Man, I really don’t want to write a post about Shahrukh Khan again. Sigh.
Whats this one about?
Well…
OK, first of all, the concept of selling a whitening cream to insecure Indian males is brilliant. The advertisement itself is sort of retarded, but makes its point… The psychological impact of the advertisement to an insecure guy is basically “Maybe I’ll get more chicks if I was fairer.”
But what I couldn’t understand is why SRK is endorsing it.
What does an endorsement mean? It means that the celebrity concerned has used the product, likes it, and wants you to try it.
(Well, actually it means that the person got a bucketfull of cash to hold a bottle on TV. But the point remains.)
That’s why if Priety Zinta endorses a scooter in TV, there is an implicit understanding that she has driven the scooter, found it great and wants us to buy it. If Sushmita Sen advertises a shampoo, it means she uses it and wants us to use it as well.
And that’s the reason you don’t see celebrities endorsing Viagra. No one wants to admit he uses Viagra. Viagra endorsement comes from anonymous individuals, not celebrities. (Well, stupid celebrities are still around.)
I’m surprised that some a$$hole of a journalist hasn’t grabbed hold of this point. Here’s how an interview between a real a$$hole and Mr. SRK would go.
A: Hello Mr. Khan, how are you?
S: Hello. I’m fine.
A: Mr. SRK is here to talk about his new movie, XYZ.
S: Yeah, I’m really excited…
A: Hey, could you wait a minute? I want to ask you something really important.
S: Er… of course. Go ahead.
A: (Produces bottle of fairness cream) Why are you endorsing this product?
S: Because its a good product. I like it and trust it.
A: Really? So you admit that you use it?
S: <<Eerie moment of clarity>>
(15 seconds pass)
(SRK looks desperately at the camera, which is going LIVE)
(10 seconds pass)
S: Er… No, I don’t.
A: So why are you endorsing it? Aren’t you misleading your fans?
S: No, I like and trust the company and am sure they will not make a faulty product.
A: You’re sure? You’re sure? Are you f#cking kidding me? You’re misleading billions of people! How are you qualified to endorse a product without using it?
S: Er… wait a second…
A: I mean, WTF? I spent my money on this. My son is dark-skinned. I bought three hundred bottles because I’m your fan! I make him take a bath in it every morning! And I thought he’ll become fairer because you said so! But if he doesn’t all my money has gone to waste!
S: Er… no, he’ll get fairer. I promise.
A: And what guarantee do I have for that? How are you qualified to say that? You haven’t tried it. You said so yourself.
S: The company promises…
A: The company promises anyway, without your involvement. What is the role of your endorsement then?
(SRK self combusts)
Final score: a$$hole 1, SRK 0
.
The only real solution SRK has is to admit that he uses the cream. I don’t think he’d like to do that, but we all need to make difficult choices in life.
These diseases are not highly visible. They do not cause explosive outbreaks that attract public and media attention. They do not travel internationally. They cause great and permanent misery, but do not kill large numbers of people or affect wealthy nations.
The misery caused by these diseases is largely hidden. Affected people live almost exclusively in remote rural areas and sprawling shantytowns, where health conditions are poorly documented and access to health care may be virtually non-existent.
These diseases are often neglected when health agendas and budgets are set. Endemic countries have limited resources to invest in health. These diseases must compete with more visible diseases – like HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria – that cause much higher mortality and attract much more attention, nationally and internationally.
Drug development is an expensive, difficult and time consuming process.
When the only reason you are doing it is for money, you don’t really want to spend decades and billions of dollars to develop drugs for people who cannot afford them. As most patients with such diseases live in developing countriesand are too poor to pay for drugs, the pharmaceutical industryhas traditionally ignored these diseases.
Governments and international donor agencies help and do their bit, but it is not enough, by a long shot.
Money for drug development usually comes in only when the disease spreads to rich western countries and it is profitable to develop treatments for the same. The great thrusts which have gone into developing treatments for HIV and tuberculosis (after ignoring the latter for decades) demonstrate this point amply.
The WHO estimates a disease burden of over 1 billion people with neglected tropical diseases. Take a good look at that number. That’s one-sixth of humanity. How does it make you feel?
Lets take a look at some of the most neglected diseases in the world, in no particular order.
1. Onchocerciasis
What is it: A worm that is the second leading infectious cause of blindness in the world.
Disease burden: 18 million people infected.
Treatment: A single dose of Ivermectin taken per year.
