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LiveStrong Bands - Funding or Fashion?
Melody Laila
Lance Armstrong is a retired American professional road racing cyclist who is most famous for recovering from testicular cancer & subsequently winning the Tour de France a record seven consecutive times--1999 to 2005!
During the summer of 2004, the Lance Armstrong Foundation (with initial funding from Nike), developed the Livestrong wristband. The LiveStrong band is ONLY yellow & is part of the Wear Yellow Live Strong educational program, intended to support cancer victims and survivors and to raise awareness about cancer.
The band became an instant hit in the USA and by May of 2005 over 50 million Livestrong wristbands have been sold - and since each band symbolises a dollar donated to cancer research, it's $ 50 million raised for cancer research by the LiveStrong Foundation in just a year.
So far so good.
A couple of months ago a friend of mine came back from holidaying in the States. He had on him a LiveStrong band & told me a little about what it was about. He had lost his dad to cancer and knowing it was a sensitive topic, I didn't ask him any more details.
However a few weeks after that another friend came back from the States & he was wearing multiple colored bands - black, white, pink....
I didn't ask him what they were about but the way he changed bands with his clothes led me to feel it was more about fashion to him than an outward sign of support to something he believed in supporting.
Last Saturday when I went shopping in South Mumbai, I saw tons of "carts" on the streets of Colaba selling bands of every possible color - at prices like INR 20 (if you know Colaba, that mean they'd even sell them for 10). Obviously they were not the real deal. Obviously none of that INR 10 is reaching the LiveStrong Cancer research foundation.
The next day Sunday, I went out with a friend who's down from the UK. He too was wearing many multiple colored bands. I begged him to take them off - if you're not supporting the causes they're endorsing, don't wear them. He didn't listen to me - until we saw (and I say this in the nicest way, since I'm a mac myself Ed: mac is a colloquialism for Catholic) many mac women (complete with stitched floral blouse & black pleated skirt) also wearing an assortment of bands on their hands.
Off came all the bands.
Here's my take on it all - DON'T wear the bands as a fashion statement just because they're cool in the States... (why the heck we Indians think ape-ing the States is cool anyway is beyond me). If you're wearing the bands just as a fashion statement, then you're making a mockery of a cause that is important to many people.
If you truly feel led to support the cause, buy the band DIRECTLY from the LiveStrong foundation and you can be sure that your money will actually go towards cancer research.
And then & only then will wearing that band on your hand make any sense.
LiveStrong Bands - Funding or Fashion?
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Sakshi
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February 1, 2006
12:47 AM
Very well said, Melody.
Now a days..its more about looking cool and trendy in whatever way possible. This is sad but true.
Shravan Sampath
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February 1, 2006
01:08 AM
Why do we assume that funding and fashion should not take place simultaniously? I think Livestrong is such a powerful brand today only because it was fashionable too. It derives its importance from its cause, but its fame from the fashion statement that it makes.
So now, wristbands itself have come into vogue (even without the cause). Whats wrong with that? The people wearing the other bands do not have anything to do with the cause, they're only wearing the band because it looks cool. And frankly, it does!
And lets not get into a debate about the loss of "Bharatiya Sabhyatha" (Indian values)and apeing the west. Why cant we just give each individual a choice to live the way he wants to, and not judge a whole generation for every one of their trivial activities?
Melody Laila
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February 1, 2006
02:19 AM
@ Shravan - You ask "Why do we assume that funding and fashion should not take place simultaniously?"
The point I was trying to make is not that funding & fashing shoudn't (or can't) take place simultaneously.
The point is that when something (in this case, the LiveStrong bands) is supposed to stand for a cause, then to use it just to be trendy (i.e. without funding the organisation) is making a mockery of the cause.
I can't stop anyone from wearing a fake band (that incidentally I don't think look cool) but I can do my bit to help the actual cause through posts like this. When I first posted this on my blog, 2 people went to the original site & bought bands rather than from the streets.
Ultimately, every individual has the right to their own "trivial activities" as you put it but that doesn't mean that makes it socially or politically correct.
Kush Tandon
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February 1, 2006
02:21 AM
Usually, if I buy a band, I donot even wear it.
I agree that one should have some emotional connection with the cause if they are going to wear the band.
Jinal Shah
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February 1, 2006
01:14 PM
I doubt if in USA, half the people who wear those bands endorse any of the causes. Did you hear about the latch-on clocks they've built for the bands? These tiny plastic watch dials that come in myriad shapes and colors are used to give those bands an added twist of individuality.
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