Rob Manker

January 11, 2010
Ladies, would you share your bra color with strangers? Perhaps only "friends" should know something so private?

Brassiere-wearing Facebook users were asked, seemingly in the name of breast cancer awareness, to share a bit of sensitive information they normally hold very close to their chests.

"Some fun is going on," reads the message that Facebook users began forwarding to one another late last week. "Just write the color of your bra in your status. Just the color, nothing else. It will be neat to see if this will spread the wings of breast cancer awareness. It will be fun to see how long it takes before people wonder why all the girls have a color in their status."

It didn't take long. As the chain's popularity exploded -- "pink," "purple," "I don't wear one" were among the countless posts -- some key questions arose. Why were so many women suddenly mentioning their unmentionables? Was the movement legit or merely the latest example of slacktivism, a feel-good effort with little in the way of real results?

The Susan G. Komen for the Cure organization was among those asked if it was responsible. Andrea Rader, a spokeswoman for the group, said it did not launch the effort but called it "a terrific tool for raising awareness."

"We just hope people act on it," Rader said. "Get educated. Get a mammogram."

Well-intentioned or not, by the weekend, the meme had degenerated into a more invasive request: "URGENT! FACEBOOK VIRUS ALERT," the subsequent mass status update reads. "An e-mail recently went out to women asking them to post the color of their BRA. THIS IS A VIRUS. To fix it, you must remove your bra, then go to > Settings > Enable Webcam > Record Movie. Please re-post to your status message."

Something tells us that one definitely has nothing to do with cancer awareness.