Angelina Jolie has preventive double mastectomy

[Minnie]

Originally Posted by Mean Mr. Mustard

But she isn't losing her breasts. She will still have breasts, she is getting implants. There is going to be little to no difference in her appearance, other than a few minor scars according to get own article. I am not saying that it is trivial but it isn't as though she is losing the appearance of her in this process.

She may not be losing her appearance but she is losing a part of herself that a large portion of the population believes is a defining part of her womanhood. People still judge. I've already read remarks that she won't be a real woman now, because of the implants. Uh, wut? People are just stupid. Incredibly stupid. One can only imagine what the dolts will say if she decides to go ahead with the ovarian surgery.

So it's not about her appearance changing or her scars so much as it is to fight the stupidity, to perhaps help other women who are facing a similar choice, that no matter what anyone says, what makes them who they are is still who they are after surgery - that their breasts do not define them.

Im pretty ho hum about celebrities and stuff like this, but kudos to her and others like her, like Christina Applegate, who put themselves out there like this, open themselves up to so much criticism and asshattery, and still come out on top.

If for some reason I'm ever in this boat, I'd have those puppies lopped off in a heartbeat too. I'd rather live and while I'm not wont to give two ####s about someone thinking I'm no longer a real woman because I chose life over a few bits of flesh, I realize there are women out there who will pay attention to the dumbarses and I figure it's for those women that she was as candid as she was.

[tete]

Originally Posted by Daradon

However, losing two would be worse, as testicles do a lot more than breasts. They help maintain hormone levels, they produce sperm obviously. A woman might lose her ability to nurse, but she can still have kids.

Along with breast cancer, the BRCA gene also comes with a significantly increased risk of ovarian cancer. I know of several women in their 30s and 40s who have been faced with the difficult decision to have a hysterectomy or not. One chose to have her tubes and ovaries removed in her mid 30s.

[Zevo]

Originally Posted by Mean Mr. Mustard

But she isn't losing her breasts. She will still have breasts, she is getting implants. There is going to be little to no difference in her appearance, other than a few minor scars according to get own article. I am not saying that it is trivial but it isn't as though she is losing the appearance of her in this process.

She is losing her breasts. I don't think you fully understand the scope of the procedure. She is not just 'getting implants'. While she is saving her nipple, she is having the rest of her breast tissue removed and then having them reconstructed through surgery and the use of implants. you make it sound like she is having the same procedure as someone getting implants for simply enlarging their breasts. Not even close to the same thing.

Link from the original article detailing what is involved with a preventative mastectomy: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/f...ive-mastectomy

[ernie]

Originally Posted by Daradon

Not entirely sure on this one. It does have an affect. I think the bigger fear for men is how other MEN might perceive them if they knew......

Yeah I probably shouldn't have went down that road. I just don't feel a guys balls play into how one sees themselves as a person nearly as much as breasts do for most women. Breasts are just so involved in completely intimate ways for extremely important aspects of their lives (motherhood, sex etc).

To Mustard....if that is truly what you believe then there is really nothing to be said that will change your mind. I think maybe go talk to some women and ask them if it matters just because implants are being put in. I'm guessing you'll have a universal agreement that getting implants doesn't make it a whole lot easier to make such a decision.

[Daradon]

Originally Posted by ernie

Yeah I probably shouldn't have went down that road. I just don't feel a guys balls play into how one sees themselves as a person nearly as much as breasts do for most women. Breasts are just so involved in completely intimate ways for extremely important aspects of their lives (motherhood, sex etc).

To Mustard....if that is truly what you believe then there is really nothing to be said that will change your mind. I think maybe go talk to some women and ask them if it matters just because implants are being put in. I'm guessing you'll have a universal agreement that getting implants doesn't make it a whole lot easier to make such a decision.

And testicles aren't? Also think of the social stigma, it's all over our language. 'That was a ballsy move.' 'Does he have the balls to do what needs to be done?' Etc.

I agree with all your points on the other side, I guess I'm just saying that cancer seems to affect all equally. I don't think any sex (or race or age etc) has it any easier than another.

[ernie]

Originally Posted by Daradon

And testicles aren't? Also think of the social stigma, it's all over our language. 'That was a ballsy move.' 'Does he have the balls to do what needs to be done?' Etc.

I agree with all your points on the other side, I guess I'm just saying that cancer seems to affect all equally. I don't think any sex (or race or age etc) has it any easier than another.

Clearly testicles are involved in fatherhood etc. However, they aren't used for nurturing a child (a very intimate moment for mothers that choose to breastfeed), they aren't part of your everyday outward appearance to the world,and don't tend to be an intimate part of a man's opinion of himself. Indeed some (a lot) of it is cultural.

I also don't think when it comes to this that cancer affects both sexes the same. I believe that overall the rate of breast, cervical and ovarian cancer are signficantly higher than testicular and prostate cancer. A 2011 survey of ~250,000 adults had the overall cancer rate about 2% higher for women (9% of women reporting some type of cancer, 7.2% of men. source: cdc.gov). That doesn't make other cancers less important, far from it, and I believe what you were really going for is that "cancer sucks". Indeed it does having lost a parent, 3 grandparents to it, friends, parents of friends etc (everyone knows several people who have lost this battle..I'm not trying to run up a "scorecard" or anything). But for the topic at hand I think this type of decision is harder for women in a psychological sense. We can agree to disagree on that. But I think we can fully agree on cancer sucks and psycholgically and physically it is a hard fight.

A fight that is hard to win.

I sure wish we could win it every time.

Give money to research!

[Bill Bumface]

Come on guys, are you seriously going to pretend the girls you've been with have spent as much time staring at and fondling your balls as you have with their boobs?

And how every time you walk down the street in a tight pair of pants you notice all the ladies staring at your balls?

It's different, and that's alright.

If I had to chose between losing a ball or my wife losing a boob it wouldn't take me for than a millisecond to hand over a nut.

[MRCboicgy]

Originally Posted by Dion

She does nothing for me.

I'm feeling ya there, bub

[undercoverbrother]

size

Spoiler!