Join us as we take a look at some of the ethnobotany in the woke-est grocery store in the bay area. Educational content is virtually non-existent as we explore what exactly it would take to make passive-aggressive woke citizens attack a person. Who can do a better job of tokenizing marginalized people? Who wins the most points for having more TRANS-POC friends? Taking a break from the inherent joy of trolling climate-denying obsolete grandpas here to throw some jabs at the other side, as well!
We also explore the phenomenon of "Hippy Snake Oil" (trademark) - In a country where the Healthcare system is completely broken and health maintenance is completely unaffordable, Hippy Snake Oil sells and CPBBD is there to make sure of it by propagating nonsense dressed in a beard and scarf. What happens when a Mercedes or BMW is dented with an errant shopping cart in Berkeley? Which of the 5 varieties of pineapple will Tony Santoro select for purchase? When's the last time a Loss Prevention agent tackled a homeless person in the doorway for shoplifting?
Please be sure to take advantage of the free samples at the cheese counter on the way out in order to supplement your lunch.
Angry EMAIL can be sent to crimepaysbutbotanydoesnt@gmail.com
This "DYSTOPIA LITE" video provided absolutely no educational content, but if you still feel like donating to the cause, consider becoming a patron at www.patreon.com/crimepaysbutbotanydoesnt
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Please be sure to visit the CPBBD reddit for a list of botany, evolution, and ecology books and where to find free pdfs of each. These are important reading materials in this epic time of mass extinction and widespread biodiversity loss. Salam!
Endnote: I hope most people understand that I'm not shitting on all herbalism, which is really just applied phytochemistry. I'm only shitting on the industry behind it and the woo-woo behind the unproven aspects of it. Some of the ideas out there are valid, some are complete nonsense. Plants are essentially chemical factories, and all those secondary metabolites have a purpose. It's all worth being skeptical about until read up on or researched though. Like it or not, the legitimate use of the compounds and secondary metabolites in plants for the remedy of human ailments (herbalism) can turn into just another fad very easily, and behind that fad is a huge industry selling everything from over-priced makeup to tinctures and pills that are %100 snake oil. And fads of ANY kind are fun to mock.
Many people - without knowing anything about the phytochemistry of these plants (and certainly not caring about the ecology or ethical "harvesting" of them) will treat them as remedies for a number of ailments that these plants have no valid treatment of. There are also people who think that because a compound came from a plant, that it is somehow endowed with more remedial potential than a chemical synthesized in a lab, though of course there is no legitimacy behind this. It seems to be another common belief that herbalism somehow trumps and is inherently at odds with "Western Medicine" (ie vaccines and doctors). This is ridiculous, as there is both legitimate science and complete nonsense behind both ("Western Medicine" seems to have a better grip on the "complete nonsense" portion though). Because of some of these silly beliefs, many wild plants end up ripped out of habitat to satiate an obsession that at times can seem to parallel the behavior of compulsive shopping.
Explaining this in depth, of course, kills the joke. It's much easier and more hilarious to let people interpret this however they want and be really mad and upset. But I figure a little clarification and articulation will pay off in the end by propagating ideas about legitimate respect for plants and more importantly, the habitats that they are a part of, as well as maybe inspiring people to think more critically about "natural" medicines (remember, ricin and arsenic are "natural" substances, though I still have no clue as to what that word means) before shelling out 50 dollars on pills and tinctures.