Saturday 11 December 2010

A Shocking Cure

Were all Victorian electric devices actually intended as sex toys? There is a modern tendency to make this suggestion; but I'm not sure if it's entirely true. However, when one talks of a machine that 'stimulates the functions of the various organs, increases their secretions' ... hmm ...

1 comment:

  1. I rather suspect that if people wanted sex toys they would be able to obtain them as they still can today in states where such things are illegal. Absence of mention in advertisements does not prove non-existence of the products themselves.

    Surely any new discovery is eagerly taken up by snake-oil salesmen who try to convince gullible would-be customers that they are offering a product with uniquely beneficial properties. For example, there are now pendants you wear around your neck that contain a micro-chip with an electronic circuit in it. As far as one can tell this does absolutely nothing but its vendors of course claim huge benefits to health.

    Anything that the public does not understand (and electricity fits that description in Victorian times) can be pressed into service to construct a fake nostrum with sales assured by advertising written in pseudo scientific language.

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