My name is BigPharma, and I’m a super villain. Now I know all you folks out there have heroes, people you look up to, people who embody the change they want to see in the world. The difference between what you call a hero, and what I am, is semantic. In an upside-down world, I might in fact, be the hero. Unfortunately, in this world, my kind is the type to be called manipulative and opportunistic. In another context, the traits you normally find abhorrent may in fact be worthy of hero-worship. In light of these unfair binaries and misunderstandings, I am starting a movement, right here, right now, for the empowerment of super villains around the world who are often vilified but never acknowledged for the benefits they could bring to the world. So let me now regale you with a story of how I single-handedly changed the landscape of the human psyche in the land of the rising sun, while also laying out a step-by-step plan on how you too may become a super villain.
The first thing you need to do is define your mission in life. You either have to find yourself a problem, or make one up. My mission was simple: I just wanted to make people happy.
In Japan, the land of the rising sun, I observed that many people were suffering from symptoms of depression and suicide. However, in contrast to these high rates of depression and suicide, I found that antidepressants, such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors or SSRIs, had low usage among the population. In fact, none of the best-selling antidepressants were even being sold in Japan! I had to do something about this – I had to bring back happiness to the people of this land.With a mission firmly in hand, the next step was to gather as much information to find out how to best complete my mission. In 2000, I decided to host the International Consensus Group on Depression and Anxiety, inviting the best minds in the world to share their research on “how cultures shape the illness experience” (190).
At this conference, I found out that people in Japan weren’t necessarily averse to Western drugs, which is a plus for me. But, they were actually averse to the disease itself; people’s attitude toward depression was extremely negative and fundamentally different from the way we view the disease. According to one scholar, the American version of depression is culturally unique in that people are willing to openly express feelings of distress to strangers, and in their belief that psychological suffering is a health care issue, whereas in Japan, feelings of distress associated with the American version of depression are often seen as a personal hardship that builds character. Further, severe cases of mental illness were seen as rare and were often stigmatized.
How was I to sell SSRIs to a culture that didn’t even believe in depression? My knight in shining armour came in the form of an anthropologist who reported that “cultural conceptions surrounding illnesses could be influenced and shifted over time” (197). Ding ding ding! This means that in order to sell SSRIs in Japan and bring happiness back into people’s lives, all I had to do was sell the idea of depression as a real disease. In order to do this, I had to exploit weaknesses found within Japan’s social structure. At this time, the country was reeling from the Asian Financial crisis of 1997, and societies are always more susceptible to outside ideas during times of uncertainty, thereby working in favour of my plans to bring happiness back to Japan.
The next step to world domination, I mean, completing your mission, is to hire flunkies to do your work. I hired advertising companies to bombard the masses with ads that gave SSRIs glowing reviews; instead of calling depression a “disease”, we called it “kokoro no kaze” – a “cold of the spirit”. I also hired private firms to ghostwrite scholarly articles on SSRIs. My ability to fund major randomized control studies almost guarantees complete control over what gets published in scientific literature, ensuring that negative results that could impact my ability to bring happiness pills to Japan would rarely enter the debate.Lastly, and most importantly, to ensure a lasting legacy of your deeds, a super villain requires a trademark evil laugh. When SSRIs finally entered the Japanese market, I sat back in my expensive office chair and gloated to my minions, “All my schemes have fallen into place, just like I said they would. Bwa ha ha!!”
To wrap up, super villains want to change the world just as much as the next hero. Super villains define a goal, lay out their plans and then have flunkies, or sidekicks in the case of superheroes, carry out their mission. Although my story is just one out of thousands, I hope that you will come out of this with a new appreciation for my sorely misunderstood brothers and sisters.This is my third Toastmasters speech performed on November 11, 2010, and was inspired by the depression chapter in Ethan Watters' "Crazy Like Us: The Globalization of the American Psyche". The page numbers in the piece above show where I took quotes from the book. The objectives of the speech are as follows:
-the speech should have a clear purpose
-should be organized so that it gets to the point of what I'm trying to say
-beginning, body and conclusion should reinforce the message
-speaker should project sincerity and conviction
My personal goal was to perform without the use of notes, but sadly, this was the objective I failed. Boo! Next time!
Please note that this piece is a satire and in no way supports the agenda of pharmaceutical companies.
