Looking for Lies? Follow the Money

Sociopath – so⋅ci⋅o⋅path
–noun Psychiatry.
1. a person whose behavior is antisocial and who lacks a sense of moral responsibility or social conscience.
2. Someone whose social behavior is extremely abnormal. Sociopaths are interested only in their personal needs and desires, without concern for the effects of their behavior on others.

Imagine that Donald Rumsfeld, the former Nixon and most recent Bush administration political operative who allegedly misrepresented reputable scientific findings to facilitate the FDA’s approval of aspartame for public consumption, was, as defined by his actions, a sociopath.

Now suppose that the corporate entities that have reaped billions of dollars by allegedly lying to the public about the dangers of ingesting a proven toxic substance called aspartame, were helmed by sociopaths.

Finally, pretend Dr. Arthur Hayes Jr., the Reagan-appointed FDA chairman who in 1981 ignored the recommendations of his own internal FDA team and findings by independent medical scientists proving aspartame unsafe, then overturned the Public Board of Inquiry and falsely declared aspartame safe for public consumption, was a sociopath.

Having no formal psychiatric education, I’m not qualified to make definitive psychiatric diagnoses. That said, I ask you to read the definitions above one more time, paying strict attention to the phrases “lacks a sense of moral responsibility or social conscience” and “without concern for the effects of their behavior on others.”

There are many different characteristics attributed to sociopathic disorders, but no psychiatric classification contains a universally accepted, completely accurate description of every single person who presents signs of it. For the purposes of the men listed above, their apparent lack of any moral responsibility or social conscience is the point of focus.

The men in question are generally recognized to be tightly organized, coldly rational people who have made huge sums of money by marketing an extremely harmful, toxic substance to the public – even going so far as to suggest that aspartame is good for people. The use of this toxic chemical has cost untold numbers of people their lives, ruined people’s health, and every day, millions more tempt fate by failing to heed the warnings of medical scientists who haven’t a single penny to gain by voicing the proven dangers of this deadly substance.

Hypothetically, let’s say you asked two sources whether aspartame is safe or harmful (even though both answers are a matter of public record spelled out in hundreds of reliable scientific documents easily found on this Web site). The first source, a group of highly educated medical specialists with flawless credentials, no political ties and no financial stake in any given set of findings, answers the question “Is aspartame safe?” with a thunderous thumbs down; the second source, a gang of self-entitled, self-satisfied, filthy rich corporate executives and political operatives who all have an unspeakably enormous financial stake in their answer, answers the same question with an enthusiastic thumbs up.

Assuming they both know the truth,  how could you know who was being truthful and who was purposely lying? As this world goes, in every case where a dispute arises between the Voice of Reason and the Lure of Money, if one side is lying, which one is it? No reasonable person can doubt that it’s always the money side that can’t be trusted (unless that person has a financial stake in insisting that people who have absolutely nothing to gain by lying, lie just for the fun of it).

Ask yourself: What would men not do for billions of dollars? The answer to that question is a terrible truth about humankind that we minimize at our own peril: Almost nothing.

Would they start wars under false pretenses? Yes. Kill people? Absolutely. Lie? Easily. Cheat? Without hesitation. Steal? Indeed, and for so very much less than that.

With that in mind, would they knowingly harm innocent men, women and children by flooding the food supply with a deadly neurotoxin?

In the seemingly endless case of the carcinogenic low-calorie substance known as aspartame, the truth has been taking an ugly, brutal beating for nearly 30 years.

And what have we gained by it all?

A lot of very sick people, a decimated healthcare system and a rampant obesity epidemic.

Part One of an ongoing series of exploratory posts concerning aspartame