'The Moodys' uses male breast cancer as a comedic device to raise awareness of the rare disease with grave implications
Fox’s holiday-themed mini-series ‘The Moodys’ features a whole host of absurdities. The Moody family is full of quirky characters -- a romantically-confused man, a good-for-nothing son with delusions of wealth and a gruff-yet-lovable patriarch who suffers from cancer but doesn't want to dampen everyone’s spirits with the news.
There is another reason why Sean Moody Sr. (Denis Leary) doesn’t want to talk about his cancer though. He has Male Breast Cancer. When he does mention it to his elder son Sean Jr., he mentions how his friends had a good laugh when they heard about what he had.
And, while it is juvenile to laugh at cancer of any kind, one can see where a 60-something man and his friends are coming from. For many, it just sounds like an absurd notion: “How can men have breast cancer!”
And the reason behind such an idea is that it is a rare disease. According to the National Breast Cancer Foundation (NBCF), even though males do not develop milk-producing breasts (everyone, whether biologically male or female, are born with some breast cells and tissue) a man’s breast cells and tissue can still develop cancer.
The NBCF notes, however, “Even so, male breast cancer is very rare. Less than one percent of all breast cancer cases develop in men, and only one in a thousand men will ever be diagnosed with breast cancer.”
In fact, as per BreastCancer.org, “In 2019, about 2,670 men are expected to be diagnosed with the disease. For men, the lifetime risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer is about one in 833.”
But how does breast cancer affect males? Male breast cancer, per the Mayo Clinic, is more common in older men. It can, however, occur at any age. According to Cancer.org, while most breast cancers begin in the ducts that carry milk to the nipple (ductal cancer), some start in the glands that make breast milk (lobular cancer).
Cancer.org notes, “Men have these ducts and glands, too, even though they aren't normally functional. There are also types of breast cancer that starts in other types of breast cells, but these are less common.”
Being a rare disease has its downsides. It often goes undiagnosed for a long time, sometimes enough for it to reach a fatal stage. While many women know to look out for changes that could indicate breast cancer, there is less awareness among men, leading to the unlikeliness of the disease being caught in the early stages.
According to a report on Medical News Today, “Breast cancer can also affect males differently, as they have a small amount of breast tissue in comparison with females. This can make it easier to detect small lumps, but it also means that the cancer has less room to grow within the breast. As a result, it may spread more quickly to nearby tissues.”
The report adds that around 40 percent of men with breast cancer receive a diagnosis in stage three or four when the disease has already spread to other parts of the body. As a result, overall survival rates are lower for men than for women.
So yes, while ‘The Moodys’ uses male breast cancer as a somewhat comedic device, it does a good job of making people aware that no matter how strange it sounds, it is a real disease with grave implications.