Thursday, July 24, 2003
 
The New Traditional

I heard on the radio today a commercial for the newest and bestest Lasik eye surgery techniques, which explained that whatever new gimcrackatron they've devised certainly beats the traditional Lasik methods.

Undoubtedly, Dr. McCoy would agree that those old, traditional means of Lasik surgery (such as those deployed against Virginia Postrel) were medieval butchers and that they were only one step above using leeches to suck that astigmatism right out of the eyeball.

Pardon me, but my family doesn't have a generations-long tradition for opening the front of the eyeball like a can of french-cut green beans and firing a computer-guided thing-we-used-to-call-a-"laser" against the retina until it scorched enough of the cones and rods to make things better, as though it was a military expedition to win over the hearts and minds of my optic nerve with napalm. Oh, yeah, and then they close it back up, and it either works or you're blind, oops.

Pardon me, but I have done too much QA with computers to trust them with anything like the impressionist-themed remainder of my vision, thankyouverymuch. Sure, I realize that the chances of failure are slim, but I buy lottery tickets with slimmer odds.

So my traditional Lasik surgery technique is mocking the very prospect. And as a conservative, remember, I demonstrate:
  • Fear and aggression of losing what remains of my sight.
  • Dogmatism and intolerance of ambiguity in adhering to my gruesome description of the procedure.
  • Uncertainty avoidance because new technology bad.
  • Need for cognitive closure so let's just drop the subject.
  • Terror management by thinking happy thoughts instead of Lasik procedures as I go to sleep to keep away the nightmares.
So thanks, but no schnucking way thanks.

This sentiment guaranteed only until next midlife crisis.

- posted by Brian J. @ 7:48 PM
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To say Noggle, one first must be able to say the "Nah."