Category Archives: Health

Like Get Out Of My Gesicht Already

November 11, 2011 By in Habitudes, Health, Helplessness, Hi-tech, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , 5 Comments

Are we having another Street View yet? German faces on Facebook? Niemals (never)!

When it comes to Facebook’s biometric facial recognition technology “Tag Suggestions”, or just about any other kind of dad-gern-new-fangled sinister and EVIL US-Amerikanische Internet technology out there for that matter, Germans verstehen kein spaß (just can’t take a joke). And when you mix up a little “out of principle” in the fixins’, this latest tasty data protection Skandal is ready-to-serve.

To opt-in or opt-out, that is the question (German paranoiacs prefer the opt-in opt) and Hamburg’s data protection commissioner is now preparing legal action against Facebook and will soon fine the company over its use of said technology because, well, he can.

“Facebook has repeatedly come under fire in Germany, where privacy is a particularly sensitive issue for historical reasons.” Historical reasons? Nonsense. This is clearly a mental health issue.

“We believe that any legal action is completely unnecessary as the tag suggest feature on Facebook is fully compliant with EU data protection laws.”

Germany Will Lead!

November 4, 2011 By in Habitudes, Health, Heconomy, Helplessness, History, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

But only from behind. It’s another one of those German schizoid personality disorder things.

When history dictates humility, and modesty proves so profitable, reticence endures.

Germans tell the pollsters they fear for their money—and then add that they like both Europe and the euro. They sense that it is cheaper to throw up firewalls than to pay for the devastation of the blaze. They bridle at rewarding the vices of the “Club Med” countries. But their real horror is to be left alone in Europe once more.

The Scam That Keeps On Giving

October 18, 2011 By in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Health, Heconomy, Helplessness, High Art, Hustle (Hoax), Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 6 Comments

Word has clearly gotten out now. What used to be a Geheimtipp (insiders’ tip) has now become a full-fledged and nationally recognized Volkssport (national sport): Early retirement due to mental illness.

Up some 6,000 from the previous year, more and more Germans (71,000) are now being “forced” to retire early each and every year because they suffer from things like anxiety disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, multiple generalized anxiety disorder, mega ultra super mulitple generalized really really bad anxiety disorder and other such imaginary diseases.

In fact, being mental is now the number one main excuse used to have to go into “involuntary retirement” in Germany, with the average age of these hapless victims being 48, by the way.

Fear industry profiteers, I mean experts, are happy to report that the increased number of diagnosed cases is due to a greater willingness of sufferers to openly admit their problems, although none of these experts are able or willing to explain where this sudden willingness comes from.

Über das Thema werde jetzt “offener geredet und deshalb diagnostizieren Ärzte jetzt eher psychische Ursachen von Leiden.”

Nice Mellons, Mom

October 17, 2011 By in Health, Higher Education Tags: , , , , , , , , , 3 Comments

Mother Knows Best (Father Knows Best got cancelled long ago)? Well it sure ain’t Leave It To Beaver we’re talking about here.

German sex experts (and there’s a whole bunch of those, let me tell you) think that parents’ porn fears are exaggerated and that online pornography is actually a wonderful and thoroughly wholesome way to change the way young people learn about sex.

Well hot diggity dog, it’s still changing mine and I’m as old as the hills.

Carl’s mother holds a PhD in cultural studies. She has done research on pornography herself and now writes erotic novels.

She explained to her son that he shouldn’t worry if his first girlfriend didn’t moan loudly during sex and that the actors in porn movies use lots of lubrication.

“My mother told me that the positions they do are all just for show.”

“I learned some things from porn,” Carl says, “like licking, for example.”

Sauerbraten Is Hell

October 14, 2011 By in Health, Home Cooking Tags: , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

Don’t ever eat German food in northern Afghanistan.

Some 200 NATO soldiers got food poisoning after eating in a German canteen in the ISAF regional headquarters in Mazar-i-Sharif.

But don’t worry, everbody has recovered and “overall fighting strength was not affected” (for the better? – maybe you should worry).

Too bad the kitchen has already been disinfected and everything. They could have started offering this stuff to the Taliban.

Army scientists were still hunting for the source of the infection.

German Soldiers Burning Out Like Flies

October 7, 2011 By in Habitudes, Health, Helplessness, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , 2 Comments

And here you thought American soldiers had it bad. Put yourselves in a German soldier’s boots for once already.

It seems that the many Bundeswehr reforms taking place these days (they’re basically cutting the German army down to the size of a large police force which will never be used either) strain German soldiers way too awful much. Particularly “overtime and anxiety about the future” afflict them grievously, I read.

“It is an unprecedented test of severity” for these soldiers and their families, causing frustration, turmoil and exhaustion and… Burn-out! You know, another one of those imaginary disease imports custom-made for German society, or the lack thereof (Burn-out is very fashionable here these days. Just the other day a Bundesliga soccer coach threw in his towel quite publicly. A freakin’ soccer coach?).

