Just to back that up, writer Anna Jane Grossman also got 3 guinea pigs to try to stop using it to check if people would notice. Nobody did, but only one person (an artist, of course) made it more than a couple of days without caving to the overwhelming sense that using these products (and being nearly sweatless and odorless) is expected of us. She tracks this all back to the turn of the last century, when advertisers convinced immigrants to start using it to smell more homogenous to fit into American society — because what America needs today is obviously more homogeneity.

Great job, advertisers!

As anyone who has ever lived or studied abroad in Europe might have noticed, they've not as overwhelmingly bought into this whole idea. In fact, many of them think the main component in antiperspirants (aluminum) might cause cancer (although, our National Cancer Institute, an arm of the FDA, says it doesn't, so I feel better). Of course, they're also generally more comfortable with body hair and the natural aging process and stuff — this insistence that we all look, feel and smell as close to Barbie and Ken as possible seems to be a uniquely American fetish.

(Speaking of fetishes, I strongly recommend no one Google image search "armpit" or "smelly armpit" with the Safe Search function off. Apparently the social stigma against hairy, smelly pits... well, you can probably imagine for yourself what kind of kink that inspires).

As for me, some days I am either too tired or too hung over to remember to use deodorant and (as long as I'm not additionally too hung over to shower and have relatively recently shaved) it isn't the sort of thing I remember because I catch a whiff, because there's no whiff to catch. On the other hand, I currently have no less than 5 antiperspirants on my dresser (they all smell differently people!), so I'm obviously a slave to the advertising gods' will, too. I've also noticed that using really strong ones have on the rare occasion yellowed my pits (I have very fair skin, so it's really obvious) and that freaked me out a bunch. I can't say that I'm not sure my European friends are right on this — a little soap, a little powder and a little perfume and I might be just as well off in terms of B.O. And maybe better off in terms of letting my body do what it's supposed to do. But, now that I've written all that, I'm suppressing the urge to sniff my own pits because that's why peer pressure sucks.

(Yes, I just caved. They smell fine.)

Cast Aside Underarm Protection, if You Dare [NY Times]
Putting the Shower to the Test (and the Nose on Alert) [NY Times]
Antiperspirants/Deodorants and Breast Cancer: Questions and Answers [National Cancer Institute]

ICYMI: Where The Ottoman Humping Began [Best Week Ever]

Researchers studying the connection between body-image and self-esteem among adolescents have discovered that young African-American males "have a unique resilience to the 'toxic' stream of media images emphasizing the importance of personal appearance" reports CNN (via Reuters). Lucky boys! But why the discrepancy? (And can we get some of whatever they're taking? -Ed.) Dr. Eliana Miller Perrin of UNC School of Medicine, the lead researcher on the study, wonders if black male adolescents escape the fate of their lighter-skinned (and female) counterparts because images in the media don't target them, adding that it's hard to say for sure because their demographic is — no shit! — a historically understudied one. Perhaps, however, Dr. Miller Perrin should check out the clip above, which — despite its title — seems to leave little doubt about this group's abundance of self-esteem.

Body Satisfaction Reflects Self-Esteem For Most Teens [CNN]