Angelina Jolie's message published in The New York TImes has been considered a rational piece. But is it really so?
However, we here demonstrate there is indeed much to take into account in order to get threats to breasts right. Analysis here is specially favored by dividing the tissue, I mean, the issue into three components: (1) her medical treatment; (2) her making a fuss about that treatment, and (3) how the mass media reacted to her revelation.
By having clearly in mind those three points, we are more likely to get our feet back down to the dust we are all made of and make better moves in face of the wave - or tsunami - of the moment.
And here we decide to end our jolie jokes.
THE MEDICAL PROCEDURE
Under point number 1 is the issue of how to judge her decision to undergo mastectomy, but not her act of making it public in the NYT. In addition, how should we interpret Brad's declaration that her decision was "absolutely heroic"?
In trying to address that, it is crucial to realize how we are virtually unconsciously influenced by her words in the NYT. As I said, we must separate the two things, or at least admit we find it very difficult and thus our judgements are less than sensible.
The surgery she did is a radical procedure. It involves risks. It leaves negative consequences ALWAYS. Furthermore, it goes against the trend in medical advancements, which aim to eliminate the need of surgeries.
Which vehicles of mass communication have put down all these consequences fairly clearly? Some used "radical" more to imply the surprising factor of the news.
Unfortunetely, the articles that have provided useful facts and thoughts are, as it is usually the case, very few. EPOCA, a Brazilian weekly, has published that the way of Angelina, according to research, only saved 4% (four percent) of the women who underwent the procedures. The rest? 'Suffered with no need', adds the doctor reporting about the research.
it goes against the trend
in medical advancements,
which aim to eliminate
the need of surgeries.
EPOCA magazine's report strongly contrasts with that of its rival VEJA, which also explores the matter as cover story. EPOCA brings statements revealing that the reconstruction of the breasts never results in any improvement, aesthetically speaking. More, women will never feel their breasts as they were before the surgery: there is loss of sensitivity to touching, and they tend to become cold. The reconstruction itself can prove impossible, if the body rejects the prosthetics. By contrast, VEJA celebrates the medical procedures, ommitting all of these negative outcomes.
Also drawing on data published by EPOCA, only ten percent of breast cancer cases are due to genetic fault. And even when there is such "wrong" gene, the development of cancer is much less than certain.Brad Pitt's seeing her wife's decision as "absolutely heroic" requires a specific approach. It is the viewpoint of a man very close to the woman that removed her breasts. It is thus inevitably loaded with emotions. How the media explores the 'heroic' factor is another story; it is one more trick to manipulate many.
Angelina's use of statistics should not lead us to forget asking elementary questions about... statistics. She stated her risk of having breast cancer was 87%. Where does this apparently so precise figure come from? The answer I have seen everywhere is intentionally incomplete. The most crucial piece among the many ones missing out from her letter and the media fuss that followed is that only ONE company provides the test linked to that statistic: Myriad Genetics. This is the company in the center of a fast thriving market, responsible for a huge increase in the number of breast surgeries in the USA in the past years, also according to EPOCA.
So this time Angelna Jolie did not actually pioneer anything in the medical arena. She was the first to launch herself as a "genetics celebrity", expression I borrow from "Mercado do medo", an article published in the Sunday supplement of O Estado de S.Paulo newspaper.
That is a supplement considered cult, one the bulk of the population does not read.
Only by reading that excellent article, by Debora Diniz, an antrophologist and professor based in Brasilia, have I come to know about the monopoly in the four-thousand-dollar genetic test involved. The American company mentioned, whose shares are reported to have gone up since Angelina's public disclosure, is battling to patent genetic sequencing before the American Supreme Court, Diniz also reveals.
Wrapping up point one, the medical procedure in question is to be seen as a curse, not a blessing. It is a last resource, and its "salvation" properties have been largely exaggerated, while its negative outcomes are downplayed or simply ommitted.
Let us now move to our second point in the discussion: the actress's act of making a disclosure in The New York Times.
ANGELINA'S BIG TONGUE, HIGH ANXIETY
Let us now focus on Jolie's going to nothing less than the NYT to make her... confession.
First thing to bring into is the fact she kept everything under secrecy for months. She only made the announcement when all was finished and, apparently, well in place. Would she have made the same voicy confession had the procedures faced troubles?
The answer is negative.
