Veracity is truthfulness, the real deal.
Although, with the exception of pathological and compulsive liars, most of us don’t spend our lives telling lies to other people, there is one area where many of us have strayed far from veracity, perhaps without even realizing it. Cosmetics, hair dyes, and the increasingly popular use of Botox are all methods of disguising our so-called short-comings in perceived beauty and youthfulness; that is we attempt to hide what we really look like. This means that most of us don’t want others to see us as we really are.
The frightening thing about this is that we don’t even read the lists of potentially toxic chemicals in the products we slather on our skin and hair. We seem to think that skin is impermeable rather than the absorbent living tissue it really is, and while hair is dead enough except for the follicles, our scalps are not.
Then there’s BOTOX – AKA botulism toxin, the most acutely toxic substance known to man. In the days when home canning was the norm, botulism was the number one danger from improperly preserved (translate as ‘rotten’) food. This means that in our quest for eternal youth, we have a potentially lethal substance injected into our faces.
Since most of us aren’t fooling anyone anyway, why do we do it? We must be crazy, or desperate. ‘Cultural pressure’ is a very weak answer.
Although, with the exception of pathological and compulsive liars, most of us don’t spend our lives telling lies to other people, there is one area where many of us have strayed far from veracity, perhaps without even realizing it. Cosmetics, hair dyes, and the increasingly popular use of Botox are all methods of disguising our so-called short-comings in perceived beauty and youthfulness; that is we attempt to hide what we really look like. This means that most of us don’t want others to see us as we really are.
The frightening thing about this is that we don’t even read the lists of potentially toxic chemicals in the products we slather on our skin and hair. We seem to think that skin is impermeable rather than the absorbent living tissue it really is, and while hair is dead enough except for the follicles, our scalps are not.
Then there’s BOTOX – AKA botulism toxin, the most acutely toxic substance known to man. In the days when home canning was the norm, botulism was the number one danger from improperly preserved (translate as ‘rotten’) food. This means that in our quest for eternal youth, we have a potentially lethal substance injected into our faces.
Since most of us aren’t fooling anyone anyway, why do we do it? We must be crazy, or desperate. ‘Cultural pressure’ is a very weak answer.