Stupid, gullible people smoke vulture brains for good luck

Explorer and documentary maker Lucy Cooke was in South Africa a few years ago when she learned about the hot new stuff that the locals were lighting up: vulture brains.

"Apparently vultures' acute vision, which can spot a carcass from four miles away, has kindled a belief that they possess clairvoyant powers…

"The stall owner tells me that since the World Cup in 2010, vulture brains have been his biggest seller. 'We make the brain dry and mix it with mud and you smoke it like a cigarette or a stick. Then the vision comes.'

Of course, vulture brains don't give you visions. This, like most "traditional medicine" is complete and utter bulls***. Since people are idiots and there's money to be made, though, vultures in South Africa are now being slaughtered by the hundreds and seven of the nine species there are endangered. That's going to work out real well for everyone when there's no vultures to scavenge dead animals, and the countryside is littered with corpses that act as disease vectors. How lucky! [Take Part]