quote: "Do you know what we mass-produce at Procrustics, Inc.? Our Commodity is Evil." "Your joking..." "Not at all. You see, we have resolved a great dilemma. Now everyone can do unto other what he's always wanted to—without causing them the least harm. For we have harnessed Evil, as medicine harnesses the microbe to inoculate and immunize. What was civilization ever, really, but the attempt by man to talk himself into being good? Only good, mind you. The rest had to be shoved somewhere out of sight, under the rug. Which History indeed did, at times politely, at times by police-ly, and yet something was always sticking out, breaking loose, overthrowing." "But reason itself tells us to be good!" I insisted. "That's well known! And anyways—look how beautifully everyone gets along today, the cheerful, kindly, open faces, the friendship, contentment..." "Precisely," he said, interrupting. "The greater the harmony, the greater the temptation—to let go, lash out, left, right, below the belt, strictly for balance you understand, therapeutically!" "What are you saying?" "Come, come. You must rid yourself of all this sanctimonious drivel. It's no longer needed. We are free—thanks to fictification and piositine. To each according to his wickedness, all the evil his heart desires, all the misery, humiliation—for other, of course. Inequality, slavery, a punch in the nose and after the woman on horseback! I recall how, when we put our first shipment on the market, the public snatched it up immediately—then they all rushed off to the museums, the art galleries, hoping to break into the studio of Michelangelo and take a crowbar to his marble works, slash the canvases, even brain the great master himself if he dared stand in the way...This surprises you?" "Thats putting it mildly!" I exclaimed. "Because you are still a slave to your prejudices. But don't you see, everything, everything is possible now. Take Joan of Arc, for example. Don't you feel, when you look upon that fairest, most exalted form, that sheer saintliness, the sublime, divine virginity—don't you feel that ut ought to be whipped? Saddled, bridled, a flick of the reigns and giddyap and tallyho! Gallopng off in a team of six, ladies cooing, Cossacks hallooing, plumes, sleighbells, and you give the tender maid a taste of your spurs..." "What, what?!" I cried, my voice choked with sudden fear. "Saddling? Bridling? Mounting?!" "Certainly. It'll do you a world of good, believe me. Just name the person, fill out our form, describe the grudges, grievances, bones of contention, though that's purely optional, for instance the majority of cases one wishes to inflict evil without any particular reason, other than—that is—someone else's prominece, virtue, or beauty. Present your specifications and you'll receive our catalog. Orders filed within twenty-four hours. Delivery by mail. To be taken with water, best on a empty stomach, but that's not absolutly necessary" ... "We owe our liberation to chemistry," he went on. "For all perception is but a change int he concentration of hydrogen ions on the surface of the brain cells. Seeing me, you actually expericence a disturbance in th sodium-potassium equilibrium across your neurom membrane. So all we have to do is send a few well-chosen molecules down into the cortical mitochondria, activate the right neurohumoralsynaptic transmissions effector sites, and your fondest dreams come true. But you know all this," he concluded, subdued. Then he took a handful of tiny colored pills frim the drawer. They looked like candy sprinkels. "Here is the evil we manufacture, quenching the thirst of the troubled soul. Here is the chemistry that wipes away the worlds sins."
--Stanislaw Lem, The Futurological Congress
Ads for prescription drugs appear on television, in magizines, in newpapers, in short they are everywhere. These are ads for controlled substances aimed at the general population. This results in people going to their doctors and ask for these drugs. You go to the doctor so that he can tell you if you need these drugs, not so you can tell him that you need them. Focusing on pills to remove the problem does not (always) solve it. Society today believes that drugs can solve everything. Overweight, don't bother exercising, or changing your diet, just take a pill. Unhappy? our sunshine in a capsule will solve that. Think you are allergic to cats? Doesn't matter dose yourself up, and you are good to go. We have effectivly banned nearly all advertisment for cigaretts, a legal product that any adult can purchase with a writ from a certified proffession. Proscription drugs should have simalar bans on their advertising.
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