And the punch line of this article (which I originally assumed to be of a satirical nature)? Not a word was mentioned about Afghanistan or any possible stress that a German soldier might be experiencing there. I guess that means that it’s less stressful to be a German soldier in Afghanistan than it is to be one back home in Germany.

Although it must be kind of stressful, or at least confusing, being a combat soldier in an army that never takes part in any combat operations even when it is in a war that isn’t really a war because this is Germany and being in wars, although having an army, is no longer provided for. Damn. Just thinking about that has me burning out already.

“Es darf keine Reformverlierer geben.”

Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life

October 5, 2011 By in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Health, Helplessness, Home Cooking, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

First the good news: Germans are no more depressive than they used to be.

The bad news is that they are now no longer expected to keep their depressions to themselves and are being asked to come out of their closets to tell everybody about it.

The numbers are shocking or something. Fear industry experts at the Foundation for German Depression Assistance say that there are four million depressed people in Germany, two-thirds of them being women. Just like the rest of us, their lives are filled with angst, emptiness and desperation. But unlike others, these folks are much easier to manipulate (by organizations like the Foundation of German Depression Assistance, for instance) and can and will be made to come public with their ailments, real or imaginary, thus “breaking a taboo” and further increasing their number and the throng of psychotherapeutically challenged pilgrims to organizations like, well, take a guess.

The development is in fact so dramatic that comedian Harald Schmidt has been asked to get involved as a sponsor. And anybody who wasn’t depressed before attending a conference moderated by this guy will be by the time he leaves.

Gee. All of this gives German depression assistance a whole new meaning or something.

Vier Millionen Depressive in Deutschland – das kann nicht nur am Fernsehprogramm liegen.

I Can’t Look Away

September 27, 2011 By in Hard Facts, Health, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 4 Comments

Nor blink anymore. Remember the old days when addiction had to do with actual addiction? I mean, with an actual substance? No, I guess you don’t.

Anyways, a new fear industry report tells us that some 560,000 Germans are now “addicted” to the Internet. How shocking or something.

Addiction here means that these poor lamentable victims can no longer stop surfing on their own (that’s why they – and we – need the fear industry, see?). Like the helpless zombies that they are, these addicts live day and night (mostly night) in a so-called “virtual world” because it is there and only there that they can find fulfillment and recognition (albeit virtual fulfillment and virtual recognition).

And their addiction is in fact so way bad out of control that many of these victims (and I really want to stress the word victims here) no longer go to school, university or, gulp, even work (even when they have work, which most probably don’t, and which can also be very addictive, by the way, the work, I mean).

Doesn’t anybody out there care? Other than me (not)?

And doesn’t anybody out there other than me break out in loud laughter when reading ridiculous nonsense like this? Hello? Does anybody read me? Or am I lost in my “virtual world” again? Uh oh. The sun’s coming up.

Das seien etwa ein Prozent der 14- bis 64-Jährigen, sagte die Drogenbeauftragte der Bundesregierung.

What Identity Do I Wear Today?

September 23, 2011 By in Habitudes, Health, Heconomy, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

So what do you want, Germany? The Germans don’t even know themselves what they want with Europe and/or Germany: In a survey this September by Der Spiegel, clear majorities of Germans said that it wasn’t right to help Greece and other countries with the bailout fund and that Germany was not benefiting from the euro zone. But a clear majority also believed that European institutions should be given more power in a crisis. Classic German schizophrenia again or what?

Not that it matters or anything. In the final analysis nobody is asking you what you want: The European Union is a union not of peoples but of heads of state. “General Franco was a head of state, too.”

Nope, I still don’t know what “Europe” is supposed to mean here, but I keep getting the sneaking suspicion that I’m not the only one living in Europe who feels that way. It’s just that I, as a non-European, have the luxury of being able to admit that I don’t get it and that I don’t really care.

But as this latest crisis develops, one thing seems certain. Whatever Europe may be, it clearly has something to do with illusion.  Illusion with an s on the end. With lots of illusions. One illusion after the next. Here’s one, for example:

Europe is founded on the illusion of German money without German control. And that bargain has worked, until now, because of the way Germany sees itself within Europe (which itself, as the polls suggest, is an illusion).

“As a good German one has to be a good European.”

More Angst Underway

September 20, 2011 By in Hard Facts, Health, Hypochondria, Hysteria Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

In a shocking new study or something, psychologist expert types have just discovered that up to 17 percent of German young people between the ages of 14 and 20 are currently suffering from the what is now to become the dreaded mass illness ailment sickness known as “social phobia” (formarly known as adolescence). No one has bothered to tell them about it yet, either.

These chronic sufferers, especially the girl ones, regularly avoid situations in which they must meet people they don’t know and do things that they don’t want to do. But there is good news, researchers say. This scourge of mankind (teenkind?) can be treated successfully. By finally growing up already.

“Die gute Nachricht ist, dass soziale Phobien erfolgreich behandelt werden können.”