How Macho are You Now?

Long ago, doctors used to not treat prostate cancer right away because it was a slow growing cancer. In this environment, my grandpa got prostate cancer. But later, in about 1987, they reexamined the cancer and found that it had spread. It spread to his testicles. The doctors had to remove his prostate and his testicles. He lived for 12 more years after that, if you can call that living. I only learned this last November, when my dad told me, because he just learned. He had also just been diagnosed with prostate cancer and had his prostate removed in January. He talks about it all the time, and I'm really glad.

According to the BBC, men don't want to get checked for prostate cancer because they are worried that it isn't "macho." Just a bit of how our idiotic gender norms harm everyone.

In a related story, we are first led to believe that having daughters leads to prostate cancer, then told that the results are inconclusive, but not until the end of the story. The media just can't seem to help itself when it comes to the birth of girls and negative consequences. Then again, maybe I'm just sensitive. I wouldn't be if so many places in the world didn't see the birth of a girl as a disappointment.