Product warning labels and hot air

It was the badger that sent me down a rabbit hole. Why a Woolworths strawberry yoghurt bar would proudly proclaim that it was “badger friendly” was anyone’s guess. But it had me looking closer at the packaging on other products in an exercise that was good neither for me nor the product.

Take my daily moisturiser as an example. Made by Dermalogica, it boasts “48 hours” of moisture protection. Which would be fantastic, if it didn’t instruct me to apply “twice a day”. In genuine confusion, I approached my wife, whom I consider to be an expert on all household skincare products which includes moisturisers in a subcategory. She was as unhelpful as my daughter, who muttered something inaudible, but which included the word “men”, accompanied by a shaking of her head.

I was none the wiser.

So I did what any sensible, self-respecting adult would do. I turned to the only place where truth and sanity still exist, the internet comment section. After 15 minutes; three conspiracy theories; and one unsolicited skincare regimen involving goat placenta, I emerged even more confused but now deeply moisturised.

But the madness didn’t end there.

Next on my forensic audit of consumer packaging was a bag of mixed nuts, unsalted, because apparently I care about my blood pressure now. The front declared, “May contain traces of nuts.” Which felt less like a warning and more like a philosophical riddle. Was I holding Schrodinger’s almonds? If it may contain nuts, and it’s literally a bag of nuts, is this a cry for help from the person writing the label?

Then there’s my shower wash. A product I have been using for years, mostly as directed, and which recently I noticed carries the solemn instruction, “For external use only.” This struck me as both reasonable and deeply worrying.

Because until that moment, it had never occurred to me that someone, somewhere, might have tried to drink it. Or perhaps use it as a colonic rinse. I’m not sure which horrified the manufacturer more, but it clearly felt the need to make it known that shampoo isn’t, under any circumstances, a smoothie.

And then the pièce de résistance: a frozen pizza box that instructed consumers to “Remove pizza from box before placing in oven.” Which, I would argue, removes the last sliver of natural selection from the modern food chain. If you’re putting cardboard in an oven, nature has tried to warn us.

Honestly, we used to worry about small print hiding nasty surprises. Now, the big print is more alarming. I haven’t even mentioned the bottle of “still water” that helpfully states, “Contains water.” Thank you. That clears it right up.

At this point, I’ve stopped reading ingredients altogether. I just scan for helpful phrases like, “Does not contain uranium”; or “Badger-neutral.”

I dream of simpler times, when a tin of tuna said “tuna”, and we all just … believed it.

In the meantime, I’m launching my own range of products. Here’s the label on my first item: artisanal steam, small batch, locally exhaled:

Howard’s hand-harvested H₂O

• Gluten-free (obviously);
• Homeopathically enriched;
• Badger-indifferent;
• 100% irony-infused; and
• Pairs well with existential dread.

Serving suggestion: read the label; question everything; and most importantly, moisturise twice daily.