Apparently there's this tea that people are drinking now called Rooibos tea. I've never heard of it before, but no doubt all of you have and will now berate me for not being on top of the latest alternative beverage trends.

"It's a robust herbal tisane (not technically a tea), and its flavor has an almost tobacco-like, nutty quality," is how Slate describes Rooibos. And: "Grown only in the Cedarburg Mountain region north of Cape Town." Also: "The bush has been touted as a cure-all for everything from skin conditions to stomach cramps." So, that's all we need to know, thanks. It's a warm, less-gross version of kombucha. Or maybe it's a warm, more-gross version of pomegranate juice.

The funniest and most enraging part of Slate's article about Rooibos is the comments from a bunch of yuppier-than-thous pounding furiously on their iPads, presumably while balancing a giant steaming mug of Rooibos tea on one knee: "Wow, you really wrote an article about Rooibos tea? Welcome to the year 2001, loser." Here's a real comment left by someone:

Rooibos tea's been around for ages. This is like saying, "Get ready for spirulina everybody!"

Ha ha, you sure showed—wait, what the fuck is spirulina? Go back to the food co-op where you obviously roost at night suspended upside down from the rafters.

This is why I have a visceral reaction against Rooibos tea and all those that drink it, without ever having drunk the tea or met a professed drinker. (And before you ask, no, I do not live in a cave, or an isolated mountain cabin!) It's one of those things where if you even mention in passing to a friend walking down the street that you've never heard of rooibos tea, a slender graphic designer will sprint out of a nearby yoga studio—face still tomato-red from his aborted hot yoga session—and sock you in the face with a 20-pound sack of the stuff for not being steeped in the hippie swill he's been chugging since birth. Fuck you, Rooibos tea.

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