What is it: A fluke which lives in blood vessels of the gut and urinary bladder. Causes chronic weakness, severe organ-system diseases and has a special link with bladder cancer.
What is it: A parasite that can cause severe cutaneous and systemic disease. The systemic form is difficult to cure and results in immunosuppression. The patient dies of other intercurrent infections.
Disease burden: 12 million people infected.
Treatment: Drugs available, but increasing resistance in the face of insufficient efforts to develop new drugs is a serious problem.
What is it: A parasitic disease which eventually attacks the brain and sends the patient in a coma. Mortality is 100% if untreated.
Disease Burden: 300,000 new cases each year.
Treatment: Drugs available, but drug companies do not find them profitable enough to produce. Most of the treatment currently available is given as charity. The drugs themselves are dangerous and fatal in a significant fraction of patients.
There are several more negected diseases, the WHO department of Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) covers thirteen of them. If you’re interested, more information is available here.
Today’s fortune by Orkut.com - “You are going to have a very comfortable old age.”
Hehe.
Now who can argue with that?
Dudes, at least make an effort to sell me your bullsh#t. Don’t just throw random stuff in my face.
What if I don’t have a comfortable old age? What if I spend my 70th birthday on the street?
Hmmm…
Hey! I can sue orkut.com for misinformation, get a billion dollars in compensation, and spend a very comfortable old age….. Guess what guys, horoscopes DO tell the truth!
Petty crimes are everywhere, including AIIMS hostels.
Besides students, the hostels are inhabited by a fair number of employees - Mess attendees, cleaning personnel and the like. And a few of these are unable to resist the temptation of picking up an Ipod or a wallet full of cash.
NOTE: If you are one of such people, PLEASE - take the cash, but you can’t use the ID cards or photographs in there. So just leave them behind, will you? Thank you!
And then, there are the students.
Yeah, one would think that medical students wouldn’t really need to steal from each other. And that’s correct in 99.99% cases. But depravity exists everywhere, not to mention kleptomania. Yeah, I’m not kidding. Dead serious.
So how do these robberies occur?
At your home, you don’t need to lock your room every time you step out of it to have a snack or go to the bathroom. Entry to your house is restricted by a central checkpoint (Your main gate) which creates a large “trusted zone” within which you can operate without bothering about locks.
But at the hostel, the trusted zone ends the moment you step out of your room.
After spending a major part of your life living under the former scenario, Locking your door every time you step out is an irritating activity, at least in the beginning.
This is what a random anonymous room latch in AIIMS hostels looks like. There’s one latch associated with a lock and one latch without a lock (You can still hang one there, if you want to.)
I humbly present…
HOW TO MANAGE YOUR ROOM LATCH AND AVOID GETTING ROBBED
Scenario A
The foolproof way to avoid getting robbed is to lock your gate EVERY SINGLE TIME you step out of your room. I can’t stress this enough. This is the only way you can reduce your probability of getting robbed to negligible.
What it looks like:
Or
Probability of getting robbed - Close to zero. There are plenty of other options for a potential robber. He won’t try to break your lock unless he’s a real stalker.
Muscular effort required - Slam the bolt, find your key, insert the key, rotate 360 degrees, Remove the key.
Time required - 5 seconds
PROS: Safest CONS: Large amounts of time and effort needed. And if you’re an alcoholic, you’re going to have to sleep outside your room every night.
Scenario B
Just sliding the bolt with the lock on it to make it appear like scenario A.
What it looks like:
Probability of getting robbed - Low. With hundreds of locked bolts that look exactly like your unlocked bolt, a potential robber will have no way of determining whether its really locked or not unless he tries every bolt he comes across. Its a simple matter of protective comouflage. Very effective.
Muscular effort required - Slam the bolt
Time Required - 1 second
PROS: Reasonably safe, Takes just one second and very low muscular effort. You reap the benefits without sowing the seeds. CONS: Probability of getting robbed not zero.
Scenario C
Leaving both bolts completely open.
What it looks like:
Probability of getting robbed - Medium. This method is effective, but much riskier. Basically it makes it appear like you’re still in your room at present. If there’s music playing inside your room, the probability of getting robbed decreases further. But from the point of view of a robber, all he needs to do is push the door open and apologise for his “mistake” in case there is actually someone in the room.
Muscular effort required - None
Time required - None
PROS: No time or effort required. CONS: Medium risk of getting robbed.
Scenario D
Sliding the wrong bolt.
