Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh is support a new McEwan's and Prostate Cancer UK partnership
Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh has stripped down to his smalls to expose the naked truth about prostate cancer – a disease which kills one man every 45 minutes in the UK.
The 59-year-old best-selling novelist has backed a campaign by iconic Scottish beer brand, McEwan’s, that will see all profits from every pair of custom-designed McNificent (McEwan’s new strapline) boxer shorts donated to Prostate Cancer UK, the leading charity in the fight against prostate cancer.
Irvine said: “When I heard what McEwan’s was doing it appealed on quite a few levels. I grew up with McEwan’s – my dad drank it, my granddad drank it and I don’t think there’s a photo of me taken in the 80s where I didn’t have a can of Export in my hand. While I haven’t lived in Scotland for a while I have a massive soft spot for McEwan’s and love the new look.
“I relish a challenge so if it takes me getting my kit off for the world to see to get through to other men of my age that prostate cancer is not something to be trifled with then that’s what I’ll do…to be honest I’m a bit of an exhibitionist anyway – this time I’m doing it for a great cause.”
Boasting two top-ten beers in the UK*, the recently rebranded McEwan’s commissioned underwear brand Bawbags to produce the boxers, which are emblazoned with the slogan ‘McNificent Man’ – because the average bloke deserves a bit of a morale boost as well as a physical one when he gets dressed in the morning!
The reluctance of men to reveal issues of a personal nature was something that echoed with Irvine, who was born into a working-class Edinburgh family, where football chat was positively animated but privates were kept strictly private.
The boxers will go on sale via McEwan’s website: www.mcewans.co.uk at £12.50 per pair. McEwan’s is also giving a discount of 20% with every purchase of promotional bottles of Export, Champion and Headspace in supermarkets nationwide and a special 20% off code card is being given with each pint sold in participating outlets.
Irvine said: “There’s this whole industrial working-class mentality (in Scotland) too, particularly among men of my generation and older, that you just don’t go to the doctor. If you absolutely had to, it wouldn’t be for anything seen as embarrassing and you certainly wouldn’t have a doctor interfering with your privates.”
“When you hear the statistic that one man dies every 45 minutes from prostate cancer, it’s alarming, but then there’s that ill-placed complacency that you think it’ll never be you. I’ve known more than one person who has died from prostate cancer: a family member and a friend who, by the time the diagnosis was given, the cancer had spread and it was terminal. It’s not worth gambling with your life – that stubbornness, that dismissiveness, seriously you need to get over yourselves and start talking.”
James Beeby, director of fundraising at Prostate Cancer UK said: “We are extremely grateful to Irvine Welsh for speaking out about prostate cancer and to McEwan’s for supporting Prostate Cancer UK and helping us to raise funds for research into better treatments, diagnosis, and the support of those affected by the disease.
