As <wiki>Huxley</wiki> paraphrased Marx in Brave New World Revisited: Once upon a midnight bored out of my freakin’ skull and pondering the imponderable, as oftimes I do, comes The Commercial for a “Happy Pill”, refreshing in its brutal honesty. WellTabs, Hey, they put a lot of thought into that name.
Are you sad, anxious, tired, restless, beat-up, beat-down, ragged, dragged or just plain not feeling good? Take Our Dope!! All natural!! or “some of the ingredients are all natural”
Big Pharma usually has the trippiest commercials, pipe people for a pee-pee problem, a grey bathrobe following you around for an antidepressant, wonder catheters that make you happy, diabetic finger-stick-readers all smiles… (and a butterfly design)
A list of probable ways the crap will kill you that would scare you silly if you weren’t taking dope to turn your brain off. (My favorite was a diet pill where the second-to-last side effect mentioned was “uncontrollable anal leakage”)
Sometimes I think the ad producers get paid in merchandise. They promise, in short, Soma. That’s what Huxley called it in Brave New World. There’s actually a narcotic sleeping pill with that name. Damn shame that Big Business got it declared Porn. Gotta keep the Masses shivering in fear of Socialists so The Masses don’t notice it’ the Capitalists screwing us. “Animal Farm” (written by a Socialist” – Good. “Brave New World” – Baaaaad.
They have the same group of Majority Shareholder (face it , kids, when the 18 political wankers tell you they care about Grandma’s pension they’re simply Lying, the one thing they do best, followed by shirking military service and Real Work, about which the LIE when confronted) yea, veriy, brethren and sistren, the Same jerkoffs who own the businesses which sell us the most gas guzzling cars, the gas itself, McGreaseburgers and Diet Plans, Alcohol and Anabuse, sleeping pills and the so-called “Puritan” work ethic that sleep is evil and we should take stimulants to work harder (Boxer’s Last Words as related by Squealer) Smog and asthma/COPD meds, stress that makes you impotent (and stops your heart) and Viagra, Cialis and Smiling bob’s Magic Penis Pills (which also stops your heart)
… and Uncontrollable Anal Leakage.
Don;t worry, though they sell Adult Diapers too…
The sell us Sugar in quantities and forms never intended by God or Nature or both, then sell us diabetic supplies shipped direct to your door.
There was another commercial right after the Happy Pill one pictures in black & wAhem… A knife sharpener. $ 19.95. Damn it, I know people who can’t write their own names, but know better than using an unsharpened knife. They also know how to sharpen knives.
Which once again begs the question: “Is you completely lost yo’ MIND?” If you can’t figure out what to do with a knife, might I suggest you use a baseball bat instead? Not that you’d have more success, but a lot of stoners would pay to watch the videos.
Now, yours truly was, in his mis-spent and wicked youth, a space cadet. Many an intriguing story beings “Me and my cousins/brothers/friend/rand strangers/who happened/to/have/dope were gettin’ stoned and we thought it would be a good idea to…”) Learned many a wondrous thing, like “When you take acid the best thing to watch, Sesame Street because they already go monsters and like, the colors are fantastic!!” That was from a guy who used pick-up lines like “I want to be a lesbian”, which actually worked. Then again, he had some WEIRD girlfriends who would respond to “Wow, that stop sign sure is RED!!”
Not the intellectual high pint of my life.
But I learned a few things.
In 8th grade we were shown an anti dope film about The Perfect Drug. Like, “what if “they” developed a pill that gets you high without side effects?” Like Soma from “Brave New World” or WellTabs.
If you have the patience to watch the commercial all the way, they offer the first dose Free. The First shot is ALWAYS free. Just ask any junkie. Goes with “Never get high with assholes” and “Never drink anything blue” and “If you stop breathing you probably took too much”.
I also learned that you friendly neighborhood pusher works for the Shadow Government. The same 1%s who would sell their own mommas if they could find somebody who actually buys skanks. Big Brother has his nasty little hands in everything.
Anima sana in corpore sano, and the Happy Pill seems to be a vitamin and other nutrient supplement. Still being pushed like dope. Message is probably more harmful than the substance. Bark worse than bite literally.
If proper nutrition would become addictive, cool. It won’t have an instant effect, and to keep the good mood and energy going you would need meditation, exercise and a more harmonious diet, with a lot less toxins.
Marketing tells us otherwise. We’ve become so used to seeing instant results, as in “Take this pill and you problem disappears before the end of this commercial” that we thing the In Reality half hour it takes for the pill to have a measurable, palpable effect, means the recommended dose isn’t enough so we add more. That part was noticed decades ago. We believe the hype of “Your friendly burger joint clown or Fairy Dope Mother will make you happy.” even with the certain Knowledge it won’t.
That’s the magic of Pavlovian conditioning. Black is White if they sell us so. and they do sell us. Gold has a certain grip in humanity, with any practicality coming late in our history. (computer parts, and really nothing more)
The mere sight of it draws us into madness, to hold it in one’s hand makes thieves and murderers of the Best of men Invites destruction in our midst and the gold should have been left buried, held safely beyond our reach. Mutter Erde should have kept if from us the way a human mother would keep rat poison beyond the reach of her toddlers.
Instead we became “smarter” than she, and learned to find it.
And to sell poison to each other to obtain it.
Disclaimer” I don’t buy stuff off the T.V. so I don’t know if WellTabs actually works even temporarily, but at least my criticism of the inherent falsehood of commercialism won’t cause uncontrolled anal leakage, and if it does, you might stop that by dispassionate evaluation of you other life choices.
It is impossible to be overly cynical. Soylent Green is PEOPLE.