• Los Angeles Times, Tuesday, September 22, 2009 11:30 AM

In applauding a new crop of breast cancer PSAs that "leverage male lechery," Dan Neal writes that the increasing frankness of the ads in "has been a bright spot of adult sensibility in what is Americans' generally neurotic relationship to the female anatomy."

A spot with the tagline "Save the Boobs," from Rethink Breast Cancer is "one of the few occasions when the male tendency to objectify the female body is put to good use, as opposed to selling beer and premium football cable packages," Neal writes. Its chilling message that breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in young women ages 25 to 49 is difficult for men to ignore. October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Neal says that other advocacy groups seem to be catching on to the idea of using sex to sell awareness of their cause. A spot from the National Lung Cancer Partnership features a beautiful woman who strips off a bathrobe to reveal some fancy lingerie wrapped around an ample bosom. As a camera shutter clicks, we see an X-ray of her diseased lungs.

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