Walking with Father Time

This morning I was doing some of my weekly eyebrow maintenance. As I sat, being all "girly" I started thinking about how obsessed gay culture is with image. From what we put on our bodies to what we look like when we take everything off, gay men seem to be more obsessed with perfection than our heterosexual male counterparts. Studies have shown that too, so I'm not stereotyping my own people here. We have our reasons as a cultural segmentation of society, but understanding the root of the infatuation doesn't make me any less susceptible to it. *plucks more strays*

As I was having these thoughts, I started noticing the crows feet forming ever-so-faintly around my eyes. It's not major and not even anything I have to take out in Photoshop yet, but I saw them. I immediately have a flash back to an episode of Will & Grace when Will goes with Karen to get Botox injections. I giggled at the line "Well Wilma! Does my 'mo' want a little 'bo'?" In turn, I was reminded of a book I bought a couple of weeks back called "Origin of Everyday Things."

The book is fantastic and it is exactly what it claims to be. It gives the origins of everyday things that most people wouldn't wonder about. It gives the TV Guide version of the history of all matter of things I use every day but had no idea from whence or where they came. From crossword puzzles to pacemakers and banks to soap, I'm getting my appetite for knowledge whetted on a wide array of topics. I find that kind of thing fascinating, so I obviously had to have it.

So what about the Botox? Well, I did some research. This Mo will not be getting any 'bo' any time soon! I already knew that Botox was some sort of poison. It's actually called botulinum toxin and is a byproduct of a bacterial pathogen called Clostridium botulinum. This little gem was discovered by a German poet and doctor named Justinus Kerner around 1820. In the late 1700s it had caused a European outbreak of botulism, mostly being passed in the inferior handling of blood sausage. Dr. Kerner worked with his 'sausage poison' extensively and found two very important facts. First, interrupts motor signal transmission in the peripheral and autonomic system. Secondly, it was lethal in small doses. I'd say the latter is the mor important of the two.

Well over a hundred years passed and the research on the substance was in medical uses, not cosmetic. Dr. Kerner himself proposed the toxin being used to treat the hyper secretion of sweat glands, diseases associated with movement disorders and the like. But as with most things, the artists of war started to take notice.

The first attempts at creating a biological weapon were in Germany in World War 1. But no good idea should be left alone so America picked up on the idea after the onset of World War 2. The United States Office of Strategic Services even developed a plan to have small but lethal sized doses packaged in gelatin capsules. These would be used by Chinese prostitutes to assassinate high ranking Japanese officials. The plan was scrubbed after the pills failed to kill stray Chinese donkeys in a trial run.

From war comes medicine and cosmetics. In all of this research, the crude form of botulinum toxin A was cultivated in 1946 and then refined by Dr. Edward Schantz for safe use in humans. However, it was not until 1978 (the year I was born) that it was approved by the FDA for use.

So what is the biotoxin used for now? It is used most notably to treat crossed eyes and the spasms associated with cerebral palsy in children. It can treat migraine headaches, tremors, vocal and even gastronomical disorders. Oh, and people use it to treat when Father Time has run a marathon on their face. I just don't think I could do it knowing the sordid history

Oh, and for a quick answer on why gay culture tends to be so body conscious, it's a psychological reaction to the effects of AIDS in the early 80s. Men did not want to look sick, so they began pumping themselves up to prove their physical status of being well. That ingrained itself into our culture and now nobody remembers why we started. At least it keeps us in shape!