Remember Paul Elam, the would-be Men’s Rights king whose assholish personality and obvious hatred of women (and, to be honest, most men) helped to derail the very movement he was trying to lead, ensuring that its time in the media spotlight would be a brief one?
I haven’t written about him in a while, because, honestly, there’s not much left to say about a man who will be but a historical footnote. But YouTube vlogger and Manosphere critic Kevin Logan has finally gotten around to doing a video about Elam, and it’s a doozy.
While I don’t agree with the way Logan has framed some of the issues in the video — I think most of you will see what I’m talking about — he does manage to capture just what an odious and angry character Elam really is. Elam’s writings are abhorrent enough, but the video and audio clips of Elam that Logan has worked into his video are stomach-churning, driven by a wide assortment of grudges and a barely controlled rage.
I’ve written a lot of stuff about Elam, obviously, but I’ve only rarely watched his videos. He’s such a toxic human being that it’s deeply draining to listen to him for more than a few minutes at a time. Logan, who obviously has a stronger stomach than I do, has taken a hit for the team by watching countless Elam videos and pulling out particularly revealing moments, despite the toll this much exposure to Elam took on him. So thanks!
I make a few cameos in Logan’s video. Apparently Elam doesn’t like me very much.
Here it is!
Oh, wait, that’s not the video. That’s a video of expert pimple-popper Dr. Sandra Lee draining and removing an inflamed cyst, which is actually much more pleasant to watch than Elam is. (And Dr. Lee is probably the most charming doctor you’ll ever run across ever.) Here’s the actual video.
Ugh. I’m not sure I’ll ever feel clean again.
Deranged can be used as an ableist slur, but it also can be used as a description. I do think that Elam don’t just look like an arsehole. My bet on why he look unpredictable, erratic, and inconsistent is however on him being an alcoholic.
I’ve never been more transfixed by a video that made me physically nauseous, and I’m not sure which video I mean.
The cyst isn’t nearly as nasty as Elam.
There are men out there who know that a bug-eyed rage expression can easily trigger a fear response. Paul Elam is one of those men. Not deranged, just an asshole.
And yet, he spends 100% of his time complaining about them.
@Lea
True, but they’re quite similar in that every time you think nothing more revolting can come out of either– ew! here comes some more vile discharge… 🙁
So, I watched the I&D video, and there’s a couple ways here technique is different than what the surgeons taught me in med school.
1: her incision was a great deal smaller than what I was taught to use. Obviously, a smaller incision would have a better cosmetic outcome (which is important), but I was taught that you had to get a big enough incision to get your fingers in there to look for any loculations (abscesses can often have layers to them, and if you don’t get through those layers, then they just come back).
2: I notice she doesn’t pack the wound afterwards. That’s probably because she’s giving the patient oral antibiotics, which should have the same effect…
Paul Elam? Who is Paul Elam?
I was wondering a while ago about Elam! Haven’t heard much about him since his latest fiasco, ”an ear for men”. Good that he’s irrelevant now.
Oooh, I love Call of the Wildman, too!
I made it about halfway through the Elam video, before I had to stop. I just couldn’t take it anymore. And to think, he has children and grandchildren.
I do like Dr. Lee. Zit-popping is fun and satisfying. I have a small bump on my chin right now. I think it might be a small sebaceous cyst. I’m not going to mess with it by myself.
I’ve had opossums in my basement before. I was able to take a few blurry photos of them. I think they were dazzled by the light, because they didn’t run. Strangely enough, they sat in the cat’s litterbox, as well as a laundry basket full of dirty clothes.
@joekster
I was taught and have done the same – larger incision, break the loculations, pack the wound. (We would break the loculations with a pair of blunted forceps though.) I’ve only done a few cyst drains though, and since I’m not in family med or derm it hasn’t come up again. Maybe this is the new standard of practice? Or the old one…
The difference between a cyst full of pus and Paul Elam is that there is a cure for the cyst…
Hm. The cyst video isn’t super-fun for me, but through it I discovered a video of her popping a bunch of blackheads with a special popping tool, and it’s weirdly relaxing.
I get (small) blackheads on my upper arms and shoulders and have a bad habit of popping them, which is a waste of time and probably a bit irritating to my skin. Oftentimes my fingernails leave crescent-shaped cuts and scrapes – I don’t have a special pimple-popping tool. So maybe I can watch Dr. Lee popping blackheads instead! Harmless fun! For the whole family!
Yes, she sounds nice, too – the way she’s talking to people, telling them what’s going on while being reassuring, chatting about their lives, etc.
I fell asleep this afternoon watching the Elam video, but did enjoy the song at the end.
@epitome, you can buy those blackhead tools at any drugstore; they’re sold by the nail clippers and tweezers. They’re not very expensive at all…around 5 bucks, IIRC.
@mildlymagnificent
Oh my goodness, that sounds painful! Not to mention way too lengthy.
I hope that this infection clears up quickly and completely.
