When you think of insane (and insanely powerful) lobbying groups, you likely think of the National Rifle Association, or whatever shadowy cabal lobbies for defense contractors. You’d be right of course. But don’t sleep on Big Milk. Those wily ol’ dairy farmers have been pulling the strings behind some the most wacky state legislation of the last 30 years, and now it totally makes sense why my mom used to make me drink gallons of the stuff growing up.
If we can’t trust milk, who and what can we trust?
Must Read
“The Female Luchador Who Was Also Mexico’s Notorious ‘Old Lady Killer’”
This is the tale of La Dama del Silencio (in English: “The Quiet Lady”), a female luchador during the mid-aughts whose in-ring moniker hinted at how she could have silently become Mexico’s most deadly female serial killer. Over the course of three years, she brutally strangled and bludgeoned nearly 50 elderly women in and around Mexico City — all while making ends meet grappling in her trademark butterfly mask, striped pink leggings and frizzy orange hair. READ MORE
The Blaxploitation of Quentin Tarantino
It’s no secret that Quentin Tarantino has, for a while now, justifiably been taken to task for the racist depictions of people of color in the movies he makes. But it’s how and why Tarantino exploits black bodies — as either a signifier of “cool,” or a means of punishment — that’s really so disturbing.
Got Milk?
Of the 29 states that have designated an “official beverage” since the 1980s, 21 have gone with milk. A strange choice to say the least considering milk isn’t even that good for you, but it’s a fact that’s made stranger when you take into account the rather insane power the Milk Lobby leveraged to make it so. Pry into the legislation behind milk’s national takeover, as Miles Klee did, and things get even more transparently cynical.
*Sniff* *Sniff* OOOH YEAH
Smelling salts, i.e., ammonium carbonate, has long been popular as a tool for both restoring consciousness for people who have fainted or been knocked unconscious, and in sports for a helluva jolt:
Short-sleeping psycho Adam Gase hits the smelling salts ahead of preseason kickoff: https://t.co/MEeaWE4LeJ pic.twitter.com/XsSyDVDZvH
— Deadspin (@Deadspin) August 9, 2019
One sniff of the stuff by an awake person can center you right-quick. Which kinda makes you wonder: What could smelling salts do for productivity? Eddie Kim attempted to find out.
On ‘Shooting Blanks’
More and more research has found that men suffer enormous shame and question their self-worth when their virility is called into question. So you can understand why a doctor might want to soften the blow when he tells a man he’s “shooting blanks.” But in doing so, they’re inadvertently creating more problems than they’re solving — leaving men feeling defective, useless and like they’re not men at all.
Defending Your Life
It doesn’t matter how hard you work for your degree — PhDs included — if you earned it online, it’s essentially worthless. So says the people who’ve put themselves through school on the internet, only to be forced to defend their education to hiring managers when applying for the kinds of jobs their degrees should have opened doors to. It’s a sad fact that the stigma around for-profit colleges has all but poisoned the well for anyone who opted for an online education — so much so that many are choosing to remove their schooling from their resumes altogether.
Sorry for Your Loss (And Your Finances)
Bad news, all 44.7 million of you student-loan debtors: If you die and you still owe, not all loans are forgiven. Yeah — your parents or spouse might still be on the hook if your debt falls under certain guidelines. Joe Longo broke down who’s at risk and who’s safe from the long arm of collections.
Jeff Gross
Jeff Gross is MEL’s senior editor for social media and content marketing. His daily ICYMI column, which chronicles all things meta on the site, is the quickest way to catch up on MEL, and the funniest thing you’ll read all day. Follow him on Twitter.
