Are Health and Social Awareness Campaigns Helpful or Harmful?

Today is the Chicago Pride Parade, an annual celebration of the LGBT community where a diverse crowd lines the streets of Boystown to speak up for gay rights.  This culminates a weekend of events and is part of the larger LGBT Pride Month, which celebrates achievements by gay activists and provides awareness and education for the community.

This is just one of what seems like an endless supply of social awareness campaigns aimed at educating the public about an issue, raising money for a cause, or both.  These events can be large in scope (e.g., Breast Cancer Awarenss month and all related events organized by the Susan B. Komen Foundation), have a smaller scope, but impact the social zeitgeist (e.g., yellow Livestrong bracelets, Save the Ta-Tas merchandise), or be extremely localized (e.g., any of the dozens of campaigns found on a college campus each day).  While it’s hard to argue many of these organizations are successfully getting out their message and raising money to support efforts, are these campaigns good for their causes or more harmful?

Increased awareness certainly has many benefits, especially when taking a controversial or taboo issue and removing the stigma – think AIDS and cancer.  Awareness events are snappy and create a sense of urgency, developing a community that feels more comfortable sharing their issue and changing the cultural landscape.  But at the same time, short sound bites about a cause can distort the message.  Two examples are Prostate Cancer Awareness month, which encourages men to get their PSA screening even though there is evidence that the test is flawed and leadsto overtreatment, and Kony 2012, which got the public’s attention despite Joseph Kony being a marginalized political figure. 

Then there are the challenges that fundraising present.  Susan B. Komen is a great example of when monetary decisions compromise the integrity of the organization and lead topublic outrage.  At the same time, just because a non-profit or awareness campaign is fighting a good cause does not mean they are spending their money efficiently or that every dollar raised is going back to advancing the cause.

Am I against awareness campaigns?  No - I think they can be beneficial as long as they are part of a larger education campaign and don’t just rely on emotional pitches to rally support.  I also worry about having so many messages coming from so many different sources that they all lose their meaning and do not engage enough people.  My hope is that people enjoy events like Chicago Pride Parade or other health-related events, but continue to educate themselves about the cause long after the rainbow flags are removed from Broadway.  And, if these messages are becoming watered down or distorted, I hope organizations have the self-awareness and lack of pride to reallocate their resources elsewhere to achieve better results in another way.