36—SATURDAY Vanguard, JUNE 6, 2015
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#Hold A Coke With Your Boobs #HoldACokeWithYourBoobsChalenge prompts fury after women are accused of trying to make breast cancer sexy... Campaigners have accused the organisers of t h e
#HoldACokeWithYourBoobsChalenge on social media of attempting to make breast cancer ‘sexy’. The trend, which was started by a Las Vegasbased ‘adult entertainment’
scout encourages women and occasionally men - to post photos with a soft drink held in their cleavage. A large number of images have already been posted online showing mainly topless women attempting to cover their nipples while holding a can of coke in their breasts - all apparently in the name of raising money for breast cancer. But it has since emerged that the trend started out as a joke intended to make fun of similar ‘challenges’ such as the Ice Bucket Challenge, and that no money is being raised for charity. Since the trend started, a large number of women and a handful of men have taken to social media to post photographs of themselves posing with a can or glass of coke stuffed into their cleavage. While some women use their underwear to hold the soft drinks, many others have opted to pose completely topless, covering their nipples with their hands or with tassles. Not to be outdone, plenty of men have
How did we get it so wrong?
H
ad things gone a little differently, they could have been sipping champagne around the Cabinet table by now. But as it is, Ed
Last FARE-well W
ith his hands gripping the s t e e r i n g wheel, he sits upright in the driver’s seat of his cab. But this Puerto Rico taxi driver won’t be going anywhere soon - because he died earlier this month. And the two men stood beside the veteran cabbie’s Toyota Corolla are, in fact, mourners at his wake. Victor Perez Cardona’s dying wish was to be propped up in his cab for a final time before his burial. After he passed away from cancer aged 73, his C M Y K
daughter Generosa Perez fulfilled his desire by sitting him in his beloved taxi and inviting loved ones to come and bid her father a final, unusual farewell. On Sunday, hundreds of mourners stood and looked at Cardona, who had been a taxi driver for 15 years, at his wake in Aguas Buenos. Some even climbed into his taxi and sat in the passenger seat. Perez told Elnuevodia.com that the bizarre sight had attracted a high number of people,
including members of funeral homes in the area. ‘Many have come to pay their respects,’ she told the site. She added that her father had always liked a good joke - and had been so passionate about his profession that he had wished for his relatives and friends to honor it following his death. Mourners were permitted to take photos of Cardona, who apparently started off driving public buses before he got work as a cabbie. He later became k n o w n throughout his town as ‘VitÌn the driver’. Cardona was removed from his cab and taken to a chapel on Sunday night.
happily joined the hashtag - using tape to strap the soft drink to their chests if their own cleavage isn’t large enough to hold a can. The#HoldACokeWithYourBoobsChallenge was widely believed to have been a way for members of the public to raise money for breast cancer charities in much the same way as the Ice Bucket Challenge raised more than £75 million for those suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. However its origins have now been exposed as somewhat less charitable, after ‘adult entertainment’ scout Danny Frost and glamour model Gemma Jaxx admitted it was them that started the hashtag. More importantly the Breast Cancer Research Foundation revealed that the trend isn’t raising money for them, telling Esquire magazine that it has no connection with the campaign but would happily receive donations from the challenge should they start coming in. Inevitably the trend has suffered a backlash, with campaigners accusing the organisers of trying to make breast cancer appear ‘sexy’, while others say it is offensive to sufferers of the disease who have had to have one or more breasts removed.
Miliband and his election strategist Douglas Alexander had to settle for a rather more modest refreshment at a pavement cafe. And with their pained expressions and frantic gesticulating, it looked as though the two men were still desperately trying to work out where it all went wrong. Two weeks after their dreams of Downing Street were dashed, the pair met for lunch at an organic cafe in Hampstead, North London. As they chatted, former Labour leader Mr
Miliband, 45, chewed his fingernails before holding his head in his hands. Across the table, his former shadow foreign secretary – who was responsible for Labour’s election campaign – stared glumly into the distance. Of course Mr Alexander, 47, may have been reflecting on losing his Paisley and Renfrewshire South seat to 20-year-old politics undergraduate Mhairi Black, the Scottish National Party candidate who is now Britain’s youngest MP. And Mr Miliband,
The 12-year-old Aussie girl who took on her dyslexia by writing to the world’s most famous sufferer, billionaire Richard Branson…
A
12-year-old dyslexic girl who penned a letter to Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson to ask him to raise awareness about the condition has been called ‘inspiring’ by the billionaire. The high-profile businessman, who also has dyslexia, shared Isley Hermansen’s story on his blog and praised her for seeing her condition as a ‘gift’. Isley, from Queensland’s Gold Coast, made a video and penned a letter to Sir Richard to get his attention. In her note to the British airline boss, Isley called on him to watch a YouTube video she made about famous and influential people who had overcome their learning difficulty to do extraordinary things. ‘Richard Branson will you help
kids like me learn to “fly” like a dyslexic? Please help me,’ Isley wrote. Her list included not only Sir Richard but The Beatles’ John Lennon, artist Leonardo Da Vinci, actress Keira Knightley, physicist Albert Einstein and celebrity chef Jamie Oliver. The young girl enlisted the use of the internet and asked people to use the hashtag ‘like a dyslexic’ to get the attention of the billionaire. Isley told Channel Seven’s Sunrise the hardest thing about being dyslexic was ‘not being able
meanwhile, is still living in the dark shadow of the ‘Ed-stone’, the infamous 8ft 6in monolith inscribed with his six election pledges. He endured ridicule for ‘acting like Moses’ – not to mention the weeks of mockery that followed a series of awkward photographs of him eating a bacon sandwich inelegantly. The pair ’s glum faces echoed that of former shadow chancellor Ed Balls, pictured in the Daily Mail last week lugging a pile of dirty work suits to the dry cleaner. to keep up with other kids in classrooms’. She also asked Sir Richard to impart advice on other young people living with dyslexia. ‘I think the thing to do in life is to do what you’re good at and perhaps delegate the rest,’ he told her on the breakfast show. ‘You will be exceptional at something... and enjoy what you’re exceptional at. ‘One day I look forward to some kid writing to you... saying how wonderful you’ve been and what you’ve achieved.’ Sir Richard initially responded to Isley’s video on his Virgin blog. ‘Every now and then you come across something so inspiring that you can’t help but share it,’ he wrote. ‘This was certainly the case with this wonderful idea from 12-year-old Isley, who has severe dyslexia. ‘She struggles in school just like I did, staying quiet in the classroom, and feeling dejected. ‘With videos like Isley’s, the word is spreading that dyslexics can ‘Shake the Shame’ and see all of the positives of being dyslexic. ‘It is no surprise that some of the brightest minds and most talented people of all time have been dyslexic. Isley, they are in good company with you.’