Wednesday, 7 August 2013

Stuff your beauty product commercials are trying to make you believe

> that your entire life, sanity, food, shelter and even mere existence depends on the color of your skin. Beauty cream is almost life-blood


> that you always need a fairer complexion though all your aunties think your the fairest in the family. Yearn for more-that is the mantra


> that your career is at stake until you do something about that poor complexion of yours




> that your family might eventually drift away from you or in worse cases even disown you because
your "far from perfect" complexion disgusts and humiliates them


> that not a single person from the opposite sex is going to do so much as glance in your direction because if you're not fair enough and aiming for fairer, you are basically invisible


> that dark people are losers, less determined, frail and always depressed. Fair skinned people are winners and role models. Perfect, heavenly beings

You don't have to take my word for it. See for yourself:




> dark complexion and self-esteem repel each other


> that the whole world lights up and shines, thanks to that pretty, fair face of yours. Yes. There are rainbows popping out all along the way you go and there is instant sunshine and happiness, everyone is insanely ecstatic; all because of the fact that you are 5 times fairer than you were last week - the week that was full of rain and gloom everywhere you set foot.
Simply put, the world goes around since you chose to use that cream


> that using a great face cream will actually transform your whole persona, your style and just about everything. Your entire wardrobe changes and you undergo metamorphosis from Plain Jane to Glam Diva instantaneously


> that everything a woman in pink clothes keeps jabbering about on TV is the universal truth and you should gape and nod and rush to the cosmetic store


> that the skin is made of as many layers as a facewash claims it can permeate. You should forget all that gibberish about the 3 layers of human skin your biology teacher kept lecturing on



> that for winning anything in life, you need to rely on a tube of vitamin-enriched potion with moisturizing granules and mud as much as you would believe in your ishta devata. Keep your tube of magic in your pooja room for better progress


> that "fairness cream" is too passé  and so you must practice saying "Beauty Benefit cream" to be regarded as cool, sophisticated, dignified and maybe rich


>that with our exaggerated, glaringly implausible, bizarre, over the top and conspicuously photoshopped advertising, we hope to help you understand how our shampoo is going to be genuinely effective and give you demonstrable, natural, gentle care

In short, the message they want to convey through such "imaginative" ads is this:
"Promises apart, don't you just love our ads? We are very proud of them too. And no, our ads are not tall/false claims, they are just representative of our proficiency at creative advertising which we think should help you see how creative we could be in our product features too, but let's not get sidetracked from our cool advertising skills.






 
> that you should blindly believe in a face pack that claims to be fortified with the purest of the pure honey, aloe vera and mud (euphemistically named Multani Mitti), claims to have no harmful chemical content and swears on mother nature that it is 100% herbal and safe because it comes in a glossy pack but you should completely disregard the natural, unadulterated home remedies that your mother prepares for you






> that your face wash/pack/cream contains all of nature's finest fruits and herbs and nuts you'll ever need. All this goodness has been scooped up and crammed up into that tube so that all you need to do is squeeze out the magic and dab it on. Forget about including fruits and nuts in you food. Because you can easily send in all the nutrition to your system by osmosis right through your facial tissues


> that those wrinkles are the most unnatural, abhorrent things to appear on human skin. They are so revolting and absolutely abnormal. In some cases they even tend to become almost paranormal in that they could scare people away from befriending you.
And they're not going to iron themselves out unless you use that specially formulated, dermatologist approved and clinically certified WTH formula or the mineral-enriched HML potion that comes in a teeny weeny vial and costs you a fortune. And don't get them wrong. They sell that stuff in a small container only because it will be easier for you to carry around and flaunt it and try to look important


> that it is not enough if you merely wash you face with a cleanser or soap to remove make-up. In order to be a great woman whom others can look up to, you should invest in a nice and luxurious make-up removal cream. Didn't know such a product exists? Wake up, woman! It's such a cool invention! Its like trying to put out fire with gasoline.
In simpler terms, you must never really let your face breathe without the interference of a bulwark of chemical compounds. So you get to take off your make-up by dabbing more chemicals onto your face.


> that when they make a change in package design and print the words " with our NEW and IMPROVED formula", you must trust them and ignore the fact that their previous ad already boasted it was "the BEST solution for acne".

Never wonder why they would try to become better if they were already the best in the market as per their previous claims


> that if you want to buy a certain brand of face wash or cleanser, in order to reap BEST RESULTS you must also commit yourself to pretty much the entire range of items that is manufactued under that brand name . So whenever you look at that single bottle of shampoo you bought, there is should be an unsettling stir in your mind that gnaws at your heart and berates you for not accompanying the shampoo with the conditioner, hair oil, hair serum, hair gel and spray that were recommended on the pack for the much coveted "best results".
Such a blooper must make you feel terrible.
But please don't get this idea wrong: It's not that the shampoo is not good enough. It's just that it will work to its full potential only when you use it along with all the other items in the same brand's hair care brigade

Hair Care. Try saying it aloud once. Swanky, ain't it?

