Doug Henwood wrote:
>
> On Apr 11, 2009, at 10:07 PM, Philip Pilkington wrote:
>
> > Hilarious that people have still ignored the psychoanalytic
> > explanation...
> >
> > And hilarious that it sort of explains why more people would care
> > more about
> > their toilet during times in which they have to "hold back" on
> > spending...
>
> That might be interesting, if true, but I'm not sure it is. Americans
> have been obsessed with colonic health for at least a couple of
> decades.
Make that at least a century. I was born in 1930. My feeling is that those of my parents' and my grandparents' generations were excessively concerned with "regularity." That takes us back at least to (say) 1880. Consider the fact that castor oil was once an essential ingredient in every family's medicine cabinet. Also, one doesn't need psychoanalysis to connect toilet habits with issues of control. If I recall correctly, St. Augustine was concerned with the fact that the mind could not control the orgasm. Bodily control as a concern goes way back. It may have lessened after the introduction of anti-biotics transfromed medicine, giving physcians something more than pink sugar pills with which to treat infections. I doubt that anyone on this list can really imagine how powerful the phrase "blood poisoning" once was.
Carrol