"I’m just a lowly seventeenth-century British sailor, not some fancy-pants seventeenth-century British sawbones, but there’s one thing I know for sure: I would rather walk the plank than suck on a single stinking lime. In fact, I will be giving a wide berth to any and all citrus fruits the Captain brings aboard during this long and arduous voyage, because scurvy is a hoax, and I don’t trust foreign fruit.
"You know what I do trust? My own body to protect me. I’m young and fit, and my childhood rickets has almost entirely cleared up. And as far as I can tell, nothing bad has ever happened to a young and fit sailor with just a touch of rickets who heads recklessly off to fight pirates and ghost ships for months on end with nothing for nourishment except barrels of stale, rat-infested biscuits.
"So, no, I’m not 'afraid' of scurvy. What’s the worst that could
happen? My teeth will fall out? My bowels will bleed? I’ll die at sea,
and my body will be cast into the murky depths by my equally moribund
shipmates, who won’t even have the energy to say a blessing as octopuses
and sea monsters feast upon my corpse? That doesn’t sound any worse
than a little seasickness, and it definitely sounds better than
occasionally sucking on a lime." -- excerpt from Kathryn Baecht's "Wake Up, Sailors, Scurvy Is A Hoax," in McSweeney's top 21 articles of 2021 (originally published on September 8, 2021, but still sadly relevant as we close out the year).
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