Corporate Greed: A Shin Ugly Perspective
Though I know Jessie has entered a state of complete transcendence, this kind of news (below) is hard for me to read - harder than reading about natural disaster, as terrible as the recent Tsunami, and the more recent earthquake, are to hear about.
Why? Because here in THIS news is the human condition of selfishness - of greed - of dishonesty - writ large.
I can’t help but think, to this day, that it cost Jessie her life. A mere three months after her death, the headlines blazed with FDA (US Food and Drug Administration) revelations about how anti-depressant drugs were causing suicidal thoughts and behaviors.
The FDA had this information - but withheld it before.
Articles in major magazines followed about others - children and yound adults - who (apparently) had the same reactions of suicidal mania that Jessie did.
Since then, with the emerging scandals around Merck’s withholding of negative clinical data about Vioxx (a painkiller), FDA and corporate whistleblowers have started coming forward. Last month Lancet (the British Medical Journal) estimated that this withholding was responsible for over 125,000 deaths that could have been prevented by simple honesty from Merck.
Investigative reporters - like on the venerable program 60 Minutes - have run with that story - which has now begun to turn over the rock to see the ugly underside of the pharmaceutical industry.
This news today (below) is yet one more brick in that evidentiary wall.
Now - stay with me while I shift gears, and close the circle on Shin Ugly Dharma:
First, I’ll be glad indeed when my own endless journey through countless lives of birth into such an endarkened existence is over, once and for all.
At the end of the day, this isn’t a a comedy we’re all living as non-Buddhas. It’s not a Bill Murray “Groundhog Day” type of experience we’re all having, again and again, even though there are many precious moments in it.
And so I aspire to end my rebirths as a non-Buddha once and for all.
But even with that aspiration I finally I gave up trying to be a spiritual person with a spacious mind - Buddhist or otherwise.
The Shin Ugly truth is I can’t pull it off. It’s just beyond my own capacity as a plain person.
Speaking personally, I have come to recognize that I have no viable plan or program to end my suffering - my endless rounds of rebirth - once and for all.
Even though I have no conscious desire to cheat people or lie to people as some of our corporations and (apparently) our government do - I can’t help knowing that I’m in the same boat as they are - and as you are too.
Why do I say that? Because I can’t get past my own self-interest, my own attachments, my own cravings and aversions, my own egotism, my own blind passion - any more than they can - any more than you can.
Sure - my “stuff” may not LOOK quite so ugly as theirs. After all - I haven’t lived a life of DELIBERATELY putting profits before people - while they have.
But everytime I start to sprain my wrist trying to pat myself on the back for being so much better than they are, I catch a glimpse in the mirror.
And because I’m a student of Shakyamuni Buddha and Shinran, that glimpse in the mirror shows me the Shin Ugly truth: blind passion is blind passion - anger is anger - anguish is anguish - grief is grief - an unenlightened mind is an unlightened mind.
And self-righteousness IS self-righteousness.
And that pretty much nails the coffin shut on MY aspirations. What about you - and yours?
Thus I am condemned, by the inexorable law of karma, to take rebirth as a non-Buddha yet AGAIN - because I simply can’t get the monkey of self-preoccupation off my own back in this age of Dharma Decline.
I can’t save myself from this fate - from this ending to this story of this particular life.
And now - as radio personality Paul Harvey says - here’s the rest of the story:
Amida Buddha can - and he will - if only I will depend upon him entirely. One moment of thought - of true entrusting - is all it takes.
My Jessie - some 16 months before she died - had that one thought moment. It changed the course of her journey - and made this her last life as a non-Buddha.
Nothing - not even her own karmic action of suicide - spurred on by the poisonous chemical reactions she was apparently having - could keep Amida from fulfilling his Primal Vow in her life.
That’s the Shin Ugly message.
That’s the reason for this blog.
That’s why Shinran had a lot to say, for 60 years.
That’s why Shakyamuni Buddha gave that sermon - the one we know as the Larger Pure Land Sutra.
That’s what it’s all about.
Namu-Amida-Butsu (I take refuge in Amida Buddha).
Paul
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NEW YORK (Reuters) - Ten of the 32 government drug advisers who supported the continued marketing of the pain relievers Celebrex, Bextra and Vioxx have consulted in recent years for the drugs’ makers, the New York Times reported on Friday.
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Last week, a Food and Drug Administration (news - web sites) (FDA (news - web sites)) advisory panel said that Merck & Co Inc.’s . withdrawn arthritis drug Vioxx was safe enough to rejoin Pfizer’s pain relievers Celebrex and Bextra on the U.S. market after concluding that all three medicines posed some level of heart risk.
The Times article said that if the 10 advisers had not cast their votes, the committee would have voted 12 to 8 that Bextra should be withdrawn and 14 to 8 that Vioxx should not return to the market.
According to the article, the advisers with company ties voted 9 to 1 to keep Bextra on the market and 9 to 1 for Vioxx’s return.
The newspaper said the votes of the 10 did not substantially influence the decision on Celebrex because only one committee member voted that Celebrex should be withdrawn.
Celebrex, Bextra and Vioxx are part of a family of drugs called COX-2 inhibitors. The drugs were designed to ease pain as effectively as older, nonprescription drugs, while being easier on the stomach.
Most panel members felt all three drugs should have “black box” warnings — the strongest warnings used for prescription drugs — explaining their heart risks.
The Times said eight of the 10 advisers said in interviews that their drug company relationships did not influence their votes. The newspaper said two others did not respond to phone or e-mail messages.
The article also said researchers with ties to industry commonly serve on Food and Drug Administration advisory panels, but their presence is a contentious issue.