What it looks like:
Probability of getting robbed - High. Come on dude. Just look at it. Its obvious that you’re not in your room (otherwise it wouldn’t have been closed), and its obvious there’s no lock. Why don’t you just write “Please rob me” on your door?
Muscular effort required - Slam the bolt
Time required - 1 second
PROS: None CONS: Everything. This method sucks. Period.
Final Word: Scenario A is what you should try to get used to as fast as possible. Do it until it becomes instinctive. But if you don’t have the time (or are just incredibly lazy) Scenario B is for you. No other scenario is worth the risk.
Has anyone else noticed that in every movie involving people on a boat…
1. There’s always a waterfall in the way.
2. The people on the boat are terrified of falling down the waterfall.
3. Despite their efforts, the boat always falls down the waterfall.
4. Energetic screams.
5. The boat is always wrecked in the fall. I mean totally smashed to bits.
6. But the people all escape with their skulls intact despite being hit by several tonnes of water.
I’m sure that when I was 6 months old, I must have been besides myself with excitement upon seeing such an action packed scene. And when everyone escaped without a scratch, I must have cheered loudly and woken my mother up (who must have been as bored with the scene then as I am now).
But now, due to constant skinnerian reinforcement, I’ve started expecting it. All I need to do is see a bunch of scared people in a boat onscreen. My brain automatically starts expecting stops 1-6 above. I usually take the time to rest my eyes until I hear exuberant screaming followed by a loud splash. Then I conclude that the boring scene is over and I can resume watching the movie.
I’m sure this crap kills a lot of kids. I remember when I was a little kid out on a family trip, we were standing at the top of a really high waterfall - and I was debating jumping off it. I was like - “Hey, its an adventure, and its not like I’ll die or even get injured or anything - movie guys always escape without a scratch.“
Directors, try something else, please? C’mon. Show four guys on a boat and don’t put a waterfall in the way. Or kill a few guys when they fall off it. I’ll give you two thumbs up. I’ll rate your movie 10/10 on IMDB. I’ll force all my friends to see it.
Hey, check it out! The new Indiana Jones movie is out! Bet its good! I’ll complete this post after I get back from the movie hall!
Celebrity episodes of game shows - is there anyone on Earth who believes they aren’t fixed? In particular I’m talking about Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC) and the new Kya Aap Paanchvi Pass Se Tez Hain.
What? You want proof?
OK. Lets talk about it.
The reasoning is simple. The deductive leap comes through the following points:
Point # 1
The contestant is a celebrity who isn’t going to let it appear (on national TV) that he’s a retard. Come on. Even if Albert Einstein goes on one of these shows (And he’s pretty smart, right?) there’s no guarantee that the very first question is not from a field he’s totally unacquainted with. No one can know EVERYTHING. Sheesh. Thus no matter how smart a person is, the probability of his coming across as a retard to the average person sitting at home is not zero. Agreed?
No celebrity is that dumb. After all, why has he appeared on the show in the first place? To improve his image. He doesn’t need the money (or he’s giving it to charity - see below). Something like could totally destroy all the money, time and effort he has sunk to create a public image of himself.
Point # 2
The proceeds go to charity. Oh awesome! I can just imagine what happens if the show wasn’t fixed.
Yeah right.
Point # 3
For god’s sake. They’re actors! This is their job! To act. Their livlihood depends on making people believe what is going on on the screen is real. Geez. Connect the damn dots.
Point # 4-10
Keep points 1-3 in mind and watch a celebrity episode and you’ll get them yourself. Acting is after all, acting. Faux excitement, indecision and nervousness is way easier to spot when you’re looking for it.
Exact figures are unknown. The RNCCP (Revised National C______ control programme) considers the prevalence to be about 0.1-1% of the general population.
Pathogenesis and risk factors
Malignant retardation is a complex and multistep process which often requires several decades to develop. Only a small percentage of the population is susceptible, but the high risk group shows a very high probability of malignant transformation.
For the purposes of understanding the pathogenesis of malignant retardation, it is convenient to divide people into four groups along the intelligence-hardworking axis. In reality there are no discrete groups and there is a continuity of individuals along both axes.
Group A: The “Golden group” knows what they want and how to get it. They can also work hard when needed to achieve their goals. As such, they are the most successful group of people in this world. No case of malignant retardation has ever been documented in this group.
Group B: This group is stupid, but being lazy, their stupidity affects themselves with little to no damage to others. The vast majority of humanity lies in and near Group B. As such, they are the benign retards. They may convert to premalignant and finally to malignant retards under conditions of stress, as explained below.
