I have a question!

[conuly]

I go barefoot. A lot. Every chance I get, in fact. I hate shoes. Now, for years people told me to cut it out because "you might step in glass or something, and die of tetnus". (They eventually stopped. I think they got tired of always being wrong). I'd always reply, reasonably, that I didn't see any glass, and that if they could show me some glass I'd be careful to walk around it. This always, ALWAYS prompted/prompts the response:

Well, there could be glass!

I don't understand that. There is no glass. Look up the street. No glass. Look down the street. No glass. Simple observation will tell you that there is far less glass on the street than most people commonly believe. Were there glass, one could easily walk around it, the same way one walks around dropped toys and other dropped... things. I am neither blind nor stupid. I am perfectly capable of seeing obstacles on the ground and not walking on them. However, it does not matter. There is never any glass. I have seen glass on the sidewalk so rarely that I can actually list up the times. And most of the times, the glass was right up against a building, not in the middle of the path.

What confuses me is that, when confronted with one of life's harsh realities, namely the fact that there isn't any glass, people always say "but there could be!" as though this means I should take excess precautions where there clearly isn't any glass (or rusty nails, or lit cigarettes....)!

Why do they do this? Why don't they say something else? I'd even "what would you do if there were?", because that opens some sort of discussion (not much, what I'd do is walk around it). But not only do they expect me, apparently, to protect my feet against imaginary dangers, they also don't like me looking around and pointing out that these dangers don't exist! And I just don't understand that.

Comments

[conuly]

You get tetnus from a type of germ, not a type of material. And they were also afraid, I'm sure, that people just wantonly tossed nails in the street and left them to rust.

[malantha.livejournal.com]

that's interesting. i didn't know it was from bacteria. i wonder why it's always (at least, as far as i've heard) associated with rusty nails rather than anything else.

also, i just found out it's spelled "tetanus". i looked it up on webmd. hehe

[conuly]

I'm not sure that it is a bacterium. It might be a virus or a small fungus of some sort. That's why I said germ. At any rate, it's not an intrinsic part of ferrous oxide, nor nails.

[malantha.livejournal.com]

according to WebMD (http://my.webmd.com/hw/health_guide_atoz/sig3065.asp?navbar=aa67373):

Tetanus bacteria enter the body through skin wounds and thrive only in the absence of oxygen. So, the deeper and narrower the wound and the less oxygen around the wound, the greater the possibility of tetanus.

so, thats why. stepping on a nail would cause a deep, narrow wound. it's not the nails or rust causing it, but just the type of injury making it more likely.

i don't know why i find this type of thing so interesting. :P

[velvetchamber.livejournal.com]

Tetanus (you misspelled it in your post) is caused by the bacterium Clostridium tetani, an anaerobic gram-positive endospore former. If the oxygen tension is low enough the spores germinate, when the bacteria die and the cell wall and nuclear membrane break up a neurotoxic chemical, tetanospasmin, is released. Tetanospasmin is an endopeptidase that selectively cleaves the synaptic vesicle membrane protein synaptobrevin. This prevents the release of inhibitory neurotransmitters at synapses within the spinal chord motor nerves, the result is uncontrolled stimulation of skeletal muscles. The early symptoms of the disease is the tension or cramping and twisting in the skeletal muscles surrounding the wound, and tightness of the jaw muscles. Death usually results from spasms of the diaphragm and intercostal respiratory muscles.

(Information gotten from Prescott's, Harley's and Klein's Microbiology, Fifth edition, pages 924-5)