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 May 13,
2003 -
Death
By Chanel No. 5 - Exasperated by her shiftless husband's stinginess, a Florida woman
exacted a revenge most terrible. Dousing herself and her young
daughter in perfume, the 36-year-old wife paraded before her chemically
sensitive husband callously spraying shots of Lysol and burning scented
candles. Clouds of bug spray completed the scene of horror.
Strangely the husband survived the assault and filed a
complaint against his younger wife. He has produced a letter from his
doctor "confirming" that he suffers extreme chemical sensitivity,
"including all fragrances, air fresheners and other volatile
chemicals," and that his wife was aware of his condition. The
wife's lawyer counters that the husband is "a faker."
 August 27,
2003 -
B.O.
Legislation - "City officials say one smelly
employee is responsible for a new policy that requires all city employees
to smell nice when reporting for work. The Murfreesboro City Council
adopted the good hygiene policy Thursday:
'No employee shall have an odor
generally offensive to others when reporting to work. An offensive body
odor may result from a lack of good hygiene, from an excessive application
of a fragrant aftershave or cologne or from other cause.' "
More outrageous than sitting down and
crafting a law to legislate cleanliness is the willingness of elected
leaders to resort to lawmaking to address all aspects of life. In
the old days an employee whose odor was offensive would have been ordered
home to clean up or to a doctor to investigate any physical
problems. Instead of relying on interpersonal skills and common
courtesy our rules concoct a law that will inevitably be misused.
Expect an anti-smoking hysteric to invoke this law to harass a co-worker
who smokes.
June 23, 2003 -
The Hypochondriacs Are In Charge Of City Hall -
Question: What if I
am already contaminated with terrible smells but I have to go somewhere that
is Fragrance Free? - Answer: If you can,
shower beforehand using baking soda instead of soap and shampoo. Baking soda
effectively removes many odors. Change into clothing that has not been dry
cleaned or laundered with scented products, especially fabric softeners, and
has not been around smoke or fragrances. Rinse contaminated clothes with
baking soda. Dry without additives. Wear a hat to contain residual odors
from hair products. Wear an uncontaminated shirt over your other clothing.
Depending on the event, these measures may be sufficient. Ask others present
if your clothing, hair, etc. is a problem. Leave if you cause discomfort to
others, or sense that your presence may be a problem. Remember: “An ounce of
prevention!” Planning ahead to be free of scents is the easiest and best
solution.
The above comes verbatim
from a Frequently Asked Questions sheet prepared by the city of Shutesbury,
Massachusetts. The interlocutor is one
Ziporah Hildebrandt (we could not make this name up), chairwoman of the ADA
Committee. We single out this one exchange as the most unbelievable in
a list of howlers but each and every exchange is truly jaw-dropping and
displays how far the batty scent-free issue has intruded upon society.
If one is to follow Nurse Hildebrandt's dictates don't imagine that merely
forgoing a splash of cologne or perfume will assuage the hyper-delicate.
To be tolerable in the Shutesbury's odor mania even the hint of an
"unnatural" order upon the body or clothes is forbidden. That includes
smells picked up by handling faxes and paper run through copy machines as
well as all smoke. Just filled up your car? You will be rejected
by the standards of Shutesbury. Welcome to the brave new world of
"fragrance-free" utopia. The odds are that you will not meet the
stringent standards determined by Ziporah Hildebrandt and the whiners that
have hijacked Shutesbury.
April
30, 2003 - Can The Ghetto Be Far Behind? - Shutesbury,
Mass. (AP) -- 'People who attend Shutesbury's upcoming town meeting will be
segregated by scent to avoid disturbing those hypersensitive to chemicals
and odors. Splitting the meeting hall into three
sections May 3 is part of a two-year-long effort that also has produced
``fragrance-free'' hours at the library.
One section of the room will be reserved
for people who never use perfumes or scented deodorants, detergents or other
products. The second will be for those who sometimes wear fragrance but not
on the day of the meeting, and the third will be labeled, ``Seating for
those who forgot and used cologne and perfume.''
Using fragrances in public is similar to
smoking, said Town Administrator David Ames, who is also responsible for
making the town compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. He said
the Massachusetts Office of Disabilities recommended establishing the
fragrance zones.
A local survey found that nine of 52
respondents identified themselves as afflicted with multiple chemical
sensitivities syndrome, although the National Institute of Environmental
Health Science says the very existence of such an affliction is in dispute.'
(Associated Press, 4/28/03)
There really isn't much more to add except
that the reporter neglected to ask Head Nurse Ames just how it would be
determined to what section each person should be herded. Will there be
a super-nose sniffer checking underarm odor? Will Shutesbury invest in
some high-tech scanning device? Town meeting attendees operate on the
honor system? Or will Head Nurse Ames, this being Massachusetts after
all, assign scarlet letters to those sinners who lasciviously smother sweaty
body odor with deodorant so that the pure of scent can recognize their
inferiors from afar?
 January 15, 2003 -
Smelly
bus passengers banned
- That brain and intelligence are now reduced to a pair of nostrils is
a devastatingly sad reality of our contemporary “health-conscious”
society. In the city of Bend, Oregon, ‘The
regulations ban anyone who "emanates a grossly repulsive odour that is
unavoidable by other
Bend Extended Area Transit customers" from being in the bus station or
on a bus. "It's an effort to keep the riding experience as pleasant and
safe as possible," said city attorney Jim Forbes. ‘
It just so happen that the hysteria about odours is also a convenient
excuse to keep the smelly poor off city transit buses. Yesterday’s
segregation was about colour, religion, or even accent. Today it’s about
smell and lifestyle; the excuses have changed, but the substance has not -- it has just
become much more petty. But hey, what is to be expected from a society
that seems to believe that cigarette odour kills?