Anyway, they're basically telling you this: "each single item in our product line suffers from a case of separation anxiety and cannot perform when isolated from it's family. So you must realize what a grave error that would be and go ahead and buy our cleanser, our moisturizer, our toner, our scrub, our astringent, our face pack, our anti-aging cream, our blackhead remover, our acne cream, our dark circle remover, our bleach, our expert treatment cream, our vitamin-enriched cream, our sunscreen lotion, our skin brightening lotion and so on and set up a little showroom kiosk for our brand at your place"


> that when a shampoo sachet gets bigger and has "__% extra!!!" printed across the pack, you must not be too curious and over-reactive and wonder about these things:

1) Does the word 'extra' mean that the level of shampoo the sachet contained before the offer was not enough for a single use?
2) How much shampoo should I actually use to safely wash my hair without drying up and damaging the scalp?

Because they need not worry about advising you on the right quantity and use of shampoo. What is more important is pleasing you with the words:  FREE, EXTRA and OFFER.
Because customer is king. Until she goes bald.

Sunday, 2 December 2012

Fixing Fatal Flaws




Daredevilry and acrobatic skills-desired qualifications
for the job of an electrician in India
[written on July 8, 2012]
 My hands are trembling as I write this. Everything I tried in order to push the thought of it out of my head has failed me. I simply need to vent. I do not know how many people witnessed the gruesome accident that happened to an electrician in Vilupuram,TN during the first week of July, 2012. About 2-3 news channels telecast a brief account of it with a video which totally unnerved me: still ringing in my ears are the brain-numbing screams of the crowd that had formed around the poor man. There he was, atop an electric pole-teetering over the ubiquitous tangle of wires, his torso on fire. He was so benumbed by the electricity that he couldn't even cry out in pain. In a bid to untangle himself from the gruesome mess, he struggled helplessly to rip his body off from the deadly wires. But wherever he tried to get a hold, there was current passing; pulling him and gluing his limbs to the wires, worsening his condition by the second. 

It is a terrible,
gut-wrenching feeling to watch a person in such excruciating struggle-pain and torture increasing boundlessly until he finally gives up.

Several minutes had passed before someone finally turned off the power and he was lifted from the trap and rushed to the hospital. However the news was not aired for more than half a day and info about his present condition is nowhere to be found (I tried all leading Indian newspaper websites and numerous Tamil news channels so far).

Where did things go wrong? The newsreader said that when the man was trying to set a connection right, someone had unknowingly turned on the power lines. It breaks my heart to think about his plight. All he tried to do was set right a glitch-just his highly risky routine job for which he was most certainly underpaid and he has been terminally injured, thanks to few other 'glitches' that I feel we must pause and think about.

First, what happened to protective, insulated clothing/uniform for the electrician? They have been given gloves but will they be adequate protection? Besides employees are not cautious enough, perhaps due to lack of proper safety training.

Second, why didn't the man who mounted the pole have personal control through a device/remote-controlling equipment to operate the current flow? How can electricians be forced to rely on a colleague to take care of something as dangerous as this? Why should electricians be made to put their life at stake just to ensure uninterrupted power supply for us?

And most importantly, why are electric poles and lines in the city and suburbs so chaotically arranged, disorderly and haywire? How many more lives are they going to claim?

Just by constructing a neat set-up of electricity carriers and monitoring the lines, thus eliminating or at least reducing tangles and congestion, half the problem could be solved.
The disheveled tangles rightly reflect the very nature of our utterly disorganized government and its institutions. Here, I'm not taking any sides or political stature because I'm pretty convinced that this condition has been prevailing since electricity was made available here. When such is the case, who is to be blamed?

Well, one thing is perfectly clear-our policy makers must get their list of priorities right. An electrician's job may be listed as a 'petty' or a 'menial' task but does that give them the right to consider his life that way too?
Have you noticed how basic survival issues and safety amendments seem to take a backseat and call for prolonged efforts and protests to garner the attention of the government while the same leaders are always prompt to announce the obviously apathetic New Year, Christmas and Diwali wishes?

If political leaders can take time off to hoist flags and visit other counties to develop friendships while they could just do it over video conferences, It is only fair that they give life-threatening issues like these some time and wake up to proactive decision making.

Friday, 2 November 2012

They are not the same!

Its is rather disappointing to see more and more people failing to notice the line of demarcation between spirituality religion and even worse, mistaking spirituality for religiousness. 

Spirituality is all about taking that inner path in search/pursuit of the true self-the essence of one's soul made possible by comprehension of realities, deep contemplation and meditative self-appraisal. It is about making the connect with one's spirit or soul as well as the human community, finding harmony with one's inner-self and within  one's outer sphere of elements and entities.

Religion comprises all kinds of rituals, customs and traditions that revolve around the faith/believe in a deity.
The only connection between the two is the fact that some individuals take the path of religion in order to achieve spiritual self-actualization. Nevertheless, spirituality and religion take different paths and use different  methodologies.
William Irwin Thompson suggested that "religion is the form spirituality takes in a civilization.
According to a poll, about 24% of the United States population identifies itself as spiritual but not religious
[Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirituality#Religion]

A spiritual person does not have to be a religious one.


What better way to put it than this!


My Empty Bus Fantasy

 

-Every regular bus commuter's fantasy is definitely an empty bus. Especially for those who travel along traffic jam-prone routes where every hour is a 'peak traffic' hour.

I was blessed with one that day-just that once in 3 college yrs of chronic bus travel trauma.
My favorite conductor 'uncle' with his 3-streak vibhuti slapped his forehead grinning while I clicked away this keepsake for posterity