Wristbands

[pjm007]

Please forgive me for sounding nieve, but whats with all these multi-coloured wristbands people are wearing ?

[Greenbhoy]

It's the latest band-wagon (pls excuse the pun) that everyone has jumped on.

It all started with the original LiveStrong yellow band being produced by Nike at the request of Lance Armstrong the American cyclist who has won the last 6 Tour de France, He beat cancer and wanted a way to raise money for his LIve Strong charity that help young athletes with cancer. The rest of the colours are other charities seeng it was a good idea and people out to make a quick buck by exploiting chariies and fashion victims.

[pjm007]

Thanks Greenbhoy, very informative.

[JohnDTC]

i know the blue ones are part of an anti-bullying in schools campaign & the black and white bands sold together are for a nike-backed anti-racism drive -altough some see the latter one as a shameless marketing ploy, & although i usually regard gary neville as a bit of a tit i respect him for saying so in an interview on tv the other day.

[willow74]

New pink ones for Breast Cancer

Red for Tsunami relief

[magicdice]

orange for self-injury awareness day (of which nobody is aware, apparently. my school took down all the posters i put up claiming 'it's not an issue here' when actually this is exactly the atmosphere where most people self-harm)

i think they're becoming more of a fashion thing these days than anything else, which is sad

[milly143]

they are just accessories so people who want to feel good about themselves can say 'look, I gave to a charity'! What they seem to forget is that they don't make these things for nothing. I say if you want to give to charity just don't it and don't preach about it.

[helen_caslas]

i believe the wristbands are a great way to show which charity's you believe in or just a way of showing how much you believe in a cause i dont believe in the people who are cashing in on them by selling people fakes in the street or on ebay.

[marymoose99]

At LifeSIGNS (www.lifesigns.org.uk) we are selling orange self-injury awareness wristbands. We have sold over 1000 so far.

While I can see milly's point, we have found it an excellent way to raise money for our organisation, getting money from people who otherwise wouldn't have donated (of course we have the option for people donating for the sake of donating as well). Sometimes it's nice to actually see something for your money! And with self-injury in particular, the wristbands are a good way of visually raising awareness about self-injury.

All profits we make will be going into other projects and ways of raising awareness.

I for one haven't taken my wristband off since I got it in January, and nor has my husband!

Mary (LifeSIGNS Director)