October 17,
2002 -
How
To Buy Perfume - A Sign Of Our Hysterical Times - Fragrance sensitivity is also emerging as a growing workplace
allergen. “People often joke about it, people wearing offensive
perfumes,” says Carrie Loewenherz,” an industrial hygienist for the
New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health. But, she adds, for
people sensitive to it, it’s no joking matter.
Take Lauren Colburn, an Atlanta, Ga.
newspaper researcher, for example. She had to shift to the “graveyard”
shift — a real hardship — to avoid people wearing perfumes and
fragranced products. “But more sensitive people are speaking up about it,
and I hope the perfume industry is listening,” she says.
The perfume industry can listen intently and
respond to every complaint with alacrity but, as with the tobacco industry,
nothing it does will ever be enough. As the newspaper researcher above
makes clear, only the elimination of scented products will solve this
problem, a problem that didn't exist 20 years ago and occurs only in the
most affluent regions of wealthy nations. Like the scent of a freshly
lit cigarette, an odor that until recently everyone, smokers included, found
pleasing, perfume, cologne, deodorant and the like are all on the chopping
block because of the hyper-sensitivities of a handful of complainers.
The well-researched article delves into some
of the processes at work in producing scented products, identifies a few
special interests who before too long will be advocating
"scent-free" policies and even digs up some common sense comments
from the Environmental Protection Agency.
May
23 , 2002
- The
smell delirium grows -
Allergy
sufferers seek remedy on airplanes – "A new ruling that could
ban perfume on airplanes is being welcomed by allergy sufferers across Canada.
The Canadian Transportation Agency has been investigating complaints from
passengers who reported allergic reactions to perfumes and pets aboard
airplanes. … Dr. Matt van Olm, a Calgary respiratory disease specialist,
believes scented products are like second-hand smoke."
Smokers said goodbye to their right to smoke on aeroplanes long ago. But the
phobia about odours is far from over; in fact, the fraud about passive smoke
just marked the beginning of a sick era of hypochondria and obsession about
odours – and almost everything else. More generally, the sickness applies to
the concept that those who claim to have dysfunction have the absolute right
to force the entire society to conform and adapt to their needs. Long ago
Michael
Fumento warned us on the nose phobia about perfumes; but he was not taken
too
seriously by those whose vision is short enough not to see beyond their nose --
and now here it is. Soon, those who wear perfumes and after shaves on airplanes
will find the police waiting for them at the airport. In times of normality (if
there is such a thing anymore), stating that "scented products are like
second-hand smoke" would simply mean that they are harmless – as much
as "smoking in the elevator" was a police jargon to indicate a
ridiculously small misdemeanour, worthy of just a benign sniff. No more. Today,
junk science frauds find a fertile terrain in the hypochondriac stupidity of the
masses, and allow the real problems to go unnoticed – such as the reduction
of up to 90% of the air circulation on airplanes since the
passive smoke fraud
was embraced by the airlines. All we need is that the air has no scent (of
tobacco, perfumes, or cats) and idiots are happy – even if there is
contamination with tuberculosis, which has no scent at all. One antismoking slogan
goes like this: "If you can smell it, it can kill you." Does
anyone have still any doubt that we are going back to the Middle Ages?
Fragrance
dangers
- "The ban on fragranced products in Halifax, Nova Scotia, is not the trivial or
amusing issue that some media make it out to be. On the contrary, fragrances are known to
doctors, scientists and the fragrance industry as respiratory irritants. People suffering
from asthma, allergies, chronic sinus problems, rhinitis, chronic lung disease and
multiple chemical sensitivities (MCS) have their health problems triggered and exacerbated
by exposures to fragranced products." - Why not? If one believes the second-hand
smoke fraud, one can believe anything!
The smell test
- To the horror of perfume makers worldwide, Halifax
has become the first major center in North America to prohibit the wearing of all cosmetic
fragrances - from Giorgio to grandmother's lavender soap - in most indoor public places,
including municipal offices, libraries, hospitals, classrooms, courts, and mass transit
buses.
Scents-orship
- A story in last Saturday's National Post described the growing number of
scent-free policies that have inundated our government buildings, schools, and workplaces
as "the Halifax holy war." Halifax is also a "hysteria hotbed," and
the foothold of "fragrance fanatacism."
Scents
and sensibility- The anti-perfume activists of Halifax
target young and old alike. On Sunday, The Daily News reported that an 84-year-old Halifax
woman was thrown out of city hall because she wore perfume to a council meeting. And
yesterday, the News reported that the RCMP is investigating high school student Gary
Falkenham after a teacher turned him in for wearing Aqua Velva deodorant and scented hair
gel. Mr. Falkenham is understandably incredulous: "I just looked at [the officer] and
said, 'Are you serious?'"
Scents
and senselessness - Nine cafeteria workers
from the Dirksen Senate Office Building cafeteria in Washington, D.C. were rushed to the
hospital last August. "Everyone was getting sick headaches, stomachaches, vomiting,
diarrhea," said a cafeteria cashier. One worker suffered head and neck injuries when
she collapsed, and the eight others reported nausea. "I threw up. I had a headache. I
felt very lightheaded, nauseated," said one. The cause of this "poisoning"?
"The haz-mat [hazardous material] unit went down, and all the readings were
negative," a police officer said. "What they found was a bag of onions...and
they just gave off a strong odor."
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