War Metaphors and Cancer

2013-14710
BACONGUIS, Liana Isabelle T.
Rhetoric of Cancer Reaction Paper

The podcast The Rhetoric of Cancer has cancer patient Andrew Graystone discuss with several people the common metaphor of having cancer as a war zone, and whether or not it is truly appropriate. We as members of society (thanks in no small part to the media) use the war metaphor more often than we realize -- "Alice is losing the fight against cancer," "Bob is struggling," "Carol was very brave," for instance.

According to Graystone's discussion with Dr. Wendy Makin, an oncologist at the Christie Hospital, the war metaphor is sort of dehumanizing towards the person with cancer - it puts them in a passive light, lays out their body as a warzone, starts treating them as "patients" instead of "people." Natasha Hill, Cancer Research UK, notes that the public likes the idea of the war metaphor -- this paints the cancer cells as the enemy and us -- the people working to delay it, to cure it -- as the heroes. Contrary to Makin, Hill also notes that sometimes the war allegory is positive: it presents a motivation or a clear end goal for the patient to stay strong with.

Grayson also met with Michael Overduin, who talked about curing on the molecular level. Overduin's interview is very science-inclined; he also stated that he disapproves of the war metaphor, calling it "a war against oneself" (as cancer cells are body cells that just multiply uncontrollably) and "wrong." Here Grayson offers an alternative analogy that I really liked -- the human body is an orchestra, with several instruments working together to create beautiful music. Cancer is anything -- a misstune, a broken string -- that can disrupt the harmony, and curing cancer is trying to "fix" that. I prefer that metaphor far more than the war one: it treats cancer not as the enemy, but as something that, while unfortunate, just happens, and can be fixed. Jim Cotter, a priest diagnosed with leukemia, described his cancer treatment as a weed killer that was supposed to target one weed but instead killed the whole garden, a sad but common truth for cancer patients (especially in times with less developed medical technology).

Grayson's own coming to terms with his cancer involved neither opinion -- his arc, instead, involved him accepting the cancer and treating it as part of him. He expresses his disapproval of the war metaphor with this line -- "...If anyone says that I have lost my battle against cancer, I will personally come back and haunt them."

Cancer is a mystery that we are still quite far from cracking. However, as all the focus has been on the medicinal research, I appreciated the podcast because it showed what was wrong with the sensationalism on the disease, showing that sometimes even the most common of phrases have quite the unfortunate implications.