 by Dr. Jeffrey Lant Author's program note. Are you familiar with "Guys and Dolls"? It's an American original written by Abe Burrows (book) and Frank Loesser (music). It won the Tony Award for Best Musical in 1950. It had high-stepping energy, characters which were particularly ours, including one gem called "Miss Adelaide" who made everyone smile every time she appeared on stage. She was the kind of woman you were warned against if you were a man (which only made her the more exotic and desirable)... and whom your mother worked overtime to ensure you did not emulate if you were a "good" girl; "Young lady, scrub that make-up off your face at once!" In short, she was a floozie... and in the long-standing tradition of such social untouchables, she generally spoke common sense (while admittedly slaughtering the Queen's English), and always had the golden heart, even if her clothes sense was outrageous, tart-like, definitely not Lord and Taylor, oh no, my dear. Of course, such a woman was not formally educated and so she spent the rest of her life reading periodicals like "Reader's Digest," with the admirable objective of self improvement thereby certain, like Dr. E'mile Coue' that, every day in every way, she was most assuredly getting better and better, a silly notion she shared with millions of her "get smart quick and easy" fellow citizens who did the same, mistaking facts and factoids for real knowledge. One of the high comic tunes of the Golden Age of Broadway shows Miss Adelaide at her self-improvement best. It is rightly titled "Adelaide's Lament", and it involves her "researches" into the undeniable connection between her unmarried state and all the illnesses she is sure to contract thereby. "In other words/ Just from waiting around for that plain little band of gold/ A person can develop a cold." I bet you didn't know this little health fact... or any one of about a million others which pass on the streets of the Great Republic daily as unquestionable truth and "God told me Himself" verities. That's why I am writing this article... Everybody wants a cure, right? So why no cure? Do you believe in the goodness of the Great Republic, that presidents cannot err and that everyone will benefit when cats (now constituting the most popular search on the 'net) take over the world? If so, you're fulfilling the destiny the great pharmaceutical companies have for you. They mean for you to get sick over and over again; each time you do to take some of your hard-earned cash and start dishing it out for all the learned, white-coated, "worship me" parasites who batten upon us, thereby waxing as fat as blood engorged mosquitos in high summer. These people tell you over and over again they are there to "help" you... If that's so, Batperson, riddle me this: with all this "helping" going on, how come the illnesses which love us so are driven by chauffeurs in their solid-gold Cadillacs with gloved hand discretely but clearly stretched out, suggesting this, propounding that, and insisting on something else again. Do you feel my drift about why year after year the only thing that changes is the fact that now those expensive curatives come in bright red boxes, where last year they were delivered in cute little green containers. In short, as even Miss Adelaide ultimately figures out, things are the way they are for a reason... and here there are millions of people who have their hands in our pockets and would just as soon shoot us dead if we try to cut this umbilical cord that is such a gravy train for so many. Consider this. Still not convinced there's a fiddle going on here? What about this? Say there was a very bright young medical researcher, you know like "Young Doctor Kildare," the kind of exceptional med student everyone knows is "going places"? He goes to work for a pittance in one of the Great Republic's run-down laboratories where the rats are just a piece of scotch tape away from grasping freedom. Yet such is his quality that he is happy, for he is "helping people, making a difference".... Or so he thinks.... "It's ours now. Don't worry your pretty little head." Then one fine day, he discovered the cure for the "common cold." It was a day of joy, of champagne, and hugs all round. Surely a Nobel Prize, not to mention the sincere thanks of a grateful world were in the works. Why, then, have we never heard of him? Is the world that ungrateful? Here's why. The very day his research was verified and re-verified as entirely accurate, a find of historic dimensions, a boon to people everywhere, should have been the happiest of his entire life... but it wasn't. What happened? Just before 5 p.m., the party atmosphere still palpable and cheering, a black limousine pulled up and our joyful researcher was summoned within. Two immaculately dressed gentlemen were inside; the chauffeur opened the door. The two greeted our Frank-Capra researcher like he was a distillation of flag, nation and baked apple pie; the man who could do no wrong. They let him know right from the start, they came from one of the largest drug companies on Earth and they were ready to "help" him... if he'd give them the privilege. All ears, all unwary Dr. Researcher said, "Why not?" Why not indeed... And so the unlikely sirens in their Brooks Brothers suits, the perfection of the tailor's craft, spun a vision of what their young friend was looking at, if and only if, he'd agree to just one condition: selling all rights to them. Just that, only that, merely that... and when they saw that tell-tale glint in his eyes, that glint of desire, of greed, of avarice (for he was but a man with a man's weaknesses), they knew he was theirs. And so for an hour or so they spun a tale of what life for him would be, his every whim to be granted forever. As for money, he could have whatever sum he desired, even twice over... or even more. And so a cashier's check for a truly obscene amount cheerfully drawn, cheerfully given, cheerfully received was handed to our hero. It was the last truly happy and unclouded moment of his still young life and he remembered it forever after with profound regret and longing. They had asked for only one condition but that condition was everything. Question: Could his invention be announced? Answer: Certainly... whenever the drug company said so, but that moment had not come. Question: Could his work be acknowledged? Answer: See above. Question: Could he consult his notes and research materials? Answer: See above. Thus did our once laurelled hero glimpse his future and for all his glorious millions was he dismayed and disheartened. The call. After a time, with no cure to his problem in sight, our hero decided to call his two contacts to see "what's what", why he was put off, and what the real situation was. Quick as boiled asparagus his call was put through. His contacts arranged an immediate meeting. It was all very efficient and professional, and, of course, when their limo arrived, he was greeted warmly. After all, he was "family"... or so they always told him. He asked his specific questions; they gave him eloquent circumlocution. It would happen; it was a big company, a giant; things took time; a worldwide promotion was being prepared; no, they couldn't say just when; be patient; don't fret; "we love you man." And off they went our researcher more unhappy than ever. Next time he didn't wait so long and was resolved to get "straight" answers, no matter what. And so requested another meeting. This one was not so swiftly arranged; moreover, it was held at "corporate" not in the limo. When he arrived he found it would include not just his two usual contacts, but a bevy of senior vice presidents and -- lawyers. It was arranged like the Inquisition. No one used the word "family". Our boy was asked why he kept asking questions, asking for meetings. Had he some complaint to make about his funds? No, he had not. Then he should understand the company possessed "all rights" which meant neither more nor less than that. He would be notified when and where necessary, but always at corporate's convenience. And so it went, one unanswerable point after another. "But what about suffering humanity?" Hero no longer, put firmly in his place, he had but one last question to ask and so with no confidence whatsoever, he asked it: "But what about suffering humanity, the people who need the cure?" His question, of course, had been anticipated and was now answered thus, with these numbers: North American annual after tax revenues for company's current common cold products (number). Then world revenues (number). Then related revenues (number) and so on, the whole added together and listed in bold numbers at the bottom of the page. This number was gigantic, larger than large, incomprehensibly enormous. And as he reviewed the overwhelming profit numbers all of which the cure would threaten, he heard the sound of raucous laughter from the gaggle of vice presidents just outside the conference room and caught his question, now mangled, a laugh line, "What about suffering humanity...?" What indeed? That is why nothing since has been heard of our ex-hero, his name unknown, his great cure who knows where. And why Miss Adelaide gets her "medical" intelligence from soiled magazines at the beauty parlor, thus "Just from stalling and stalling and stalling the wedding trip/A person can develop La Grippe." |
