nothing to do with the decision but for the good of Komen she was taking herself out of the picture. Another curious move if indeed she had nothing to do with any of it, but understandable from a PR point of view. Of course, a few days later she was accusing Planned Parenthood of reneging on a back-room deal not to publicize the de-funding move, which was evidence that she was involved in it, but that's just another layer of Komen untruth laid bare.

Throughout the controversy, Komen has defended itself by saying that the protests are trying to politicize breast cancer awareness and research. Anti-abortion foes are raving that pro-choice protesters have politicized the issue and are lashing out at Komen for reversing their decision. In fact, the right-wing pundits and Komen are united in their belief that this politicization is all because of pro-choice advocates.

It is embarrassingly hypocritical for Komen officials and conservatives to claim that the protests of pro-Planned Parenthood advocates "bullied" Komen into reversing their decision.  According to Komen statements, the protests of anti-Planned Parenthood advocates at past Komen events prompted their decision. Why were those earlier protests not "bullying?"

Even more to the point, for critics of the popular basklash against Komen's decision to de-fund Planned Parenthood to claim that the current protests have politicized the foundation, since those protests were in response to anti-Planned Parenthood protests in the first place, the blame for politicizing Komen rests on the original anti-Planned Partenthood contingent. They forced Komen into taking a political stand instead of simply raising funds for breast cancer awareness.

When I say "forced," of course, I am giving Komen officials the benefit of the doubt. Nancy Brinker is an ultra conservative, and no stranger to Republican politics. Karen Handel is a staunch Republican and a declared foe of Planned Parenthood and all the necessary women's health services it provides. My personal feeling is that this is a move Brinker and her cronies have had on the agenda for quite a while, and bringing Handel on board was a way to make it happen.

The Susan G. Komen For the Cure Foundation has also spotlighted itself at an inopportune time. A documentary revealing the "pinking" of questionable or unhealthy products, in which Komen partnered with corporations to give them a veneer of breast cancer awareness respectability in exchange for donations, was just released in Canada, and is headed south in the near future.

More alarming to me, though, is the personal realization that a charity behemoth like Komen is sucking up the majority of donations intended for beast cancer research but only doling them out to research organizations that fit their political agenda. Komen refuses to donate to breast cancer research facilities that conduct stem cell research, even though such research promises great potential. If everyone donates to Komen thinking they are doing their part for breast cancer, but Komen is deciding which research projects are "worthy" of their funding--and that worthiness is based not on medical or scientific considerations but political or religious considerations--then critical research might effectively go unfunded.

I don't think the Komen foundation is qualified to be making those choices. It would not be an issue except that Komen is the only breast cancer charity that many people are aware of. It is the 800-pound gorilla in the room. Research projects that do not get the Komen Foundation Seal of Approval probably do not get breast cancer related donations. Komen has gotten too big to be allowed to play partisan politics with women's health. And so, they must go. Someone else neeeds to step up and fill the vacancy, and we can only hope breast cancer research will not suffer for it. Komen has damaged the breast cancer research fund raising machine, and betrayed the trust of women everywhere.

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