Controversial breast cancer awareness campaign in Singapore

The controversial cartoon character


The Singapore Breast Cancer Foundation (BCF) is a non-profit charity organisation, established in October 1997. BCF’s mission is to eradicate breast cancer as a life-threatening disease

According to BCF, breast cancer is curable if detected early. BCF hopes that by raising awareness of breast cancer and encouraging women to screen themselves regularly, breast cancer will be detected earlier and the chances of surviving the disease will be greatly enhanced.

The mission is noble - but BCF's recent campaign to prevent breast cancer, creates controversy.

This is beacuase A CARTOON character used in that campaign shows the character squeezing a nipple and painted with breasts as its head.

Media reported that the campaign with the tagline “Are you obsessed with the right things?”, was launched by the Breast Cancer Foundation in order for women not to take their health for granted.

Besides the cartoon characters, it also featured the buttocks of a woman painted on bare breasts.

Foundation general manager Christine Ang said it was satisfied with the advertisements as these had clearly sent out the message to women.

The advertisments’ creative director, Thomas Yang, said its team found that many women were obsessed with their appearance, such as their hair, pimples or weight.

“So our team decided to use the naked female body as a canvas to capture public attention and focus on the right part of their body,” he added.