More “Health” Bullshit

Turns out that this “YOU HAVE TO WALK 10,000 STEPS A DAY OR YOU’RE GONNA DIEEEEEE!!!” mantra is absolute bollocks.  Actually, I always knew this instinctively, but here’s the !Science!:

By analyzing data on tens of thousands of people across four continents compiled between 15 existing studies, a team of researchers has landed on a more comfortable figure: the optimal number is probably closer to 6,000 steps per day, depending on your age.

Anything more is unlikely to further reduce your chances of stumbling into an early grave.

“So, what we saw was this incremental reduction in risk as steps increase, until it levels off,” said University of Massachusetts Amherst epidemiologist Amanda Paluch when the study was released in March 2022.

“And the leveling occurred at different step values for older versus younger adults.”

So… 10,000?

Half a century ago, the Yamasa Clock and Instrument Company in Japan sought to cash in on the buzz left by the 1964 Tokyo Olympics by producing a pedometer they called ‘Manpo-kei’ – a word that translates into 10,000 steps.

Why 10,000? Good old fashioned marketing. It’s a nice, round number that sounds taxing enough to be a goal, but achievable enough to be worth striving for. What it doesn’t have going for it is any scientific backing.

Yeah, but for the Health Nazis, that’s all they needed to boss us around.  It’s like that “drink 100 gallons of water a day” (or whatever bullshit “round” number they came up with for that bit of nannying);  everyone knows (or should know) that too much water is about as bad for you as too little.

Funny thing, that:  humans actually have a trigger mechanism to tell you when to drink.  It’s called “feeling thirsty”, and we’ve somehow managed to survive as a species for thousands of years by relying on it.  Also, we know when to stop, because we start feeling “full”, but clearly we have to ignore our bodies and keep on chugging back the water… until our overworked kidneys say “Fuck this nonsense” and quit.

As will our hearts when, as senior citizens (or “useless mouth-breathers” as the yoof calls us), we end up dying because those useless and as it turns out, dangerous extra few thousand steps will tax that organ into failure.

Every doctor or “health professional” or “fitness expert” who has ever insisted on the “10,000 steps and/or x liters of water per day” regime needs to get strapped to a scaffold and flogged, say, 10,000 lashes with a bullwhip.

Is that too much?  I dunno, but it’s a nice round number.

Return Of The Asshole

Just when I thought that ex-BritPM Tony “Oily Little Shit” Blair had disappeared from public view, he steps forward with yet another Nanny-State idea:

Tony Blair has urged ministers to tax junk food so it is too expensive for the poor in a bit to tackle obesity. The former Labour prime minister urged an interventionist policy on public health, with an expansion of the sugar tax, new levies on foods high in fat and salt, and advertising bans.

He said ministers needed to help ‘create the circumstances’ in which poorer families choose healthy food, and likened the situation to the fight against smoking when he was in No10 — which included a ban on publicly lighting up indoors.

…which did fuck-all except drive people outdoors to get their nicotine fix.  It certainly didn’t stop poorer people from buying cigarettes.  There’s no reason to suspect that his jihad against “junk” food will perform any differently.

I also love the “create the circumstances” line — a classic piece of unctuous Blairite pablum which covers the intrusive governmental bossiness of what he’s suggesting.  “We know better than you what you should do.”  (cf. Hillary Clinton.)  And speaking of this bitch…

This, by the way, is the real problem with electing leaders when they’re young:  they carry on with their bullshit after leaving office (e.g. the Clintons, the Obamas and even Jimmy fucking Carter).  As much as I detest the late Harry S(hitbrain) Truman, when he left the Oval Office he retired to Bumfuck MO and we never heard from him again.

Would that his political descendants would follow his example.

Crap Statistics

Via Reader Mike L. comes this nanny article telling us how youngins are drinking themselves to death:

An estimated 1 in 5 deaths of people ages 20 to 49 were attributable to excessive alcohol use in the United States, according to the study published Tuesday in JAMA Network Open. For people ages 20 to 64, drinking-related deaths accounted for 1 in 8, the study said. The percentage of deaths attributed to alcohol use varied state by state, but nationally it’s a leading cause of preventable death, said lead study author Dr. Marissa Esser, lwho leads the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s alcohol program.

Researchers took national and state mortality data from 2015 to 2019 and looked at deaths either fully or partially attributable to excessive drinking. Those causes of death included vehicle accidents, alcohol poisoning and other health impacts, such as liver disease, Esser said.  The data showed that the deaths fully attributable to alcohol have risen in the past decade, Esser added.

Umm yeah.  Notice how when you add the 50-64 age group’s numbers, the incidence drops from 1 on 5 to 1 in 8 — which should your clue right there that the BULLSHIT STATISTICS bell is clanging loudly.

Ever wondered why beer company commercials tend to show young people drinking at picnics, beach parties, watching the game on TV and so on, and not old farts like me huddling over a pint in a dark pub?

 

It’s because the 20-49 age group accounts for most booze sales (from memory, it’s about 70% although that’s an old number).  Also, youngins (especially young men) are most likely to do stupid stuff, especially when drunk (“Hold my beer!”) and so it’s small wonder that the death rate is high.  Remembering my own misspent youth and narrow escapes, I’m amazed it isn’t higher.

Also from the article is another little snippet which makes me reach for the gin bottle:

“I’m not surprised at the numbers,” said David Jernigan, a professor of health law, policy and management at Boston University. “This is a conservative estimate.”

Health law and -policy?  Allow me to bring in a guest speaker for comment:

It’s all neo-prohibitionism, masquerading (as always) under the mantle of caring.

Fuck off, the lot of you.

Another Added To The List

There is no limit to the micro-managing that a Blue state can descend to:

The bill — Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair — prohibits discrimination based on natural and protective hairstyles, including braids, locks, twists and Bantu knots. It also blocks Bay Staters from being denied employment or educational opportunities due to their hairstyles and textures.
Gov. Baker described the nexus of the CROWN Act as a “citizen movement,” started by a “very small number of people in which the right thing to do became clearer and clearer the longer the discussion went on.”

      

And while we’re there, some old-fashioned ones:

   

And of course, my old favorite style chart:

New Horror

OMG:

Applying gun control logic to the above, I think that we should ban all backpacks.  After all, nobody needs to own a backpack, which frees the arms and hands to perpetrate horrible atrocities like this one.  Had the scumbag been carrying a suitcase, he wouldn’t have been able to do this.

Don’t even get me started on the high-capacity military-style backpacks, which have no place in civilian ownership.

Commonsense backpack control.  It’s time.

Language Nannies

And then there’s this development:

Google has announced the launch of an “inclusive language” function to help users eliminate politically incorrect words and expressions. The feature is being introduced initially to Google’s “enterprise-level” users and will include both warnings and suggestions as part of Google’s new assisted writing features in Google Docs.
Typing in the word “landlord,” for instance, generates a warning the term “may not be inclusive to all readers” as well as the suggestion to replace the offensive locution with “property owner” or “proprietor.”

Similarly, Google takes issue with the word “mankind” and proposes substituting it with the more appropriate “humankind.” Use of “policemen” and “housewife” provokes a correction as well, and Google will urge replacing them with the gender-neutral “police officers” and “stay-at-home spouse.”

Curiously, the new software seems targeted only at a specific sort of communication infractions.

How nice.  Wait till this feature turns into “obligatory” rather than just “advisory”…

My message to Google:  take your wokist nonsense and stick it up your excretion aperture.

Oh, and fuck you.  And your poxy email.