Here are 5 things to know about black teeth. Japanese women used to blacken their teeth and shave off their eyebrows post marriage, prior to the mid nineteenth century. Ohagaru was practiced up until the Meiji era. It is interesting to view this custom through the lens of our current 21C obsession with very white teeth. Some see this as further evidence of the control and denigration of the human rights of Japanese women in their traditional society, whilst others disagree with this conclusion. Early western anthropologists described ohagaru as an abhorrent custom, which disfigured women. The custom was, also, practiced in parts of China by minority groups.

List Of 5 Things To Know Of Black Teeth

- Black teeth were once considered sexy in Japan. - This female fashion trend caught on in China & The Philippines too. - Black teeth signified female sexual maturity in many parts of Asia in earlier centuries. - The polarity between black & white may reflect the earth vs the heavens. - Women represent the earth/black sexuality = fecundity. Black Teeth Were A Mark of Girls Coming of Age in Asia

It is recorded in the seventeenth century by Spanish colonial officials that this practice, also, occurred in the Philippines. Other countries where the black teeth regime for women was practiced were Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, India, and various Pacific Islands. It was a ritualistic mark of girls coming of age as women in parts of Asia for millennia. Its social function was involved in the determination of the status of women within these societies. The obvious result to western eyes was to make the married woman less attractive to those who observed her. This, however, was not the case in traditional Japanese society, where it was a sign of sexual maturity and beauty.

More Black & White Issues

5 things to know about black teeth. The black and white polarity plays out throughout humanity’s many interests and values. White teeth are considered today to be a mark of youth, beauty and purity. Movie stars in Hollywood are signposted by their gleaming chompers on screen, no matter what type of character they may be portraying. Dentists are making a fortune from our current obsession with white teeth as an aesthetic imperative. Click here for more to see an example of a modern dental practice philosophical approach to dentistry in the 21C.

Teeth Blackening Agents

In Vietnam, Si La men painted their teeth red and women theirs’ black. The interesting thing about this practice is that the blackening agents used, often, protected their teeth and enamel from decay. In Japan, they utilised iron filings in vinegar with some vegetable tannins to create the blackening agent. The agent needed to be applied daily or every few days to maintain the effect. In India they employed a mixture of iron and copper sulphate with vegetable tannins, such as myrobalans. Islamic cultures, also, employed the teeth blackening ritual as part of the female sexual cycle. Prostitutes had black teeth to symbolise their sexual maturity. 5 things to know about black teeth!

Reasons To Blog

“There are those that blog and those that don’t. I would posit that there are many more non-bloggers out there than the dedicated and diligent keyboard artists. Here are 5 top reasons to blog. Writing is for many an undiscovered joy and a challenging chore, when they are forced to record their thoughts on screen in print. Many owners of websites outsource all the boring bits to poorly paid writers, who are, often, located in the third world. Now, of course AI can do all that too. Communication via the written word is, somehow, seen as arcane and not worth the effort. Which means that we have a lot of bad writing and poorly constructed sentences adorning the pages of the world wide web. However, despite this, blogging is the new medium for the essay.”

- (https://wordsforweb.com.au/5-top-reasons-to-blog/)

Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of Bite & Smile: Delving Into Dental Care For An Informed Choice; What Price Life?;  SpeakTruth; The Stoic Golfer; Money Matters and America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump.

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I have just had the fortnight from Hell. A week of agonising tooth ache followed by root canal and another week of painful recovery. What is it with human teeth not being up to the job? WTF cannot our teeth last the distance along with other functioning parts of our body? I am angry about my lousy teeth. And like all good humans I am looking for someone or something to blame. I have walked the straight and narrow, for a decade, when it comes to my oral hygiene. Done the right thing diet-wise, according to the experts. Still I suffer like a bastard left out in the cold.

Frustrated By The Failings Of My Teeth

You know, I am tired of that story I peddled about the kid who ate too many sweets. I am fed up with the narrative purporting to point the finger at my indulgent character. Indeed, I’m bloody furious about my lousy teeth. You know, its like a kick in the teeth when you are down. Exposed nerve pain strips you of any dignity and the basic joy of eating. Even a drink of water can set off a chain reaction of shooting pain in the nether regions of my jaw. Why does this shit happen and what is at its core?

Dentist Points The Finger At Sugar

There I was reading an article published online by dental experts, as you do. This toffy nosed dentist from some private London clinic was being interviewed. Mister Dentist told it plain and identified the problem we all endure. The perpetrator, the number one culprit, is sugar – refined sugar to be more precise. This dentist with half a brain put it all in evidentiary terms. He stated that if you examine the prehistoric skulls with teeth, virtually none of them have tooth decay. It is only after we started farming sugar and refined it back in the 16C and it became a major trade commodity that tooth decay went ballistic. The Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, and British made their serious wealth on the back of trade in sugar, tobacco, and slavery. All of these things were interlinked with enslaved Indigenous Indians and Africans working the sugar plantations. This sweet substance, this drug really, was in high demand throughout Europe. Millions of dark skinned people were worked to death and died of introduced diseases in the Caribbean, the Americas, and even in northern Australia. Sugar cane farming has a dark history of degradation and shameful behaviour by whites. “The first place to cultivate sugarcane explicitly for large-scale refinement and trade was the Atlantic island of Madeira, during the late 15th century. Then, it was the Portuguese who realised that new and favourable conditions for sugar plantations existed in Brazil, where a slave-based plantation economy was established. When Brazilian sugarcane was introduced in the Caribbean, shortly before 1647, it led to the growth of the industry which came to feed the sugar craze of Western Europe.” (https://theconversation.com/a-history-of-sugar-the-food-nobody-needs-but-everyone-craves-49823) Sugar is a drug, in the same way that other unnecessary substances like alcohol, opium, cocaine, etc are. We love them and some devote their lives to consuming them. They cause untold damage to millions of lives, billions of lives, and cost us big time. Sugar has flown under the radar for much longer than, say, tobacco but is just as poisonous to our health. Sugar and alcohol are interrelated, as lots of refined sugar goes into our favourite tipples. Think sweet bourbon and cola, the popular drink of working men and women. Consider the fact that the DV crisis, the violence against women crisis is tied to alcohol consumption. Drinking too much amplifies behaviours. These folk drink too much in part because they like the sweet taste. The sweet deceit. A woman is killed by her partner or former partner nearly every day in Australia. Booze plays a big role in this. Sugar plays a role in this too. Still angry about my lousy teeth!