Jolie's declarations are junk food for those hungry for anything but quality and reason. Her words are worth if we would ask ourselfves: why do we so often despise quality in favor of illusion and the peace of reason in favor of fear?
Angelina's words are in line with the magazine covers; what is there up in the front in either case: Angelina herself or breast cancer? The answer, again, is straightforward.
Angelina tries to convince her aim is to inform other womem. I take that as self-justification. Else, she talks about herself, her family; her now minimal chances of having breast cancer, since, well, she has no breasts anymore. It is like saying one cannot lose their job since they are already out of work.
Jolie's declarations are junk food
for those hungry for anything
but quality and reason.
While placing herself in the center, Angelina makes a concession in the end to refer to women in general. She then offers herself a leading role in a life-death cause. We take sides with EPOCA in taking that as pretentious rather than heroic. There is nothing heroic in fear and escapism.
One thing is buying the diagnosis based on a test only one company provides, then following the only "salvation" track "open" by such test, which, obviously, seems the most effective. But then, how can one compare? Not even "goddess" Angelina can. That is why it is totally another thing acting as a publicity pin-up and/or an advisor of such monopolistically traded products and services, without technical qualifications or whatsoever means to assess them, being, in addition, aware of one's own tremendous power of influence.
One thing is recognizing to oneself how afraid one is about the chance - a more sensible word than risk - of developing cancer. Another is sparking off fear all over the world, while hipocritically promoting the search of information. The whole mortal sapiens species knows cancer is never faced mainly rationally.
Several years ago, when I was deeply in love and faced constraints to marry my lover, I wrote a poem that associated an element of the body with love. In English (I wrote it in my mother language, portuguese) it goes:
Love is like a nerve
It can link,
it can desperately hurt.
A nerve reminds us that there is
something incredible
beneath life.
So is it with love.
In order to overcome
or just bear
the pain caused by the love-nerve
we look towards the sacred.
...
anything to attain a Meaning
that surpasses the loss...
The sacred then is confused
with such Meaning.
But every confusion is valid
in this martyrdom
that is having things
so fragile as nerves,
and depending on
others so incredible
as love.
(from "Como um nervo", translated into English by the author, Mariangela Pedro)
In this discussion, I would confirm that anything is valid in the search of Meaning, adding: as long as it is an internal affair. One of the mind. One essentially private. One that can at best rely on the ones closely involved, only.
THE MEDIA FOLLOW-UP
Many have taken the same naive approach as the Brazilian columnist Ruth Aquino (incongruously also published in EPOCA): "In the latest magazine covers, she is like a sublime goddess, herald of the suffering of millions of women", says the journalist.VEJA also argues in favor of the image of the heroe, assuming what have crossed the actress's mind before her reaching a decision: no director would give her new roles as a fatal woman and the like. As to this, we must remember Angelina announced her retirement as an actress a few years ago.
All this heroic attribution from the media is meant to serve a vested purpose: make other women jump into taking the same medical path, while not the least so beautiful as the actress, while any role of fatal woman is even in the shadows. The Market thanks for that.
The fear arising from a perceived risk
generally leads to an even higher
risk - and one more tangible. Mass
media has been adding a lot of
spice to that tangibility.
We named in the two previous parts of this article rare sources of actually rational information and argumentation, which our not among the best selling items of the media.
[We have not yet looked for other articles in The New York Times itself. We hope something more inquisitive and less misleading than Angelina Jolie's words haa come out, or will come out soon.] UPDATED (below)
We have by now retrieved a NTY article about the issue, published on the same day as Angelina's letter. It is long and we thus have not gone through all of it. But we soon found the statement quoted as follows, which echoes one of our main points:
"... some doctors also expressed worry that her [Angelina's] disclosure could be misinterpreted by other women, fueling the trend toward mastectomies that are not medically necessary for many early-stage breast cancers."
That implies there is a market (including doctors, clinics, so forth) where one can be operated on unnecessarily. That must be especially true, of course, if a great disposition to paying high for treatment (knowingly, most people become so inclined when their health appears under great risk) proves viable. That may be not something ellegant to say, but once one gets blind when it comes to risks, the fear arising from a perceived risk generally leads to an even higher risk - and one more tangible. Mass media has been adding a lot of spice to that tangibility.
REFERENCE
link to the article of The New York Times mentioned
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/15/health/angelina-jolies-disclosure-highlights-a-breast-cancer-dilemma.html?pagewanted=all
