You Can't Cure Stupid.

Recently, I  got some confirmation of a notion that I have suspected to be true for some time.  We Americans are stupid, ignorant and gullible, and apparently proud of and accept it with little protest and no intention of changing.   I got this notion from my favorite medium, THE TUBE.  A couple of months ago,  I saw a commercial for Bayer Aspirin and, quite frankly, it irritated the ever-lovin’ crap outta me the first time I viewed it and even more so every time since.  But then, I am over the age of 60 and well into curmudgeonhood, so there is no big surprise there.  If I had a lawn I might consider yelling at kids to get off it. But since I don’t, I am reduced to complaining about TV commercials--and politics.

Anyway, in this particular TV ad, there's this thirty-something business-traveler type traveling on what looks to be an international flight--some Asian airline probably, from the appearance of the Stews (Oops! I mean flight attendants-just showing my age, I guess).  Anyway, this biz-twit sez to the Sky-Goddess that he is having back pain and vigorously pointing to his lumbar region and some cards apparently meant to help with the language gap, and loudly demanding something for pain relief.  I can tell that he is about to raise the volume of his voice, because we Americans all know that the louder you speak to them furiners, the easier is it for them to understand our language.  Now maybe it's just me, but from my experience, whenever I've flown on international airlines out of a major metropolitan American city, the staff always speaks fluent English, so I was thinking that maybe Mr. Junior Exec. was a first-timer on AsianAir or whatever it was called, and just didn't know this.  Well, in the commercial,  the lovely young flight attendant speaks excellent English and offers this yo-yo a Bayer Aspirin.  And immediately he responds by saying, "OH, I'M NOT HAVING A HEART ATTACK!"  And I'm sitting there with my rum and coke, thinking W.T.F.?  There are obviously a couple of things going on here and one huge disconnect for this viewer. The first, is that maybe Bayer Aspirin has been around for so long and it’s use has been so overshadowed by advertising by other modern painkillers like Motrin and Acetaminophen that maybe Mr. Ugly American Traveler really doesn't know that years ago, Native Americans boiled White Poplar Willow to extract Salicin, which is the main ingredient in modern day Aspirin, to relieve  pain.  And, two, much to my chagrin, is that this might really the face and level of intelligence of this guy's generation and he really doesn't know that aspirin can be used for something besides relieving a heart attack.  Or maybe I've got it all wrong and Bayer wants to appeal to the moron in all of us who watch TV.  You know, that lowest common denominator thing.

Or, as I sometimes have a tendency to do, maybe I am just overthinking the whole thing.  After all, it just a dumbass commercial.  But then again, after further thought, I might believe that it is a sad reflection of what goes on with us and the constant bombardment of unfiltered crap we have to deal with and sort through, to find a nugget of truth.  Maybe sometimes it just gets to be too much and we get worn down and complacent by the constant bombardment of visual and auditory stimuli attempting to influence our thoughts daily.  Maybe we are just too damn lazy to deal with it all.  Or not!  I guess we can rationize anything.  After all, it is easier to pour another cocktail than to have to really put much thought into our opinions or the information gathering needed to validate them.

Now,  I do have a medical background and should know about things like where aspirin comes from and and what it does for pain, so maybe I am being a bit harsh.  With that in mind, I took my own independent poll and found that yeah, everyone I talked to was aware that aspirin WAS a painkiller and WAS used for more than treating acute heart attack. So, what’s up with this commercial?  Do the makers of Bayer really think we are stupid or, do they just look at what’s going on in this country , where politicians and right-wing, talking head gasbags on hate radio and TV and their political minions spout whatever lies they want to and your everyday good Americans citizen will buy into it?  May the good goddess deliver us, if the latter it true.  But then again, I did watch the teabagger debate and was surprised that Dr. Ron Paul didn’t even offer to give Brian Williams' hypothetical dying man so much as a 325 mg. tab of generic aspirin to relieve his pain.  Matter of choice I guess.  And personal responsibility too, I was told.  Now, in real life, according to the audience, this poor schlimazel should just be allowed to die because of his poor judgment in not buying health insurance (or maybe he just couldn’t afford the premiums or get insurance because a pre-existing condition-but that’s for another blog posting about the evils of Obamacare).  I was suspect as to the audiences cheering at the demise of another irresponsible sponge sucking at the public trough until the debate cameras panned the audience at this teaparty event and I swear I saw a Madame DuFarge lookalike, complete with her knitting needles clickin’ and aclackin’ and ready to give the thumbs-down to anyone who even looked like they might be a liberal or who wasn't wearing a flag pin.  Oh, my apologies, but as is sometimes my wont,  I do digress.  So back to the point I am attempting to make.

Is anyone else offended by this commercial and its recently shown follow-up, which is complete with a REAL doctor from Bayer informing us all that pure Bayer has more uses than heart attack relief?  Does the advertising industry really think we are as stupid as politicians and their media puppeteers apparently do?   I mean really???  Well, I have been around for a while and I happen to know that they may be on the right track and that this is only the beginning.  Soon we will bombarded by nonsensical, unproven lies and misrepresentations of factual information from all political persuasions and will be expected to take their proclamations as gospel. If we believe everything we hear without checking the facts,  then we as a nation are in BIG TROUBLE.  But the silly season has officially begun and personally, I am prepared to be insulted.   We live in the information age, where anyone with a computer and internet access can find out the truth and facts about anything within seconds.   Let me  repeat the main words here, which are TRUTH AND FACTS.  Why do people believe Sarah Palin when she spouts her nonsense about “Death Panels” in the Affordable Healthcare Act, along with the other politicians who all chimed in with their “pulling plug on granny" remarks?  Even after Politifact determined this to be the Pants on Fire Lie of 2010, you still have people who promote it?  Or, that Barack Hussein Obama is not really an American, was born in Kenya and is really a closet Muslim? Or the nonsense that everything the president proposes is a  “job killer” and people just believe it without going on their “internets” to get the real story?  Are we just a bunch of dummies who will believe anything and everything without researching the truth as long as it agrees with our political choices, bigotries and prejudices. Or our just plain ignorant, uneducated beliefs and ignorance influenced by advertising commercials and political claptrap by psuedopersonalities named Harry and Louise?  And, this promotion of ignorance includes the premise that there is one idiot out there who just doesn’t know that something as simple as an aspirin could possibly be used for something besides mediating the effects of a myocardial infarction-in-progress?   

So, Yeah, today I am of the belief that many Americans may be proudly stupid, ignorant and gullible.  I might be wrong and hope that is the case, but today I am betting on the philosophy of two common men who I think have got it right.  The first is a gent named Steve Polyak who proposes that “Before we work on artificial intelligence why don't we do something about natural stupidity? “   As if there is something that can actually be done about that.  I’m afraid, that it is just too much effort for most folks.  I am closer to agreeing with the more realistic view of view of my favorite blue collar philosopher, Larry the Cable Guy who sez “You can’t cure stupid". 

Now I've got a headache, and a pain the caboose, besides. Give me a damn Bayer and make it a double! 2012 is a long way off and I'm afraid this is as good as it's going to get until it's all over.