# Why dont Koreans need to use deodorant? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 17, 2002, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286 "2002-08-17T03:10:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Space\_Vampire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Space\_Vampire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Space_Vampire)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/21 "2002-08-17T20:30:28Z")
Couldn’t find deoderant in China either. People didn’t even know what I was talking about when I used the word I found in the dictionary. “Perfume?” “No, so I DON’T smell.” Nothing. ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/22 "2002-08-17T22:17:18Z")
My earlier point exactly. There`s no earthly reason why the natural bodily odours of a person who bathes or showers regularly should be considered offensive. Commercial interests have managed to persuade us otherwise. I trust the Chinese public will be a little more perceptive. ---
**Author:** ![phartizan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba8739/32.png) [@phartizan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phartizan)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/23 "2002-08-17T22:30:14Z")
I suspect it’s partly diet. I’ve been going regularly to Taiwan for decades, and at first they neither stank nor had deodorant available. But this summer, Whew! Plenty more stinkers than I ever noticed before. My wife argues it’s because their diets are becoming increasingly westernized. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/24 "2002-08-18T00:52:07Z")
Definitely it seems that different races have different stink levels, but as has been suggested that could just as well be due to dietary habits. Arthur (or is it Alex) Haley, in _Roots_ said his ancestor Kunte Kinte could smell the white men on the dock as the boat pulled in. ---
**Author:** ![Space\_Vampire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Space\_Vampire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Space_Vampire)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/25 "2002-08-18T01:08:21Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by aldiboronti \* > \*\*My earlier point exactly. There`s no earthly reason why the natural bodily odours of a person who bathes or showers regularly should be considered offensive. Commercial interests have managed to persuade us otherwise. I trust the Chinese public will be a little more perceptive. \*\* Whatever, hippie. People is stanky. ---
**Author:** ![bbeaty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c0e974/32.png) [@bbeaty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bbeaty)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/26 "2002-08-18T05:06:58Z")
Try this one: [http://www.killbo.com](http://www.killbo.com) The stuff mentioned on this website does work. Strong body-odor is a bacterial infection, and if you kill off that particular bactrial strain, you won’t stink no mo’. If an entire foreign culture lacked the “American Stank Microbe”, then they’d have a strange lack of deodorant products in that country. The most useful item in the above [KILLBO.COM](http://KILLBO.COM) site is the fact that the stinky bacteria inhabit the **underarms of shirts** , and are NOT killed by washing or by dryer heat. Bathing doesn’t stop them because your underarm’s petri dish is immediatly recontaminated when you wear clothes. Fortunately the bacteria are very sensitive to chlorine bleach. If you take a shower and then apply deodorant once and wear Chlorox-sterilized shirts, it takes many days for your normal stench to return, even if you sweat like a pig. (“Mitchum” deodorant seems to work best as a bacteria killer.) The author of the KILLBO site claims to have gone months without getting re-contaminated with the smelly bugs. PS, if you wash your laundry with chlorine bleach, and if you leave the wet cloths in the machine for many days, they have no stench! No “wet dishrag odor.” It’s really amazing. Usually I have to re-do the laundry if I leave it in the machine more than 24 hrs. ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 8:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/27 "2002-08-18T08:12:45Z")
I think Qadgop answered the OP perfectly well, but since some people continue to suggest dietary reasons, I’ll just add some anecdotal evidence: my best friend, born in Korea but raised in America since the age of two, with very typically American dietary (and other) habits, has never had any need to use deodorant. ---
**Author:** ![Babar714](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/779978/32.png) [@Babar714](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babar714)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/28 "2002-08-18T08:20:05Z")
Yeah, and we’ll be getting rid of the bacteria in our intestines soon, too. Qadgop got it right. I’m not a physician, but we did go over this in an anatomy class I had. He said it exactly as I remember. ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/29 "2002-08-18T11:44:01Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Babar714 \* > \*\*Qadgop got it right. \*\* Let’s just see now. 25,000 Dopers at $ 65.00 per Doper for an office consult…geeez, no wonder he drive a **Lexus**. 😃 😃 😃 😃 Thanks, **Qadgop** , you are as usual the veritable font of all things medicinal and healthy. So, how’s the Leech Farming coming along, anyway? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/30 "2002-08-18T14:34:42Z")
Font? Or Fount? It’s important. 😃 Raising a nice crop of mosquitos, now that the rains have come. The Lexus now has 185,000 miles on it. Thank the gods for weekends. No prisoners! ---
**Author:** ![Enola\_Straight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dec6dc/32.png) [@Enola\_Straight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Straight)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/31 "2002-08-18T17:09:18Z")
American Stank Microbe. What a cool band name! ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286/32 "2002-08-18T17:16:25Z")
My Korean pals are just as stinky as I am, and believe me, I don’t smell like rose-petals, ever. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-koreans-need-to-use-deodorant/124286.md?page=1)