Why Not Sunbathe? “Because the Sun’ll Kill Ya!”

Summer hit hard here. Not a week ago I had the heater running most nights, because I tend to run cold and it’s chilly here in the Pacific Northwest. Two days ago I was absolutely sick of gloomy days oppressed by incessant cloud cover. But today I’m watering a wilting garden because it’s so hot.

I’m also wearing shorts for the third time this year. I was talking to an acquaintance and, pointing to my white legs, said, “This is actually a tan, Jack. I’ve been tanning myself.”

Jack asked, “You lie in the sun?”

I said, “Yeah, I’ve sunbathed this winter as many days as possible.”

He replied, “But you were supposed to be the health expert. Don’t you know you shouldn’t go in the sun?”

“Why shouldn’t I go in the sun?” I asked.

“Because the sun’ll kill ya!”

Now normally at this point I would engage him in a debate, but I’ve found that debating Jack is absolutely pointless, like pulling up weeds with a tweezer. But I did want to know how he knew this and what his reasoning was. So I asked him, “How do you know it’ll kill me?”

He tilted his head toward me, pointed at a spot on his scalp with his index finger, and said, “Because I got cancer right here and it could have killed me. My doctor–and everybody who’s in the know, actually–said that with my complexion I shouldn’t go out in the sun.”

I see.

Faulty Logic

Jack got skin cancer. His doctor said the sun caused it. Jack made and repeated two false assumptions from this:

1. His doctor is correct in that the sun caused the cancer.
2. What is true for Jack is true for all.

The sun as killer is a common myth that keeps children indoors, or outside heavily layered with clothes or smeared with expensive chemicals. You need only look around at all the pale, anemic-looking children, to realize that we don’t spend even half the time in the sun that our forefathers did.

This horrible lie–sun as killer–is repeated from doctor to patient, friend to family. The media makes sure we know that our makeup and body care products are best for us when the sunscreen is at SP15 or greater. We are cautioned to avoid the sun or to wear sunscreen if we must be exposed to it. One wonders how wildlife has ever survived, how we have survived and evolved to be the dominant species on this planet without blessed sunscreen.

Common Sense

Let’s just use a little common sense to start with. The human body requires vitamin D. It makes its own by converting ultraviolet rays from the sun into vitamin D. It also has a mechanism in place to stop conversion of ultraviolet rays into vitamin D when it has made enough. Common sense thus tells me that exposure to the sun is natural and necessary to the health of our species.

But too much of anything can be harmful. If I stay out in the sun too long, I will damage my cells, which is referred to as a sunburn. Common sense tells me that too much exposure will harm me, so I need to moderate my exposure.

If I believe the cancer industry, the sunscreen industry, or the sunglasses industry, then I need to buy their products to protect myself from a deadly disease. If I believe the doctor, then nothing I did contributed to my skin cancer. I am a victim.

I’ll write more on this topic in the next post along with why you should avoid the use of sunscreen.

See also: Will Sunbathing Cause Cancer?
Benefits of Sunbathing and Risks of Sunscreen