QuickiesSkepticism
Skepchick Quickies, 10.26
- Screenwriter Paul Haggis is leaving the Church of Scientology, and is happy to tell you exactly why.
- Just in case you were wondering: vaginal mints are a bad, bad idea.
- The Walt Disney Company is now offering refunds for all those “Baby Einstein†videos that did not make children into geniuses. (From Steve.)
- Just for fun: Iowa man at a restaurant called a zombie, then punched twice.
- Want to speak at Skepchicamp? Sure you do! Details here.
Here’s a link to Haggis’ full letter.
Re: Mints.
Ummm… Stuff is good as nature intended, IMHO. Just sayin’
I have some damn fine memories of that Panchero’s in IC….none of Zombies tho. ‘Course should that have been a real Zombie that guy would have been pate. Everyone knows you don’t make fluid contact with a zombie.
@fairboxie: I actually ate there earlier that day. There was a disapointing lack of zombie punching.
You know, inside every living person is a dead one waiting to get out. Perhaps people should consider that before universally discriminating or abusing out Post-Vital friends. Vitalism is an ugly thing.
You should never punch a zombie anyway. It has no effect. They might stumble backwards a little bit, but they don’t feel any pain. They just keep lumbering towards you. If it’s absolutely necessary to defend yourself, get a desperately improvised weapon and aim for the head! I can’t stress this enough, people!
Vaginal mints may be bad, but I’m still sorting out the lawsuits from my vaginal vindaloo.
Ugh, some people just don’t know how to survive the Zombiepocolypses.
And, just for the record, I saw the Haggis letter, and thought about going with it, but opted for the Sweedish Church that voted to allow gay matramony. (sorry for the misspelling)
So, I’m guessing the guy who punched the ‘zombie’ was a tad high…
But the Scientology thing is heartening.
Oddly, my work filter flags movieline as pornography.
Vaginal mints are just another example of people getting bad or no sex ed, of being to shy or misinformed to talk to their doctor about private issues. If you have a problem with your vagina, talk to a doctor -just as you hopefully would if you had a problem with your teeth or your eyes. There is a wide range of “normal” for female intimate places, but if you have a concern you should go to the doctor and not to the mint aisle. Just practice good personal hygiene, everywhere, and you shouldn’t need a lot of added products for any body part!
Actually there is some evidence that the practices the vaginal mints are supposed to foster are not exactly healthy for women. There does appear to be an increase in bacterial vaginosis in women who practice receptive cunnilingus.
http://sti.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/76/2/144-a
The reasons for this are unclear, likely the normal flora of the mouth are different than the normal flora of the vagina, and when the vaginal flora is disrupted, then bad bacteria can overgrow causing BV.
Just to be clear, what is meant by “good hygiene†isn’t what main stream media and corporate America promotes. Douching is not good hygiene.
http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/kwn103v1
Douching is bad for you, just like douches are. Avoid both.
@daedalus2u: Oh, absolutely. Again, you shouldn’t really need a lot of extra products to keep yourself healthy. If you think you need something, check with your doctor first.
Meh, making false claims about a product is probably the least evil thing that Disney has done.
I love whoever picked the photo for that vaginal mints story.
@daedalus2u: Well, there goes my business plan for selling flavored douches based on the flavors of Bonne Belle lip balm.
WARNING: TMI!!
External mints aren’t fabulous for the vagina either. Hubby used one of those dissolve on your tongue mint things, and turns out we didn’t wait long enough for the “active ingredient” to be absorbed by his mouth. Shrieks of pain aren’t as romantic as shrieks of delight. Ouch.
I’m 25 and tend to think of myself as mature, however I still found myself giggling at the phrase “vaginal mints”. I had honestly never heard of them before
But what if we added some positive ions to the vaginal mints? That would make it a good product, right?
@davew: Ouch! I had a “husband made chili from scratch earlier today without wearing gloves” incident that makes that too real to be funny. For me anyway, everyone else feel free to laugh it up. Much like I did the night he removed his contacts using the same finger he used to taste a friend’s collection of hot sauces.
@chistat: Egads! I dated a guy who had a thing for eating the peppers straight out of the pepper sauce bottle…
The ensuing string of obscenities could legitimately termed epic.
@BonnieBeth: @chistat: @CanadaLes:
http://justgiblets.com/wp-content/uploads/old/feel_burn.jpg
Boy, there’s truly a lolcat for every occasion, isn’t there?
@SKrap: with my browser, the page just shows up, gives a load error or something, and when I click OK on the error message, the contents of the page disappears and I get a “Page cannot be displayed” errorpage instead. Ther first two paragraphs of the article are at least very interesting. Which is all I can read while the error message shows. Seems like somebody fucked up their HTML.
Luckily the direct link to the letter works much better.
When I saw the heading I thought the mints were vaginal flavored. Why have peppermint when you can have vaginamint! Don’t be a clown, go down … with new Vaginamint! Don’t be a wussy, taste some pussy … with new Vaginamint.