In Defense of the Calculator

November 10th, 2005

Filed under: Comics, Medicine

After my previous post, I’ve gotten a great deal of grief about why the the Calculator didn’t just order his SSRI medications from those spam e-mails everyone gets. Look, the Calculator may have mis-diagnosed his condition, but that doesn’t make him stupid. He knows better than to order drugs from spam e-mails:

  1. It’s spam. You never, ever answer spam — it only makes the problem worse. (Anyway, I figure that Calculator is enough of a computer genius to have rigged up a super spam filter. If any junk mail manages to get through, he just sends Deathstroke or Talia after the spammer — or if he really wants to embarrass them, he sends Big Sir or the Mighty Bruce.)
  2. It’s illegal to prescribe medication without a medical license. Now the spammer (or website) may have someone with a medical license on payroll signing the prescriptions, but that’s not really any better (and would you really trust a doctor who took such a job?). It may be slightly more legal (though the FDA disagrees), but it’s just as dangerous. A physician should never give a prescription without examining the patient first. Yes, I know a number of physicians practice “telephone medicine” — but it’s a risky choice, both medically and legally.
  3. The spammers aren’t really going to send you medicine, they just want your credit card numbers.
  4. If they do send some medication, you better hope that it’s a placebo. The odds are it’s going to some random drug, say Estrogen instead of Viagra, or canine heartworm pills instead of Prozac.

3 Responses to “ In Defense of the Calculator ”

  1. David Oakes
    November 10th, 2005 at 11:53 pm

    You forgot the most important reason that the Calculator doesn’t order his drugs from SPAMmers (call it 0 or Prime since this is DC, but I guess it is 3B):

    The Calculator is a SPAMmer. The Calculator is THE SPAMmer. Anytime you get SPAM, the Calculator is there. Everytime you consider sending money to Nigeria, the Calculator is there. Everytime you have to validate your credit card numbers so that Ee-Bae dodn’t charge your for something you didn’t order, the Calculator is there. Everytime some Script Kiddie launches a DDOS against your server because you didn’t bow to his L33T-ness, the Calculator is there. Everytime a commenter suggets that your site could be improved by a link to “hotbutteredweasels.tv”, the Calculator is there. Absolutely anything EVIL happens on-line, the Calculator is there.

    He’s like Bill Gates, without the meds. And even without the meds, the Calculator isn’t crazy enough to trust Bill Gates.

  2. Jon H
    November 11th, 2005 at 11:13 am

    I wouldn’t order from a spammer, no way no how, but I have used an internet no-prescription pharmacy during a long period of unemployment/uninsuredness.

    The seemed fine, being simply the products packaged for the Australia/New Zealand market. The expiration dates were reasonable, except in one case where they expired within a month or so. The meds (Paxil, actually) certainly appeared to be genuine, since they had the same unpleasant effects if I forgot to take a dose.

    Plus, there’s something neat about getting air mail from Vanuatu.

    BUT - I did a degree of research beforehand to check for complaints on the internet. I went into it cognizant of the risks, and remained watchful in case quality dipped.

  3. Randy
    November 11th, 2005 at 2:33 pm

    Man, I’d really like to check out that hotbutteredweasels.tv

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