Column

The Dominatrix of Health

A leather-gloved hand lashes down. WHIP!

Subject in Necessary Need of Elementary Redirection: Aaaagghhh!

The Dominatrix of Health: You think you know what’s good for you? Well I’m going to give you what you really need!

SINNER: Ouch! Oooohhh!

Dominatrix: There. That’s better than all that reckless sunbathing.

SINNER: Ahhhh!

Dominatrix: And all that lazing around on beaches. Submit?

SINNER: Yes. Enough! Stop!

Dominatrix: (Gazing out at the sunshine) We’ve been a very naughty boy with our sun block haven’t we?

SINNER: No. Factor 30+. Honestly!

Dominatrix: Try again.

SINNER: Okay, okay. Factor 15+. And…one day last month I forgot. (On his knees, begging) Please. It won’t happen again.

Dominatrix: (Putting away her whip) That’s better. I have to be strict, you know.

The dominatrix notices a waste bin out of the corner of her masked eye. She reaches in and pulls out an old newspaper. She sniffs it, crushes it with a flourish, and then tosses it to one side.

Dominatrix: (Reaching for something metallic and pointy) Perhaps you’d like to tell me about your fish and chip supper….??

Through screwed up eyes her subject grimaces at the crumpled newspaper on the floor.

The Independent, Saturday 31st January 2004

ADVICE TO AVOID SUN SHOULD BE LIFTED SAY CANCER EXPERTS

The head of Britain’s drive to cut soaring skin cancer rates said the advice to restrict sunbathing is ‘draconian and unnecessary’…

Professor George Davy Smith said: ‘For many people the small increase in risk of melanoma (one form of skin cancer) could easily be outweighed by the effect of reduced sunlight on mood.’

‘Not so,’ says Sara Hiom of Cancer Research UK, ‘…we have to come out with these rather strident comments to get the message across. We have to be rather strict.’

SINNER: Yes. Yes! Hit me. I deserve it!

The ultimate aim of health promotion’s dominatrixes is to have their subjects live as long as possible without pleasure, because pleasure is always risky. But they can’t do it alone. Health promotion requires willing subjects.

Some health promoters and promotees are made for each other. And who’s to say they should abandon their sport, if that’s what turns them on? But why should the rest of us be expected to pay for it?

In the interests of democracy, I propose we end the funding of this rather elaborate fetish on the ground that it discriminates in favour of minority predispositions, and because its directives about what’s good and bad for us change repeatedly. Advice on cholesterol levels, safe drinking limits, the intensity of exercise, sexual behaviour, and now sunbathing have significantly altered over the past decade – in some cases to the point of outright contradiction. So why must we continue to indulge eccentric health promoters?

It is surely only reasonable that health promotion devotees should consent in writing to health promotion activities, must pay for them out of their own pockets, must be over the age of eighteen, and must do what they have to in private – away from the majority of us, who prefer to live guilt-free, balanced lives.

Let’s allow health promotion’s sado-masochists to define their pleasures and pains – so long as they leave the rest of us free to choose for ourselves.