March 7, 2010 in City

Doug Clark: Can’t hear the bright side, can’t fear it

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I believe the goal of every scientist is to keep the rest of us in a perpetual state of panic and paranoia.

The latest example made front-page headlines this week when a newly released study claimed that taking aspirin might make you deaf.

Isn’t that swell?

It wasn’t all that long ago when scientists were crowing about our friend the aspirin. Nobody said boo about hearing loss.

Paramedic – “You’re gonna make it, Mr. Clark. Thank God you swallowed that aspirin.”

“What?”

Paramedic – “I said, ‘Thank God you took THAT ASPIRIN!’ ”

“What?”

Medicine was so much simpler when I was a kid. Whenever I went to the doctor I would automatically place both hands over my rump.

That’s because I knew I was not leaving that Paulsen Building office without getting a shot of penicillin from a hypodermic needle the size of a railroad spike.

Penicillin was the doctor’s answer whether I had swollen tonsils or a sprained ankle.

Now scientists tell us that taking all those antibiotics created resistant strains of superbacteria that will eat us faster than a school of starving piranhas.

Which has turned America into a nation of germ-phobic sissies who can’t even shop normally anymore.

The other day, for example, I had to go to Rosauers for an emergency kettle corn run. Before stepping inside I started scrubbing down like a surgeon preparing for a gall bladder operation.

It’s so weird. Where did all these little tubs of disinfectant wipes come from?

One day they just suddenly appeared at supermarket entrances with the aggressive Girl Scouts who keep trying to guilt me into buying a case of Tagalongs.

I used to worry about terrorists poisoning the water supply. Not anymore. Americans are even too afraid to drink tap water.

No, the way to bring us all down would be to slip a deadly biological toxin into all the supermarket sanitation tubs.

We’d literally wipe ourselves out in a week.

But here’s the real issue: Why do we let ourselves get so terrified?

Global warming. High cholesterol. Swine flu. Aspirin …

Secondhand smoke used to scare us. Now we’ve been warned to look out for thirdhand smoke, and I don’t even know what thirdhand smoke is.

The truth is that human beings are much hardier than the scientist scaremongers would have you believe.

Watch my favorite TV series, “Man vs. Wild,” if you want proof.

In each episode the star Bear Grylls goes to a dangerous remote location where he dines on raw bugs, grubs, slugs, eyeballs and lizards in order to survive.

But in one show – and I am not making this up – Grylls demonstrated how you can keep from dying of thirst on the African savannah by drinking the juice squeezed out of a fresh mound of elephant poo.

(Quite frankly, if it ever came down to dying of thirst or drinking Dumbo nectar, well, it’s been nice knowing you.)

But think about it. If a hearty swig of pachyderm punch won’t kill you, do you really need to fret about catching cooties off a shopping cart handle?

Doug Clark is a columnist for The Spokesman-Review. He can be reached at (509) 459-5432 or by e-mail at dougc@spokesman.com.

Six comments on this story so far. Add yours!

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  Mr_Bloggy on March 07 at 8:49 a.m.

  I am in complete agreement with Mr. Clark. Spokane is lame this way, you can’t even buy a 2 liter bottle of soda pop at a convenience store without a SPD officer trying to knock all the germs off you with his nightstick.

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  Backcountry on March 07 at 9:48 a.m.

  Yeah, bad news about your favorite tv show. It’s all nonsense. He isn’t in remote locations at all; he’s parked along side of a road, typically in some sort of state or national park, with a dozen man production team. And the elephant poo smoothie? More nonsense. Do you actually believe that an animal living in a desert is going to expel that much water in its waste? In reality elephant poo is nearly bone dry, call your local zoo if you don’t believe me. Oh and ingesting any sort of fecal material in a survival situation likely will kill you. Well, dehydration after a day or so spent with sever vomiting and diarrhea is what will actually kill you but I think you get the point. Everything on the show is about ratings, “survival” advice is just a gimmick to draw in a wider audience.

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  SugarShane on March 07 at 10:33 a.m.

  Im still waiting to see the piles of corpses from swine flu. You all know who you are, story after story about it and you were here to comment about how you got your swine flu vaccine and always use the wipes at the store. Wow surprise surprise, it was all a hoax perpetuated by the media to make you buy vaccines. Fear mongers.

  @Backcountry, you nailed it.

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  suzieQ on March 07 at 12:28 p.m.

  I agree about fear mongering when it comes to global warming, asprin use ect……but what is wrong with disinfecting your shopping cart? Im not afraid I will die if I dont..but if I can avoid getting a cold or flu and bringing it home to my family and being sick and miserable for a few days…then why wouldnt I take the two seconds it takes to wipe down my cart. I appreciate that stores are providing the wipes now…especially since I have a 3 year old who sits in the cart. Do you also think its stupid fear mongering to wash your hands after you go to the bathroom? If everyone would wash their hands and disinfect more often we would have a lot less sick days. Being clean and sannitary isnt fear mongering or something for sissies. Lets see who feels like the really many ones…the person avoiding getting sick or the “tough guy” laid out in his bed for 3 days with a cold. and trust me…men are huge sissies when they are sick.

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  CharlesBillford on March 07 at 2:10 p.m.

  I remember being told we had to take salt tablets in the military. Now everything is low salt, low caffiene, low fat, low calorie and low flavor and high cost.

  Just look at your kids, like zombies addicted to their cell phones, iPods and video games. If they bring a toy soldier to school, they are tased, arrested and the records follows them the rest of their life. We have helicopter mommies and dead beat daddies. Each marriage has a 60% chance in divorce because the scum bag attorneys leach our relationships into their $175 an hour fees.

  When was the last time you read a book, took a walk or listened to a live musician? If we cant google it, it does not exist. We are Wikipeadied into ignorance. We dont learn, we just are trained to find the answer in someone elses search engine.

  Our elected officials steal our money, our vote and our integrity. Cops harass, intimidate and abuse, when they were supposed to protect and serve. Our judges waive a blind eye to the crooked cops, corrupt politicians, scamsters and abusers, and let the guilty dui’s wave bail.

  We are becoming pussified a little more each day by the forces around us that we let be.

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  cowboy on March 08 at 7:47 a.m.

  They have to keep us in a state of fear that way we will follow with out asking questions.

  at some point we will have to face the fear, and realize it has been a smoke screen all along.