Taken for a fluoride
It’s difficult to know where to stand on the issue of water fluoridation. After listening to two days worth of pro- and anti- ‘experts’ shouting at each other on the radio, I’m still none the wiser.
Advocates insist that we need fluoride in the water if we’re not all to end up with cakeholes like Shane MacGowan. Those who are against say better that than bone cancer. Either alternative seems to have a grotty, unpleasant outcome.
Health Secretary Alan Johnson insists that ‘prevention is better than cure’. Fluoride in the water means fewer trips to the dentist. And with there being fewer and fewer NHS dentists these days, you can see why Alan might be keen.
When you think about it, adding chemicals to the water supply could cure all manner of ills. First, we should add Prozac to the water coolers on the floors of stock exchanges across the world, to stop the traders feeling gloomy and bringing about the self-fulfilling prophesy of a global financial crash.
Then it has to be LSD in the water supply for the general population - to make us all think we live in a magical wonderland where everyone is happy and performing their designated role with the optimum economic efficiency. Think of the money we could save on PR, spin doctors and all the other professional liars who are paid to tell us we’ve never had it so good and not to worry. Prevention is better than cure after all.
One of the side-effects of an excess intake of fluoride is apparently increased docility. Whether that’s a good or a bad thing depends on where you stand. Personally, I hope Alan Johnson’s hands don’t shake when he’s adding the recommended dosage down at the water treatment plant.
Posted on February 6th, 2008 at 1:13 am
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Filed under New Labour, Science and progress |
You may be onto something with docility. In metropolitan Sydney where I used to live, 100 percent of water out of the tap is fluoridated (and usually tepid). Look at what happened after I arrived here and the effects of the flouride (eventually) wore off.
;o)
Careful, people will be pointing you out and saying, ‘Look children, that’s what happens to you when you don’t take your fluoride.’
Ah yes, but I can dazzle them with my winning (and largely intact) smile.
We have flouride in our water, apparently.
And there’s me thinking it was all the hash I smoked…
Then it has to be LSD in the water supply for the general population - to make us all think we live in a magical wonderland where everyone is happy and performing their designated role with the optimum economic efficiency.
I take it you’ve never dropped acid. During my LSD years I believed a lot of stange things, but the thought that I was “performing [my] designated role with the optimum economic efficiency” never once crossed my mind.
‘Tis true that I am regrettably unschooled in the way of psychadelics. It’s something of a regret.
Everything I know about acid I got from Aldous Huxley and the last five minutes of this episode of The Simpsons.
How about Soma?
I always thought the most psychedelic episode of The Simpsons was The Mysterious Voyage of Homer. A classic.
Did anybody actually ever put LSD in the water supply?
Did anybody actually ever put LSD in the water supply?
No. It’s not actually possible. LSD degrades rather rapidly on exposure to water, heat and light. This includes even the water vapour in the atmosphere, which is why it needs to be stored in a sealed container, in a dark, cool location if you want it to retain any potency.
There’s a famous case where a rumour began that Abbie Hoffman planned to dump LSD into a Chicago reservoir. The Deputy Mayor of the city mobilised the National Guard and 2,000 troops were deployed at the reservoir to prevent it happening.
Hoffman said later; “I read in the paper the day before that they had 2,000 troops surrounding the reservoirs in order to protect against the Yippie plot to dump LSD in the drinking water. There isn’t a kid in the country, never mind a Yippie, who thinks that such a thing could be done.”
Hoffman recommended that the Deputy Mayor check with the chemistry department at the university. Apparently the politician replied that he had already asked the scientists on his staff who had assured him that it could not be done. But he was concerned that perhaps Hoffman had gotten hold of “better scientists” so deployed the troops anyway.
(I love that story. It says so much).