Take good care of yourself.
@Cat Mara
Drawing! And here I thought I might be the only one. When I was very young, my mother used to draw pictures for me and I had this ASMR response.
Now, many years later, I don’t have that response automatically. There’s too much societal architecture in my brain. But I’ve never forgotten it and can will myself into it by not anticipating where the line of drawing will go. I just follow the line and I’m kinda hypnotized in a really pleasant way. I can do that with writing too.
I also have synesthesia (in my case, I assign colors to numbers). I thought I was alone in this until I was 20 and read an article on this phenomenon in Psychology Today. Mind blown.
@Cat Mara and Kat
Is this similar to the sensation you get when someone is braiding your hair?
Because sometimes I get it, too. Watching stuff. But not music, because I do that. And not popping zits/cysts.
But stuff that’s intricate and uses hands, like watching the Buddhist monks put colored sand in a mandala, that I had a chance to see once.
@eli
It is! No one has braided my hair since I was seven and got my first haircut. But I do recall that sensation.
I listened to an NPR podcast called “Invisibilia” and one of their episodes I remembered was about things like synesthesia. I can’t find the direct podcast link, but the entire series was very good. It’s also on iTunes.
http://www.npr.org/podcasts/510307/invisibilia
They were talking about this phenomenon:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2015/03/04/synesthesia-based-alphabet-magnets/#.WJf8tiMrJPU
I’m always interested in synesthesia because certain composers, like Scriabin, possibly Amy Beach and others felt this as a connection with music and colors.
Sorry if this was a double post.
I work for a vet. We had somebody come in recently with a dog who apparently had a burst cyst. Well, it was a burst cyst, but there was a lot more cyst than the owner thought. If they aren’t surgically removed they tend to refill, but a lot of people aren’t prepared to pay for surgery, so – The doctor pokes the cyst. Stuff spews out. Owner leaps back. I lean out of the way. Flushing of cyst proceeds. Dog is very patient.
When all was done I went and described it to the person then at the reception desk: “There were two holes! Stuff spurting out! He stuck a cotton swab in there!” Response: “Was it chunky? I love it when they’re chunky!” We may be odd people.
We had a dog once with a facial abscess that the doctor poked lightly and the pus shot across the room and hit two sets of cabinets. One cup total, surgery involved.
And there is nothing I love like feeling through a dog’s fur for random dog lumps (old dogs can be very lumpy. Sometimes we give up and just record the ones over a certain size) or, better yet, ticks. Ticks are so satisfying to find.
@eli
Thanks for those links.
The second link, Discover magazine, says this:
The Psychology Today article I read said that 90 percent of children experience synesthesia, but only 10 percent remember it. As I recall, this figure wasn’t based on research.
Talk about rough estimates!
@ledasmom
Oh my! My poor little long-dead beagle had such amazing lumps. His dad had them too. They were majestic and they impeded his mobility terribly. I regret that they got to the point that they did. But nobody wanted to do anything about them.
@Kat
yeah, pretty cool stuff. Estimates always seem to be rough!
@joekster (bearded beta) said:
Dr Lee talks about loculations in other videos and sometimes uses a cotton tip or blunt forceps to explore, but you’re absolutely right that she keeps the incision as small as possible for cosmetic reasons. She’s said that based on her experience, making a bigger incision doesn’t necessarily reduce the risk of recurrence. But she will enlarge incisions if she needs to.
(Disclaimer – I watch a lot of YouTube doctors and am slightly addicted to pimple popping and cyst videos! Don’t judge me ?)
Interestingly, there’s apparently recent research that shows, according to another YouTube doc Geoff Butler, there may not be any advantage in terms of healing time to packing a wound (although he says he prefers to do it for other reasons). Might be something you’d have an interest in so here’s a link to the video where he discusses it:
***CONTENT WARNING*** this video also had an infected cyst being drained!
https://youtu.be/0CgNbYhT7cE
Must say, this is still a more interesting topic than Elam – I do try my best to avoid even thinking about him these days. Remember the glory days, when AVFM, The Spearhead, and RoK were the worst things we had to think about? You know – before Trump? *sigh*
@ Eli & Kat
There was an amazing Horizon documentary about our senses. During that it was explained that everyone is born with synesthesia.
That is to say our brains haven’t yet differentiated which bits are going to process which sensory inputs. Over time though the relevant pathways sort themselves out to one degree or another. Adults who experience synesthesia just don’t have the demarcation of the brain as rigidly defined.
However that demarcation isn’t fixed. Turns out there’s truth in the old myth about losing one sense making the other senses stronger to compensate. There was for example a blind guy who could ride a bike by echo-location. When they put him on a CAT scan they could see that the part of the brain that had previously processed sight was now processing hearing.
There was also an amazing thing where they managed to give someone the ability to sense the magnetic field of the earth, to the extent the could navigate blind folded.
Brains are a wonderful things.
This guy. I’m doubly impressed because I can see but I still drive into the back of things.