Hands up who only thinks about their teeth when something goes wrong? OK, that is just about everybody. Teeth are not the kind of thing we pay much attention to until they don’t work. Excepting, of course, if you are in the dating market and you are ashamed of how they look or something. Drilling down into your bite and smile. Our teeth are, primarily, functional, as in they are about the bite more than anything else. The importance of your smile has been flagged in recent years, in the main, by dentists seeking more business for their services. Bite and Smile are the two sides of dentistry.

Delving Into Bite & Smile Issues

Most of us just want our teeth to work properly and not cause us any distress. Unfortunately, this is rarely the case and why the bloody hell is this? Why can’t teeth do their allotted job for the life of us? Why do we have tooth decay, gum disease and lose our teeth? Why has our human biology let us down in this way? It is all so bloody annoying and painful too. I mean, the term tooth ache is so maddeningly inadequate when describing the level of pain an exposed nerve can generate inside our mouth. It is f****** agony!

Dentist Calls Out Sugar As The Culprit

I was seizing on this biological failure the other day, whilst in the fevered grip of another broken tooth with decay in my lower jaw. WTF did this keep happening to me? I had changed my ill begotten oral hygiene ways a long time ago. Then, I came upon an article quoting a top dentist in London telling the world why we all have such problems with our teeth and gums. He put the blame squarely at the feet of one thing – sugar. Yes, you say, we all know this. However, I don’t think that we truly grasp the full ramifications of it. This posh dentist went on to say that if you look at the archaeological records of prehistoric human skulls with intact teeth there is bugger all decay in these teeth. It is only after the introduction of refined sugars in the human diet that we witness a veritable explosion of tooth decay in humans. Refined Sugars Us Primates Can’t Cope With Drilling down into your bite and smile. You see, our teeth and oral health are not set up to cope with all this refined sugar. Manufacturers put it in everything they can because they know we like it. We are weak in the face of our addictions. Many of us are addicted to sweet things and snack on sugary drinks and foods constantly. The sugar does not directly cause decay it creates acidity and feeds the consequent bacteria, which results in infection, decay, dead pulp and severe pain. Our teeth are literally dying in our mouths from being poisoned by refined sugar in so much of what we eat. Dentists are, at once, appalled by this reality and rubbing their hands together in glee at the constant demand for their pricey services.

First Landing of Christopher Columbus by National Gallery of Art is licensed under CC-CC0 1.0 Sugar Plantations & Slavery So, we know about the dangers of too much sugar in our diets. Governments know this too; and why don’t they do something about it? The sugar trade put many European powers on the map. British, Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and others enslaved millions of Indigenous peoples and Africans to work on sugar plantations in the Caribbean, the Americas, and here in northern Australia too. They worked them to death and infected them with diseases costing the lives of tens of millions. Sugar is very special in the history of colonisation – it was the top commodity for centuries. The sugar business remains influential. Sweetened Alcoholic Drinks Fuelling Violence Think about how much refined sugar is in the diets of modern human beings. Drilling down into your bite and smile. The alcohol industry is into refined sugar in a big way. Think about all that sweet bourbon and cola in cans being drunk across the globe. Consider all the trouble that alcohol abuse causes. All that domestic violence against women fuelled by alcohol consumption. A woman dies in Australia at the hands of a partner or former partner just about every other day. Alcohol is nearly always involved. It costs our communities and nation billions of dollars in damages to lives and the economy. Sugar is not only bad for our oral health it is bad for our health, more generally. Poor diets, too much fast food, too many processed foods – they all contribute to Cancers, bowel and heart diseases.  

Have you ever tried playing golf with a bad tooth ache? I have and it’s no fun. Bite & Smile is my new book and is full of expert dental advice. Discover dental secrets to save you money and pain. Why do our teeth fail to measure up when it comes to staying healthy and lasting the distance. In some ways they are like that round of golf where everything falls apart over the final stretch. There are basic scientific reasons why our teeth and gums cannot cope with the modern diet and cause us pain and expense as a result.

Dentists & Golf Pros Endlessly Fixing Teeth & Swings

Is the dental profession a bit like the club golf professional in that fixing teeth and teaching the golf swing are both never ending stories? What do I mean by that? Teeth cannot cope with our modern diet and lifestyles; therefore, they are a lucrative gold mine for dentists. Golf swings never stand up to 18 holes of competitive golf for the majority of players; thus golf swing lessons are a cash cow for PGA club and teaching professionals.

Save Dollars By Knowing More About Dental Secrets Bite & Smile: Delving Into Dental Care for an Informed Choice. Discover dental secrets to save you money and pain. There are some basic things you need to know about oral care and hygiene and these will reduce your need for expensive procedures going forward. Most of us only go to the dentist when we absolutely have to. Dental emergencies are much more costly than preventative behaviours designed to maintain the health of your teeth and gums. Water plays a big role in this and it will cost you little to incorporate this key to keeping your oral care in good shape.