Start Worrying -- Details to Follow!If you're the type of person who likes to worry, great news! There's an entire culture out there ready to help you. The latest enabler is the front page of the "Home" section in The New York Times. The lead article — and entire page and a half, or roughly the amount of space usually devoted to stories like, "U.S. DECLARES WAR ON JAPAN" — is all about a new profession, the "building biologist." It's a job straight out of "The Jetsons" or maybe "The Simpsons": A home detoxifier. And while the "biologist" part makes it sound academic, please note that all the profession requires is about a year of online study. So, now you have these building biologists who go into peoples' homes and use whiz-bang devices that light up or hum to measure the "toxicity" in everything. In this case, the Times reporter learns about her candles (toxic), her refrigerator (toxic), her shower (toxic), her oven (toxic), her microwave (guess) and her mattress (surprisingly, not toxic — for the moment. But apparently as the springs get old, they can get "magnetized" and that, for some reason, is bad.) This is not to mention all the radio waves, light beams and electricity bouncing around her home, possibly creating a "body burden." In other words: Just living in any house that is not a yurt is enough to hurt you. So why aren't we all dead? That's the question you have to ask almost every time you turn on the TV, since "Up Next: Is Your __ Dangerous?" has got to be the best-selling hook of all time. I flipped on TV the other morning and there it was: "Up next, on Dr. Oz: Is Your Makeup DANGEROUS?" Then it cut to video of the good doctor pointing to a lipstick and saying things like, "Chemicals ... germs ... " I distinctly heard the words "fecal matter." The reaction shots were priceless. But enough.
So apparently by the time the average American woman has put on her makeup and set foot in the office, she has already put her life in peril TWICE. Then again, thank GOD she is out of her house, that festering citadel of toxins! I was talking about this with Andrew Tallman, host of a radio show on KPQX-AM in Phoenix, and it turns out that he keeps a little tape recording of some of the strangest "DANGER!" stories on TV. His favorite? "How your driveway could be making you sick, at 10!" What's really making us sick is the constant drumbeat of terror. There's almost no item we can use, eat, wear, kiss or plug in that we have not been warned about. Ever look at the recalls on the Consumer Product Safety Commission's website? They recall things so remotely dangerous as to be bizarre. Last year, over a million Little Tikes toy workbenches were recalled because one of the nails ALMOST caused a child to choke to death. The "nails" are made of plastic and measure a little over 1 inch by 3 inches. In other words, they are the size of a saltshaker. But even this is "too dangerous" in our "everything is dangerous" world. What's the downside of an excessively cautious culture? A country that is paralyzed with fright. A country that is putty in the hands of charlatans peddling "safe alternatives" to already-safe items. A country that can't distinguish between a real danger (peeling lead paint on the walls) and an over-hyped danger (one speck of lead paint in Barbie's eyeball). I'm all for ferreting out actual dangers. But if pretty much everything is dangerous, maybe it's time to relax, sip a scotch and (toxic) soda, and enjoy a slow death. Lenore Skenazy is the author of "Who's the Blonde That Married What's-His-Name? The Ultimate Tip-of-the-Tongue Test of Everything You Know You Know — But Can't Remember Right Now" and "Free-Range Kids: How to Raise Safe, Self-Reliant Children (Without Going Nuts with Worry)." To find out more about Lenore Skenazy (lskenazy@yahoo.com) and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com. COPYRIGHT 2010 CREATORS.COM
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