Cecil appears to be having so much fun mocking extreme “addicts” he leaves himself no room to consider whether there may be any nub of truth in the claim.
Cecil cites only two sources contradicting the claim, and they are (believe it or not) the two major companies selling lip balm. I’m no conspriracy theorist and I work in the corporate world. I’m not the type to believe “All Big Companies is evil” but for goodness’ sake; there is a level of naivety here on Cecil’s part that beggars belief. What the hell did he expect the companies selling the product in question to say?
Personally a number of years ago I began to realise that I seemed to have a “need” for lip balm all the time to avoid painful cracked lips to an extent that others didn’t. I found that if I stopped using it, I would have to suffer through cracked lips for a while even if I wasn’t in conditions - like being outdoors in windy dry weather or getting sunburned lips - that I would expect to cause problems. If I stopped using lip balm, after a couple of weeks or so my lips would reach a state in which they didn’t crack or get sore even without lip balm. But then if I did something specific to cause cracked lips again - like being outdoors in windy dry weather or getting sunburned lips - and used lip balm again, I would go back to a state where I would need lip balm all the time, unless I went cold turkey for a couple of weeks.
I went through this cycle several times, enough to convince me that the lip balm solved an initial problem but then seemed to perpetuate it.
If one is not quite such a sucker as Cecil and actually looks at some sources who are not financially interested in downplaying the issue, one finds articles like this, which say things like this:
and this:
Nobody (well, nobody serious) is suggesting that lip balm is laced with addictive substances deliberately added by the purveyors in order to hook its users. But there does seem to be some serious basis for believing it tends to perpetuate the problem it solves in a way that makes it tempting to go on using it.
And even if I’m wrong about that, Cecil’s column is methodologically deeply, deeply flawed.
Hmm. That column is 16 years old, when methodology wasn’t so demanding and when there wasn’t an internet. I’ll see if Cecil wants to do an update. Thanks for the comments.
I was going to mention something like this in another thread. We were discussing something or another and someone linked to a Cecil article and, naturally, it was nearly two decades old. When it comes to the internet there’s usually something about just about every topic that’s been written within the last few years and a wiki article that’s probably been edited 15 minutes ago. It might be time to start updating ALL the articles.
I mean, most of them either aren’t relevant anymore or, if they are, have very old dates on them. Maybe it’s time someone at least goes through them and says ‘the information on this article is still 100% valid and worthwhile’, maybe updates some sources and puts a current date on it (I have no idea if that’s kosher though).
After reading this thread, I went back to check the date of the article I had been about to comment on - the one about airbags - and I see that it also is very old. I didn’t realize that any of the articles were old. If the airbags article is just as old, I am wondering if airbags have evolved since 1998. I am a woman under 62 inches in height who sits close to the steering wheel. (That is where the power seat lift puts me, when I raise it to the maximum height.) I never had a car with airbags until 6 weeks ago, and I have been wanting to get the airbag for the driver’s seat disabled from the get-go. According to that old article, people like me can get the airbag disabled. But Cecil is no doubt citing American regulations, and I am not in the USA. I guess I will just have to take my car to the mechanic and ask.
The soothing sensation of the balm is probably masking the fact that you’ve just re-injured the lips from rubbing a cold stiff tube of wax on them. It’s all friction injury; the chemicals have nothing to do with it. I’ve since switched to Carmex or Vaseline and never had a minute’s problem. Use soft, greasy emollients.
Generally, if the article says “A Straight Dope Classic” you can bet it’s not recent, as in not within the last 3 years or so. Many of them hold up; often they include information that makes it clear that they were written in the 90’s and may not be relevant anymore.
As to lip balm, it’s certainly not creating a traditional addiction like nicotine, but I’ve seen many modern studies that show using lip balm increases the need for lip balm. I sadly don’t have time to go track any cites down, but if anyone is really concerned I bet a google search will turn up a lot more hits on real studies today than it did in 1998…
