Susan G Komen: The tip of the iceberg

[tabatha]

Columbus, OH - Perhaps over the past week you've heard of the foundation named after Susan G Komen? You know the folks I'm talking about, the ones who have turned breast cancer fundraising into a non-stop Nike-like branding campaign that translates into helpful suggestions, like how you should chomp down on the extra crispy bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken to fight cancer (get heart disease, but cure cancer!). Yeah, those guys.

They've had a bad week or two, to put it kindly. But their self-immolation at the hands of Tea Party cranks, such as their recently resigned senior vice president for public policy, Karen Handel, is worth looking at for what it tells us about the demise of institutions in the US. Because the thing is, their corruption of a charity meant to help find a cure for breast cancer with their Sharia Christianity, is only one of many examples of this phenomenon in the United States.

Whether it's the courts, Congress, state legislatures, media, churches, academia, non-profits or a variety of other institutions, these important organisations that set the social, cultural and political parameters in our democracy, and served us well (overall - on the issue of race, for example, it took many of them a while to get with the programme) have been thoroughly hijacked by what the late historian Richard Hofstadter referred to as those exhibiting the "paranoid style".

You know who I'm talking about. The tri-corner hat crowd ready to take up arms every time they walk into Nathan's because they have a sneaking suspicion that the hot dogs are halal. Those who think that Social Darwinism was ordained by God, but actual Darwinism is a hoax. The ones who claim they are pro-life, but love everything from .50 caliber sniper rifles to foreign wars, like they're engaged in the honeymoon period of a non-platonic relationship.

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/02/2012210104518705672.html

[customerserviceguy]

1. SGK is a church

Look at all the similarities:

1) It threatens all who challenge it with charges of blasphemy, if your organization dares to use the color pink, or the magic words, "for the cure", they will come down on you like any state-supported religion has ever done.

2) The central figure (Brinker) is a godlike figure, hey, her sister died of breast cancer, right? That makes her beyond reproach in the eyes of the believers.

3) Great tithes, er, contributions are required of the faithful.

4) The true believers are called upon to perform meaningless rituals that have nothing to do with the stated "mission". Running around a track does not cure cancer, research does. But it gives the faithful something to do, not unlike kneeling before an omnipotent deity helps Him run the universe.

[Quantess]

2. Charlatans.