Well it's either I use them regularly or I start shoving sharp ***in my ears to scratch.. I don't care about the wax so much, I just picked up on the fact that if I don't do it regularly (once a week) my ears itch like crazy (and did well before I even knew what a q-tip was) and I can't handle that ***.. When my ears itch I'll use anything to scratch them.
The damage/pain posed by a q-tip can't begin to match me shoving the tip of a knife, pencil or key in there to scratch.