Now Age Minute - 4.15.09
In the Land of Oz
Like Dorothy and her companions, Americans have come to the end of the Yellow Brick Road, and reached the Land of Oz. Still, it seems there's another pulling back of the curtain each week, revealing another scam. Case in point as noted in a recent piece from the NY Times,
"Americans yearn to be young. So it is little wonder that RealAge, which promises to help shave years off your age, has become one of the most popular tests on the Internet.
According to RealAge, more than 27 million people have taken the test, which asks 150 or so questions about lifestyle and family history to assign a “biological age,” how young or old your habits make you. Then, RealAge makes recommendations on how to get “younger,” like taking multivitamins, eating breakfast and flossing your teeth. Nine million of those people have signed up to become RealAge members.
But while RealAge promotes better living through nonmedical solutions, the site makes its money by selling better living through drugs.
Pharmaceutical companies pay RealAge to compile test results of RealAge members and send them marketing messages by e-mail. The drug companies can even use RealAge answers to find people who show symptoms of a disease — and begin sending them messages about it even before the people have received a diagnosis from their doctors."
In the early nineties, an urban legend took flight claiming that Pink Floyd's recording "Dark Side of the Moon" was actually written to synchronize with the film, The Wizard of Oz. There's even a Wikipedia page about it that states, "Dark Side of the Rainbow (also known as Dark Side of Oz or The Wizard of Floyd) is a name used to refer to the act of listening to the 1973 Pink Floyd album The Dark Side of the Moon while watching the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz for moments where the film and the album appear to correspond with each other". While the theory has been debunked by the Floyd, that America today resembles the Land of Oz can't be disputed, as the Times story excerpted above continues,
"The test has received widespread publicity because of its affiliation with Dr. Mehmet Oz, a popular author and regular on “The Oprah Winfrey Show.” Dr. Oz — “America’s Doctor,” as he is known on Oprah — is a RealAge spokesman and adviser, and his soothing, simple approach to health is reflected in RealAge’s message: you can change."
If you think Dr. Oz is the only drug industry shill hiding behind the media curtain, you're wrong. Just turn on CNN in pursuit of the news, and you'll find snippets of news-o-tainment, sandwiched between ads for medications for men with penis problems. One pill for the "going" problem, and one for the, well, you know. Let's just say they got you coming and going. All is well in the the Magical Land of Oz.
The magic is not just limited to CNN, however. Switch on CNBC, and you're bamboozled by the network's financial "experts" and corporate CEO's practicing their patented version of Reiki: laying on of bullshit. Even with the global economy in free fall, the CNBC band plays on, as if their religion of free-market capitalism was not responsible for the meltdown. When you're on the Yellow Brick Road, more than the bricks are yellow.
What's different from Oz and today's America is that even though the curtain of the American Dream has been pulled back, and the "wizards" exposed, they won't relent. Bernie Madoff's guilty plea simply won't restore trust and confidence in our economic system while the free market maestros of our current condition are pulling the strings at the White House and Treasury Department. While I have a lot of hope in Obama, it seems that when it comes to Big Finance, that tail is clearly wagging the dog. Unfortunately, this pup is not named Toto.
Craig Gordon
