Anti-fluoride nutballs

[alex_antonin]

Here in Portland, the issue of putting fluoride in water has come up. Which came as a shock to me; I've lived in so many cities, and they all did fluoride in the water, that I naturally assumed that every city in the Western world was already doing it. After all, it's proven to be a safe and cheap means of preventing tooth decay, and the only

Comments

[mandragora1]

Oh dear, how wrong can you be. You naturally assumed that every city in the Western world was putting fluoride in water because you've lived in so many cities. Were all of those in the US, perhaps?

Clearly it would surprise you to learn that the vast majority of European countries don't add fluoride to water, then. Only 10% of the population in the UK have added-fluoride water, for example and that percentage is high compared to many other European countries.

This is an example of how carrying out, oh, I don't know, maybe 30 seconds worth of research would have saved you from looking rather, well, stupid...

[boyzici]

Hasn't that already been addressed when he/she said 'I naturally assumed...' Which to me reads as them having come to realise this isn't the case.

[mandragora1]

But the OP is decrying the anti-fluoride in water people as being stupid, presumably on the basis that everyone else does it so why are the people in Portland being so stupid?!

Whereas the reality is that it's only a small minority of cities that fluoride their water. Suggesting that the people of Portland may not actually be stupid for not wanting it. Because if putting fluoride in water is so great, why isn't everyone doing it?

[lied_ohne_worte]

Come now, we all know that US = the Western World.

[m03m]

Exactly! Why can't we stupid Elsewherians just accept that?

[bopeepsheep]

OP has form.

[lied_ohne_worte]

"You foreigners"? Oh, lovely.

[mandragora1]

Hmm, and this would be the point where I ask whether failing to learn from your earlier mistake is the very definition of stupidity...

[gerald_duck]

A learning experience is one of those things that say, "You know that thing you just did? Don't do that." -Douglas Adams

Yeah, I think we know where the stupid is here.

[babybeluga2003]

While I agree OP made a poor choice with this post, don't you think it's a little rough to bring up something from two years ago?

[bopeepsheep]

Two posts made here, both using a flawed "but everyone does it this way, so those who don't are stupid" argument, where "everyone" equals "my limited experience" and the premise of the argument is not even true for his whole country, never mind a broader community. The responses OP made in the first are relevant to the decision about whether it's worth even engaging with this one.

[foreign_xchange]

MTE, thank you!

[conuly]

Only 10% of the population in the UK have added-fluoride water, for example and that percentage is high compared to many other European countries.

Well, you know what Americans think of your dental care : )

...though, funny thing, I have no idea if that stereotype is at all warranted.

[bopeepsheep]

Apparently not! Britain's children (along with Germany's) have the healthiest teeth (of OECD countries). We don't put as much effort into the "must be dead straight, must be blindingly white" part, it's true, but it's certainly an option open to us. We just don't feel the cultural imperative to fix one mildly crooked tooth or bleach our teeth two shades lighter than the natural enamel.

(My dentist - who is Danish - explained natural enamel colours to me a while back, as I had no idea that they vary so widely. Very few people have naturally white teeth, apparently, and he thinks that bleaching them is "wewy foolish", weakening a healthy tooth for purely cosmetic reasons.)

[foreign_xchange]

Apparently that stereotype comes from the 1950s/1960s before the NHS and free dental care for u18s, but I don't think many people around the world would have had a high standard of dental care then! Plus, the statistics which the above comment added.

[conuly]

Well, the US doesn't have state-paid medical OR dental, so who are we to complain?