Not A Very Absorbing Read

It’s hard to wrap your mind around a whitener made of charcoal. Like, because, you know, it’s charcoal. The darkest stuff there is. The stuff associated with soot. So how does it whiten teeth?

The actual product copy doesn’t really give too much help here: “A lot of people use this to remove stains on their teeth from coffee, red wine drinkers to smokers.” That’s about as much as they say. (And, I’m a little confused; red wine drinkers and smokers alike use this stuff to remove coffee stains from their teeth?)

My only guess at a plausible explanation is that it has to do with charcoal’s absorbent properties. I know about this because one time my dog wouldn’t stop drooling so I took him to the vet. They thought he might’ve eaten something bad, so they force fed him charcoal to absorb any potential toxins. When we came home, he promptly vomited, leaving an enormous ink-black stain on my rug that I had to have professionally cleaned.

So maybe the charcoal on your teeth absorbs gunk much like the charcoal in my dog’s stomach was meant to absorb whatever was making him leave drool puddles everywhere before it was expunged from his body as dark ooze. (He’s fine, by the way.)

None of this is a big-time endorsement. But then again, this is a 4-pack of this stuff for just $16. So, sure, you might look down and you see this:

And sure, you have to look in the mirror and see something like this:

Or this:

But, in the end your teeth might look like this:

And isn’t that worth a shot for $4 a pop?