And this achieves what... exactly?

I've never understood the purpose of "raising awareness" for a particular cause. The whole concept seems so absurd. Case in point: today, on Facebook, a silly little thing has gone around, encouraging women to post the color of their bras as their status updates in order to "raise breast cancer awareness." It's one thing to do something goofy like getting all your friends to tell the world what bra they chose to wear, but it's another to claim that doing so has any value or importance. It's amusing. Let's leave it at that. It isn't really "raising awareness" for anything, for starters, and secondly, what good does "raising awareness" do exactly? Ok. I'm aware. So...?
My beef with the whole concept is that it really accomplishes nothing but make people aware that a problem exists. Yes, breast cancer is bad. It exists. How is posting what color bra I'm wearing going to help or change that? Better yet, how is my knowledge of its existence going to change anything? Most people with an internet connection (and more than two connecting neurons) are AWARE that breast cancer is a problem that exists. But by being aware of it, it still isn't going to solve the problem. It's not like it's some secret that people don't know about and need to be informed of (through absurd methods). I understand that one needs to be aware of a problem before being able to do anything about it, but so many people just stop at the awareness part. And really... everyone already knows about breast cancer and AIDS and poverty and PETA and world hunger and all those other big causes that people love to waste time "raising awareness" about. If those "awareness" efforts were redirected elsewhere, just think of what could be done!
The bottom line is that "raising awareness" is pointless because it's just not enough, and people spend more time informing themselves and others than actually DOING anything about it. Actions will always speak louder than words. So next time, how about instead of posting what bra color you're wearing (or having a big free concert for Africa that doesn't actually do anything to end poverty in a place thousands of miles away), donate some money to that cause. Or volunteer at the organization you're proselytizing about. It's so much easier to just "raise awareness," isn't it? It makes us feel just self-righteous enough without getting our butts off the couch or away from the computer and actually effecting a change. And we love easy. We'll do anything if it's easy enough. Now that I think about it, the whole concept pretty much sums up the mediocre mindset that our society embraces: All talk, no real action. We feel good enough about ourselves that way. If we didn't actually do anything, well, hey, at least we talked about it...


It's too bad I didn't know about this bra color thing sooner... I would've worn a much more interesting bra today.