The Macmillan cancer adverts

[LionsTeeth]

They just give me the rage “a Mum with cancer is still a Mum”. Well, obviously!
Perhaps I’m completely missing the point of them but my god do they make me angry.
It can’t just be me who finds them in poor taste?

Yeah I don't like them either, I don't get the point really. I understand the need for advertising though, I now have direct debits set up for GOSH and Cancer Research thanks to adverts. The CR one with the wee boy getting dressed for his first day at school with his mum's reflection in the mirror behind him and then she disappears, had me in tears. It still gets me when I think about it

Yeah I definitely understand that they have to advertise, I just hate the way that they’ve chosen to do it.
That CR one was heartbreaking

'I know it's hard.' Um, no you don't. 'You're going to be okay.' 'Actually, I might not be, lady, I may die.' Hate those ads!

Yes I feel like shouting that they may be okay but my Mum isn't. 😟. And my God! If you have itvplayer they repeat them every break!

I've had cancer and I just switch these adverts off. Macmillan really hacked me off anyway. They have a forum for cancer sufferers, which I was on. I had a rare type of cancer which they know bugger all about, so I posted a link for someone to help them find information. Macmillan didn't approve and deleted my post.

Oh, yeah, the guy all on his own in a gown in the wind. 'Are you okay, David?' Well, no, dumb ass, I'm not. I've got fucking cancer.

I agree, and it's not just Macmillan.

There is a Cancer Research shop in our local town center. It has an A-frame outside with "Cancer can't" and a who load of things that cancer can't do. One of these is; "take away hope" It just gives me the rage, I want to storm in there and shout at them "When you get a terminal cancer diagnosis, yes it can take away all hope".
Sorry OP, just needed to get that one off my chest.

Some times these charities really don't stop and think about the people they are there to help.

I think the idea of them is to kind of say I’m a Mum not a victim even though I’ve got cancer.

I think they’re done terribly and can’t believe they even get airtime. So many better ways to do it! Think adverts just try too hard for a “tag line”

Oh, yeah, cancer can't. Fuck you! I lost all hope, I lost dreams, I lost love, I lost my sanity, I lost my faith, I lost everything the day leukaemia killed my 9-year-old daughter. I don't donate to CR, either, because despite using children in the majority of their adverts only 4% of their funding goes towards paediatric cancers.

I don't like the focus on "cancer, I'm gonna kick your butt" mentality.
It negates the feelings of those who didn't "survive" or "kick butt".

That's another thing, the bloody BBC always report when someone has died of cancer, that they "lost their battle". It's crap saying that because it sounds like you didn't do well enough to get better.

I agree, my best friend was the biggest kick ass, no shit kind of lass you would ever meet.

Boils my piss when I hear people talking of battling cancer, and that they are 'coming to get you cancer', losing the fight etc.

My BFF had an aggressive stage 4 ovarian cancer. No amount of 'fighting' would touch it FFS

I fucking despise Macmillan with a passion, their gimmicky fundraisers and stupid adverts make my blood boil! Their piss farting about meant my mum had to wait 2 weeks to get home from the hospice and died a few days later. They made her last weeks harder than they needed to be so they can take their exorbitantly expensive ad campaigns and gimmicks and shove them where the sun doesn’t shine! All that money and it’s not going where it’s needed most!

Sorry that was a bit ranty

I like them.
Last year my mum was diagnosed with cancer out of the blue. Really dire outlook and no signs as she wasn't ill.

She is a mum, nan, wife and teacher first and cancer patient second.

At the beginning all our conversations centred around cancer and chemo. Even our normal everyday conversation disappeared until I realised and it took time to go back to her being mum and nan first.

She's in remission ATM.

Notreally I can understand that. Macmillan promised nurse provision to my terminally ill stepdad, and on this understanding he was released from hospital.
I travelled 250 miles after two days to help her, to find she had had to provide 24/7 nursing care for a dying man with multiple brain tumours. He was taken into hospital and died that night, next morning they appeared at the door to return his commode etc., to the local hospital - so that it looked as though they had provided the care after all.
FIL is now terminal with lung cancer, and being treated by the 'Macmillan Wing' of his hospital.
I hope his poor wife doesn't end up treated like my mum, dh and I live in Scotland and they are in Bedfordshire, so it will be difficult to get there quickly if they are left with no support.
It's bad enough to suffer cancer, to be offered support that is not forthcoming as well is just cruel.

@Coffeethrowtrampbitch I’m sorry your stepdad went through that, and you and your family too. I do hope your FIL receives better care I have to say the Marie Curie nurse who sat with us all the night Mum really began to decline was incredible, she was just quietly holding us all together.
But I shall never forgive Macmillan, they held things up needlessly and caused my Mum further distress at a really rough time for her.
I hope your FIL has the best palliative care available and that you all get the support needed x

I think Macmillan do some fantastic work but I stopped supporting them when they continued to use the ghastly ‘Brave the shave’ campaign despite numerous complaints from people who have or had cancers. The adverts are irritating.

The adverts annoy me in that they make people think that the minute they have a cancer diagnosis there is lots of financial help waiting for them . The reality is that there isn't much unless you are disabled enough by your cancer to access disability benefits ( very difficult), or you are on such a low income that you qualify for one of their charitable Macmillan grants . It is easy to understand how a cancer diagnosis can mean hundreds of extra pounds spent - travelling to regional centres for treatment, hospital parking costs for numerous appointments, special food, wigs ( not everyone gets them free), loss of earnings etc, but in reality there is very little help and people are still governed by our not very generous benefits system. I wish Macmillan would emphasize this and spend money changing the system rather than misleading everyone when they are already vulnerable.

That too! DS1s lovely stepmum is halfway through a brutal treatment regime and there is no financial help available at all. Fuck knows how because my XH is a feckless dick and can’t be relied on to bring money in! It’s making a horrendous situation a hell of a lot more stressful on top of everything else. It’s not fair at all.

Completely agree as does dd (age 10) who saw one and said “but mummy WHY would anyone think you aren’t a mum if you have cancer? I don’t understand.”

Macmillan give the impression that they are there for you whenever you need them.. They really aren't.

I would like to know how much of every pound donated to them gets used for marketing and advertising and all the rest of it. The level of exposure mcmillan have at the moment is huge. I prefer to give to smaller charities where I am more certain the money is being used for what donors intend.

youarenotkidding i know what you mean. Ever since DH was diagnosed with lung cancer, every conversation I have - at home, at work, with family or friends - involves cancer. I can't even go to a meeting with senior managers without them first enquiring how he is and how I am coping. I get that they are being lovely and supportive, I really do. But it already fills almost every waking thought I have, so talking endlessly about it in places where I am seen usually as a colleague or a friend, not the one whose husband is sick, feels almost suffocating.

I do get what Macmillan are getting at in these ads, but I think it could have been done better.