Today's Society Pill Poppin'

Medicine is the quick fix to the slightest hint of pain. Medicine is a manufactured, artificial pill designed in a lab to sooth our symptoms. More interestingly "shaman", the native American term for "medicine man", derived from the word "medicine" implying "magical influence" (Online Etymology Dictionary). I found this incredibly intriguing because of the way medicine is used in millions of households today.

So many people rely on medicine as a quick fix and don't realize all the complications and the harm that it can cause. Medicine is just seen as something that suppresses the pain. In the book that we are reading in American Studies, "White Noise" by Don DeLillo, there is a quote that really relates to this.

"They isolated the fear-of-death part of the brain. Dylar speeds relief to that sector." (190)


In the book there is this drug called Dylar that is supposed to suppress the fear of death from a person. DeLillo is satirizing our society's dependency on medicine and how medicine cannot fix everything, especially not the age-old fear of death. This also relates to a blog that I recently read by a classmate of mine, Layne E, who commented on the over medication that is going on in today's world. The over medication of today's world is causing people to be much more dependent on medication and leads other more serious medical problems.

What do you think about the uses of medication in today's society? Do you think that advances in medicine are truly aiding our society or causing more problems for it?