Cleaning up
Sunday, 24 July 2005 06:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
miriam_eA massive scam has been perpetrated upon us all.
When I was a kid the Saturday night bath was standard; that was what everybody did. I used to use ordinary, cheap soap on my hair. There were no shampoos or conditioners. When I grew older I used to love the smell of my girlfriend's underarms when we were having sex. And I was aware of the research explaining that humans released pheromones from the underarms -- that it was the reason women's periods would lock-step if they shared much time.
Barely a century ago Queen Victoria bathed a couple of times a year to set a good example for the people of the British Empire.
Now everybody assumes that we all must shower every day and that not to do so is somehow dirty. We all believe that the only way we can clean our hair is to use a shampoo and that it must be followed by a conditioner. Somehow we've allowed ourselves to be brainwashed into thinking that body odor is unnatural and a bad thing.
Our bodies have lost their natural surface ecologies that protect us from invasion by harmful weed organisms. The skin has been daily swept clear of the many species of friendly bacteria which used to maintain our first-line defences.
Our clothes get washed so much that they last only a short time before being unusable. Once upon a time clothes wore out; now they get washed to pieces. And the effluent from all this washing of us and our clothes is wiping out all the life in the streams of the land around us.
I found, recently that for the first time in my life my scalp appeared to be becoming allergic to something, and it seemed to be the petroleum-based shampoo or the petroleum-based conditioner. I tried different more expensive ones and obtained some relief, but it would have cost too much. Remembering the use of soap when I was young, I decided to try it in place of the shampoo, and continue the conditioner. Worryingly, I still had the allergic response. So, still believing all the crap we are fed from the advertisers I very reluctantly tried using just soap.
The result was astonishing. For the first time in ages my hair was really manageable and felt more full than the flat limp stuff resulting from shampoo+conditioner. It no longer shines like nylon hair on a Barbie doll, but big deal! I found that I had to use real soap -- not the solid detergent that most cakes of "soap" seem to be. Real soap can only be found in the laundry part of supermarkets these days.
I am horrified how brainwashed we have all become on this topic. We all fear that others might detect a whiff of natural odor, and have become hyper-dependent upon petroleum products bottled in plastic petroleum products. How the hell have we let it come to this?
Our society is more than a bit insane.
When I was a kid the Saturday night bath was standard; that was what everybody did. I used to use ordinary, cheap soap on my hair. There were no shampoos or conditioners. When I grew older I used to love the smell of my girlfriend's underarms when we were having sex. And I was aware of the research explaining that humans released pheromones from the underarms -- that it was the reason women's periods would lock-step if they shared much time.
Barely a century ago Queen Victoria bathed a couple of times a year to set a good example for the people of the British Empire.
Now everybody assumes that we all must shower every day and that not to do so is somehow dirty. We all believe that the only way we can clean our hair is to use a shampoo and that it must be followed by a conditioner. Somehow we've allowed ourselves to be brainwashed into thinking that body odor is unnatural and a bad thing.
Our bodies have lost their natural surface ecologies that protect us from invasion by harmful weed organisms. The skin has been daily swept clear of the many species of friendly bacteria which used to maintain our first-line defences.
Our clothes get washed so much that they last only a short time before being unusable. Once upon a time clothes wore out; now they get washed to pieces. And the effluent from all this washing of us and our clothes is wiping out all the life in the streams of the land around us.
I found, recently that for the first time in my life my scalp appeared to be becoming allergic to something, and it seemed to be the petroleum-based shampoo or the petroleum-based conditioner. I tried different more expensive ones and obtained some relief, but it would have cost too much. Remembering the use of soap when I was young, I decided to try it in place of the shampoo, and continue the conditioner. Worryingly, I still had the allergic response. So, still believing all the crap we are fed from the advertisers I very reluctantly tried using just soap.
The result was astonishing. For the first time in ages my hair was really manageable and felt more full than the flat limp stuff resulting from shampoo+conditioner. It no longer shines like nylon hair on a Barbie doll, but big deal! I found that I had to use real soap -- not the solid detergent that most cakes of "soap" seem to be. Real soap can only be found in the laundry part of supermarkets these days.
I am horrified how brainwashed we have all become on this topic. We all fear that others might detect a whiff of natural odor, and have become hyper-dependent upon petroleum products bottled in plastic petroleum products. How the hell have we let it come to this?
Our society is more than a bit insane.
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no subject
Date: 2005-07-26 11:34 am (UTC)By the response you've given me I can see that I've made a good choice in adding you. I agree with everything you've said above. I don't expect that we will always agree on everything, but by having noticed some of your comments in Robert's journal I see that when you don't agree with someone you attack their ideas, and not the person. I can't tell you how much I respect that. I wish everyone could be more like that. We have too much hostility toward each other, at least in this country. We really need to try to be much more civil to each other, even when we dissagree, especially when we disagree. I don't think you and I will dissagree too often, but when we do I have a good feeling that we will be civil to each other in our dissagreements.
I lood forward to getting to know you better.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-26 10:00 pm (UTC)On friends and topics: although I mostly talk about things that my old girlfriend (still my best friend) calls "boring and pompous", I value friends who talk about things like the shoes they bought at the mall because they keep me grounded. I have a disconcerting tendency to come adrift from the ordinary world, almost like a disembodied mind. I use those peeks into "normal" life to remind me what it is to be human. :)
Sitting at my desk way out here in the country, miles from the nearest town, with barely enough money to pay the bills, it is so easy to look out at the trees, forget everything, and wonder about universal questions.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-27 12:08 am (UTC)I choose my friens carefully. I had been considering adding you for some time based just on some of your comments in Robert's journal. Just before I added you I clicked on your journal and read your post on bathing and soap. It had personal information in it, as well as some scientific facts, and also some speculation about what a strange society we live in. This one post pretty much covered everything I like to read about in a person's journal. That is what made me decide to finally add you to my friends list. I look forward to reading more of your thoughts.