Fear of Xenon Grips America

It's odorless. It's colorless. It could suffocate you to death and you'd never even know it - until after you're already dead, that is. It's xenon. And it may be coming to a basement near you.

Xenophobia - the fear of xenon - has become America's number 2 phobia, ranking just behind the largely internet-created microphallophobia.

"Some people think the fear of xenon is irrational, because it makes up only one 64 millionth of the mass of the earth. Well, most spiders have a mass even less than that, and people are still afraid of them!" ranted John Elm, founder of the Society for the Expulsion of all Xenons (SEXY).

"We haven't decided what the 'Y' stands for yet, but our acronym just sounded more acrimonious with it than without it," he elaborated.

Xenon has been controversial ever since it made its first appearance in the Big Bang, some 14 billion years ago. Though it claims to be "noble", chemical tabloids have published damning evidence of xenon forming unholy bonds with hexafluoroplatinate, endohedral fullerenes, subarctic hydrous clathrates, and the highly volatile trioxides. There have even been confirmed reports of homonuclear bond formation with other xenons to create excited dimers. Xenon was in fact the first of the "noble gases" to be adulterated by molecular mixing.

Due to its stealthy nature and a numbing effect on the brain, xenon may be illegally creeping across the blood-brain barrier even now. "It has an anesthetic property: more and more of it leaks into your system or country, and you adapt to it and don't even notice - until it's too late!" SEXY propaganda literature has warned, "If xenon could blow up a building, it would."

Once inside, xenon takes a long time to get rid of. ¹²⁹Xe has a half-life of 16 million years. After a sometimes explosive mid-life crises, it goes on for a whole-life of 32 million years. Xenons frequently do not pay taxes.

Xenon also poses a radiological threat. "There are only 9 stable isotopes of xenon, and over 40 unstable ones. If you randomly pick a xenon isotope off the street, the odds are better than 4 to 1 that it is radioactive!" Elm fumed.

"¹³⁵Xe is a powerful reactor poison, which caused the reactor at Chernobyl to become sick, melt-down, die, and also stop producing electricity. Some call it a 'noble gas' - I call it a 'Chernobyl gas'!"

SEXY is opposed by the Federation of Xenophiles (FOXY), who also have not decided what the 'Y' stands for. The membership consists mostly of college students, who are generally known for their tolerance of many different elements and drugs.

"It is not fair to portray all xenon as dangerous because of the fatal beta rays produced by a few of its daughter nuclei," the FOXY president explained, "In fact, xenon has more stable isotopes than any element other than tin. Also, it has many applications, such as flashlamps, neonless neon signs, reactor poison, and making your voice sound like Johnny Cash."

Elm, however, remarkably, is unimpressed by such arguments.

"Xenon is by far the worst element on the periodic table," he declared.

"Second only to arsenic, lead, mercury, cadmium, radon, beryllium, sodium, fluorine, chlorine, bromine, iodine, polonium, uranium, plutonium, and ununhexium."