Health

10 Things That Will Kill You, According to Women's Magazines

Water fountains, iPhones and makeup brushes -- you've been warned

by Amanda Montell | COMMENT

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It's a common scenario: You're at the nail salon waiting for your pedi to dry, when you flip open a magazine to find a deluge of stories like "My Flip Flops Almost Killed Me," and "Here's How Diet Coke Ruined My Life."

Stories warning of the myriad ways in which everyday objects and activities can kill you are a dime a dozen in women's magazines. Even though contracting sepsis from your toothbrush or a deadly parasite from a gumball is statistically very rare, according to our favorite glossies, such things are of grave concern. What gives?

"Women's magazines come at their readers from a point of service, essentially telling them that everything in their life needs to be improved," says Jennifer Nelson, author of "Airbrushed Nation: The Lure and Loathing of Women's Magazines." "It's constant fear-mongering."

Sure, there are scary, "it happened to me" stories out there, but the reporting in women's mags is meant to pull on a reader's heartstrings -- to make her feel like she needs that magazine's help to survive.

In other words, the way that every male neighbor in a Lifetime movie is a killer of women, so are oodles of harmless objects, according to your favorite magazines. Why do we fall for this stuff?

To gain a little perspective, we decided to put together this list of the most ridiculous things women's magazines say can kill us. Here, 10 ways to develop cancer, have a stroke and go into anaphylactic shock, according to the most popular pink glossies.

SEE NEXT PAGE: Killer No. 10: Hot Tubs

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