hile this is a very serious issue for a lot of men and couples, it's a big joke to me while I'm still young and healthy. As of now those commercials with rugged 50ish men cuddling their well-preserved wives and looking loving are hilarious, and people who eat ground rhinoceros horn (or whatever) are idiots. Some day this may change, but until then you can expect a lot of bad jokes and unsubtle innuendo. All archived here for your reading convenience.

More recent additions go on top.

February 2, 2004

[During the Superbowl] There were a ridiculous amount of "can't get it up" pill commercials, several of which even gave you some chance of guessing what they were commercials for.  There were the usual Levitra ones, which are utterly perplexing in their vagueness.  I saw the one with the guy throwing footballs through a tire swing at least a dozen times during the regular season without ever suspecting it might be an anti-impotence pill.  I figured it was for an arthritis pill, or something like that, since the whole commercial shows a guy who is working in his hard and playing around with an old football, and seeming to feel rusty.

I never had any idea it was for what it's for until I read a Dave Barry column about it, and his jokes at last clued me in to the rather absurdly-metaphorical aspect of an aging man taking a pill that suddenly allows him to repeatedly throw a football through an old tire.  In my defense, I never paid the commercial any attention, other than wondering why the hell this guy was throwing a football around like that, and laughing at how it was yet another idiotic commercial for a prescription drug that at no time made it clear what the drug was for.  I saw Claratin ads for at least two or three years before I eventually found out what they were supposed to do.  Perhaps I'm ignorant, but magazine photos of fields of flowers, and TV commercials of smiling people with excellent facial skin never shouted out "anti allergy medication" to me.

This is as true of arthritis and baldness and indigestion and allergy pills as erection ones, in my viewing experience, and the marketing scheme puzzles me.  They show random images for 30 seconds without ever putting up a single one that directly tips you off to what their expensive new chemical is supposed to do if you take it, and then spend the last 8-10 seconds with their silken-voiced announcer reading off a long list of possible side effects like diarrhea or nose bleeds or headaches. And then they say, "Ask your doctor about it."  What?  Do people just make a doctor appointment to go in and say, "So, I saw this ad with a guy throwing a football through a tire and running around and hugging a woman, and I have no idea at all what the pill does, but I simply must have one, just because their commercial was such a masterpiece of Madison Avenue genius!"

One of the dicker upper pills on the Superbowl sounded interesting, since the ad said that it worked for 36 hours, for when "the romance turns to passion" or something romance novel sounding like that. As best I could tell, you take it, and then if at any point in the next day and half you start to get turned on, you'll get an actual serviceable erection.  I can't see how that works; it's like a lurking instant boner?  How long until they have that in some sort of drug implant, like Norplant under the skin, to release a constant supply of whatever hormone or chemical enables proper penile blood flow?

February 3, 2004

In yesterday's blog I wondered about those stupid unknown prescription drug commercials that just show happy people, or footballs being thrown through tires, or fields of flowers, and never actually give you any indication what the drug is supposed to do to you if you take it. Along came Aahz with some info.

Regarding the Levitra and Claritin-type commercials, a law was promulgated by the FDA that does not allow a drug company to advertise the benefits of a drug without listing the side effects experienced in clinical trials. So in an ad like the Levitra ones, the company has decided specifically to not mention what the drug is for so that it does not have to list side effects. (Which makes you kind of wonder if this was the decision all along, or if there is some heinous side effect that happened in trials that the company does not want to mention.) As for the “ask your doctor about it,” I imagine that they want to catch people who are going to be at the doctor anyway (like maybe they already have an appointment scheduled) so that the people will be prompted to ask the question. Even if it’s not a problem the patient has, he might know of someone who would be interested in it and mention it to that person. (Probably not in the case of Levitra, but maybe in the case of Claritin.)

I suppose that makes sense, though I immediately wonder just how vague they have to be about what the drug does in order to not have to list the side effects.  I mean say your drug gives men erections.  How much cuddling or kissing or whatever can you show before you trip over the "must list side effects" line, a line that you're doing all you can to tiptoe up to without crossing?  Does the FDA have a committee that watches the ads and approves them before they're allowed on TV?

I could probably find answers to these questions, but that would require, like, effort.  And I'd much rather sit here shivering and hoping the fricking UPS man shows up with the books Malaya ordered and that they brought by Friday, but didn't leave since there wasn't anyone to sign for them, despite the fact that we were both home, and would have heard it if they'd rung the doorbell. Which is why I'm sitting here now with a sweatshirt on and the heater turned off and the front door open with the screen door closed, hoping someone in a brown outfit knocks pretty soon so I can sign for it and then close the door, turn the heat back on, and take a damn shower.  On the other hand, I've been prevented from going out onto the back patio and scooping the cat boxes since I can't hear the front door from out back due to the street noise and wind in the trees noise, and I might yet delay enough that Malaya will get back from running errands and scoop it herself.

Anyway, here's a bit more from Aahz's email.

The 36-hour drug is Cyalis (sp?) and has been used in Europe for a few years. Apparently it has been nicknamed les weekendere in France. (Or whatever the French word for “weekend” is.)

What I thought was interesting about the Cyalis commercial is that one of the side effects goes something like this, “In rare instances, erections last for more than 4 hours and must be medically treated immediately.” How does the trip to the hospital go in that case? “I need a cute nurse out here to treat this STAT!” Seriously, when the nurse asks you the nature of your problem, how uncomfortable is that conversation going to be?

I've read about that sort of thing (priapism) in the past, with some fascination.  It's a real problem, and the problem is that orgasm won't relieve the "swelling."  Which, unfortunately, rules out the pretty nurse solution. It sounds like paradise, but after a while the penis becomes very sore and super sensitive, not to mention embarrassing if you intend to go out in public, and it's not a joke.  The sacs that fill with blood inside of the penis can be permanently damaged by it, and you have to physically puncture them to drain out the blood, either back into the body or out of the penis, or you can do permanent damage and lose the ability to get an erection at all, magic pill or not.

And no, it's never happened to me. Not yet, anyway.

All site content copyright "Flux" (Eric Bruce), 2002-2007.