By Deepika Sarma

We learned a new phrase today: Poop Shame. It’s been in the news lately thanks to a hilarious ad called ‘Girls Don’t Poop’.

Apart from building pressure on us to come up with some terrible PJs, the fragrance ad promises to disguise the smell of freshly-made poop. It’s madly entertaining: it begins with the sound of a toilet flushing while a posh girl with pearls and a retro hairdo tell us from the stall of a public loo that we’ll never believe “the creamy behemoth” she just “birthed from her cavernous bowels”. With plenty more inspired adjectives to describe excreta, you know right from the start that you just won’t be able to look away.

The ad is everywhere. On YouTube, it has over 16 million views; the company claims they’ve sold over 4 million bottles of the stuff. They’ve been talked about all over the place from Cosmopolitan to the Washington Post Magazine, whose columnist felt compelled to see for himself if it would, in fact, alleviate Poop Shame:

“I have just used the product as directed and can report that, as promised, there is no typical bathroom smell. Instead, there is a suffocating pseudo-floral stench far more vile than anything the human body can produce.”

Your niggling misgivings about perpetuating poop anxiety may be flushed away by just how funny and self-reflexive ‘Girls don’t poop’ is.

Or, like the tenacious skid marks mentioned in the ad, a trace may still remain.

We’ve picked three features of Poo Pourri’s line of fragrances that they hope will have you rushing to buy it:

1. It will help you get more out of your relationship
Heaven forbid your boyfriend finds out that you’re only human. Men never need to know that women also poop. That way girl-poop can soon be declared a rare and magical substance and we will be able to sell it to boys for a buttload of money!

Urban Dictionary already has an entry under ‘Girls don’t poop’ that says: “It’s true. Girls have poop-pixies to take the dookie away to a far-off land.”

Poop Shame can be a lot of pressure, hey? Writer and anxious pooper Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan knows exactly what we’re talking about. She gallantly wrote about it recently.

2. Your inner hipster will be thrilled to bits
It’s based on aromatherapy principles, and you won’t be soiling Ol’ Ma Nature.

“Poo Pourri does more than just improve air quality – it’s environmentally friendly. Our secret, patent-pending blends rely on essential oils to eliminate bathroom odors, making it safe for the planet and your septic systems.”

In other words, it’s specially designed to make your newly-emptied insides feel all warm and fuzzy, innit?

3. It’s no joke
“Yes, it is a real product”, says the lovely lady in pearls, just in case you thought it was too good to be true.

The folks at Poo Pourri clearly take their jobs seriously. “Our business,” says their posh mascot, is “to make it seem like your business never even happened.”

They’ve got a range for men, women and children (we kid you not!), and even a fragrance for shoes, to mask toe jam.

We have one question, though: surely leaving behind a pleasant fragrance is a classic sign that you’re guilty of a cover-up?