handcuffs
By Alexandra Brodsky • @azbrodsky • 9 years ago

Friday Feminist Fuck You: Pink handcuffs

You can’t make this shit up.

Remember how turning everything pink helps cure breast cancer? Right, it doesn’t. Apparently the Massachusetts police didn’t get the memo. Jezebel reports that in honor of October, National Breast Cancer month, the MA police will use pink handcuffs to raise awareness for breast cancer. Yes, you got that right. Pink handcuffs.

What, exactly, do these cops think is going to happen? Why officer, I’m sad you’re arresting me, but could you please tell me the story of the pink handcuffs? Oh! Thanks for the reminder! I’ll do my monthly breast exam as soon as I have use of my hands again and find a five minute break from navigating the labyrinthine criminal justice system.

handcuffs

These handcuffs might take second place only to pinkwashed fracking — which, you know, causes cancer.

One of the many, many ironies here is that health care in American prisons, and particularly women’s prisons, is abysmal. The best way for the cops to keep a woman in good health is probably just to let her out of those handcuffs.

Photo via Jezebel.

Washington, DC

Alexandra Brodsky was a senior editor at Feministing.com. During her four years at the site, she wrote about gender violence, reproductive justice, and education equity and ran the site's book review column. She is now a Skadden Fellow at the National Women's Law Center and also serves as the Board Chair of Know Your IX, a national student-led movement to end gender violence, which she co-founded and previously co-directed. Alexandra has written for publications including the New York Times, the Atlantic, the Guardian, and the Nation, and she is the co-editor of The Feminist Utopia Project: 57 Visions of a Wildly Better Future. She has spoken about violence against women and reproductive justice at campuses across the country and on MSNBC, ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, FOX, ESPN, and NPR.

Alexandra Brodsky was a senior editor at Feministing.com.

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