Group C: This group is smart, but by being lazy they basically waste their gifts. As such they are benign retards.
Group D: The group is stupid but hard-working and therefore their stupidity can move beyond screwing their own lives and start affecting others. This is the high risk premalignant group.
Malignant transformation: By virtue of his stupidity, if a premalignant retard makes a decision that does not improve his condition at the same time worsening someone else’s, he is said to have undergone malignant transformation. He is now diagnosed as a malignant retard.
Diagnosis:
Evidence of one decision within the last six months which:
1. Does not improve his condition but worsens someone else’s.
2. This fact should be clearly visible to anyone of normal intelligence.
Further Course
The usual course of the disease begins with the patient being universally detested by everyone he/she comes into contact with. The patient may realize this fact (or not - after all, she is a retard). The further course is complex and depends on the patient’s choices and mental state.
Reperfusion injury: Sometimes, after a slight improvement in symptoms, the realization of his/her past wrong choices may plunge the patient into a further bout of denial and lead to reactivation of disease.
The above shown disease process can be interrupted at any point by the death of the patient. Most patients live a full but very unhappy life and die of unrelated causes. A few patients, however are the source of great entertainment and hilarity when they are killed off in highly creative ways by someone who’s really, really pissed off.
Treatment
Cure: The definitive treatment has to come from within and there isn’t much an outsider can do to “cure” a malignant retard. Spontaneous resolution may take years or even decades and most cases remain untreated until the patient’s death. Emotional and psychological support over several years can help speed up remission but this is difficult because the average person can stand only so much bullshit.
Minimising impact on others: The RNCCP advocates simple protocols to minimise the effects a malignant retard has on society.
Simple Excision: Most civilised societies simply don’t have the time or motivation to treat a malignant retard and respond by simply ignoring him and excising him from normal society. This has remained the first choice treatment for years.
Traumatic excision: Some malignant retards resist polite efforts to excise them from society and thus warrant a short course of traumatic excision. Beatings are administered in controlled doses until the retard realizes his place in society. This is currently the second choice treatment and is usually sufficient.
Here’s the spiel on Wednesday this week- Its 10 am in the month of May, and the sun is hidden away by the dust. Its not hot, and there’s so little light that it looks like its 7 in the evening. Strong winds buffet the trees. Dust is running into my eyes. A few raindrops fall as if they’re not certain whether they’re supposed to come down or stay up there. Suddenly the lights go dim, and slowly give out.
Feels like Apocalypse.
Feels like the end of the world.
And I get this totally awesome feeling in my head and half-seriously, I try to locate a mushroom cloud in the distance somewhere.
There was none, of course. It was just a dust storm that hit Delhi on Wednesday morning.
But if I had seen one, what would I have done?
Once I would have ascertained that there was nothing I could do about it, I would have stood strong till the shock wave mowed me down and enjoyed my one and only opportunity to watch a nuke firsthand.
And that, I think, is the right way to live. Stand strong. Take what life gives you, change what you can and endure what you can’t. Squeeze out every drop before you get kicked out of the bar.
One of my pet peeves is web pages which automatically start playing music when you go on them.
Recently Orkut decided to rip off Facebook and allowed gadgets on profiles. One of the gadgets links with iLike and allows you to force anyone who visits your profile to listen to your chosen tracks.
Retards!
If I want background music while surfing the net, I’m perfectly capable of playing Winamp and Firefox at the same time. Then I can listen to the music I LIKE while I SURF the net. I don’t need YOUR CHOICE of music suddenly blasting my ears when I open your page. You may think heavy metal is the best thing that ever happened to the music world. I may think that the world of music begins and ends at Classic Rock. But I won’t thrust my likings on you as long as you don’t thrust yours on me.
Actually, the basic thinking of the average retard who does this sort of crap is probably…
Well, here’s a surprise for you.
This is what the average person thinks when crappy music suddenly blares out of his speakers.
A better system if you want to share music is to give me a choice. Put up your playlists, but don’t let them play automatically. If I want to listen, I’ll click the play button.
A little etiquette on the internet will make it less of a hellhole.
Well my internet access was screwed for a couple of days and now its actually over 10100. Its sort of a special event - like I mentioned in a previous post, we use the metric system in this country. The blog moved to WP in October 2007 and a special thanks to the WP team for their facilities.
So anyway, I’m releasing a bunch of statistics for you guys. Probably 99.9999% of you will not be interested. I know that. Don’t bitch, move on to the next post. All the statistics are October 4 2007 onwards.
