ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, A Watered Down View

I first came to know about it through one of my school mates, now based in US, with whom the only interaction I had in past three decades was to accept his Facebook friend's request. He had posted a video of him on Facebook undergoing this bizarre ritual of getting drenched in cold water. That was my first brush with 'ALS ice bucket challenge' and it did take some time for me to bother what ALS stood for. Initially I mistook it for some reality show, going by the fun, frolic and narcissism the participants were exuding and the way it was going viral with every celeb, Page 3 wannabe and 'like'-starved Facebookers willingly getting splashed with ice cold water and flaunting how hot they looked.

After Googling I came to know that ALS was a grim affair - it stood for Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as motor neurone disease - a crippling ailment that affects the neurological system, with no known cause or cure leading to paralysis and a very miserable end. Those afflicted with the disease rarely live beyond five years, one notable exception being famous British scientist Stephen Hawking, who was diagnosed with ALS when he was 21 and has now crossed 70. The other ALS afflicted notable figure that comes to my mind is former chief of army staff General Krishnaswami Sundarji, but he could survive only a couple of years after being diagnosed with the disease.

I had a rather nodding acquaintance with a person who was quite literally 'felled' by this ailment. I first met him at a hospital. He had come to visit my father, who was convalescing after a heart attack. He seemed happy and boisterous type and tried to assure me that my father will be fine and not to hesitate to call him if there was any need. Later I came to know he was the latest tenant in the house close to mine.

His name was Thomas, a middle aged man with two teenage sons and like most Malayalees had spent best part of his working years in Gulf. He was quite energetic and was always seen going around in his red TVS Suzuki bike. On seeing me he often used to stop by and enquire about my father's condition. Through neighbourhood grapevine I came to know that he was a small time financier.

Later on during those brief encounters on the road I noticed that his manner of speaking had changed and he had difficulty pronouncing certain sounds, especially vowels. Quite often I had to make a guess about what he was talking about. I thought something had gone wrong with his vocal cords, though never bothered to check out what his ailment was.

A couple of months later he and his bike were not to be seen and it took me some time to realise that he was not stepping out of his house altogether. Instead his house began witnessing a steady stream of visitors.

Out of concern I too went to his house and the sight left me shell shocked. Thomas was now confined to wheel chair and though he could recognise me, he could barely speak and tried to make hand gestures, again with little success as he could barely move them. It was then I first heard about motor neurone disease. As his wife explained to me about the seriousness of the disease, it left me too numbed to say anything. It also made me realise how much of nervous coordination and energy is needed even to do mindless gestures like scratching ones hair or nose. 

Some months later they shifted to a new place and I lost touch with them. But one day one of my neighbours told me that Thomas had passed away. I guess for him it must have been a welcome end to a long drawn suffering.

Coming back to ALS challenge, the current hoopla on social media is showing no sign of cooling off with bucket full of controversies. Matt Damon decided to use toilet water for the purpose (to highlight about scarcity of clean drinking water across the globe) and Obama ducked the bucket challenge, though he agreed to donate for ALS research. The fact that Corey Griffin, one of the pioneers of ALS challenge died in a road accident added a sympathy angle to the event.

Though some reports claim the drive has raised $100 million, many participants in Britain admitted that did not donate to an ALS charity after taking part in an ice bucket challenge. Many participants were not even aware what the event was all about. For them it was just another souvenir to be posted on their Facebook wall.

In India it has mutated to 'rice bucket challenge' with participants handing over a bowl of rice to a needy persons and posting pictures on Facebook. Looks like in this era of social media epidemic even the good old anna daanam has to be clothed in vanity.

Pic courtesy: Wikipedia

Also Read: Bangalore Beat

The Syrian Itch

Syria is the new 'itch' of the West. The script seems all too familiar. The US and its European allies look for an excuse to meddle in a West Asian country and it does not take long for them to prise open a window of opportunity. They are egged on by regional satraps like Saudi Arabia, and of late Turkey, who have their own axes to grind.

Of course, being democracies the West is saddled with the burden of 'manufacturing consent' (apology to Noam Chomsky) among the populace that it is a 'just war' and worth shedding the blood of some promising youngsters, though not those from affluent background. Good old white man's burden theory gets reloaded with some new characteristics.

However, what is disappointing is that it is happening during the tenure of a US President who came to power on an anti-war platform. He seemed more than eager to bring back his troops from Afghanistan and Iraq.

But now we have his lieutenant John Kerry play Donald Rumsfeld by hoisting Bashar Al Assad to the evil pantheon of Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein. Being Democrats one was lulled into believing they won't be as economical on truth as their Republican rivals. But looks like the corroding influence of White House is a great leveller.

While marshalling his case against Syria, Kerry revealed a picture of rows of dead bodies lying on the floor, wrapped in white shrouds, and claimed they were victims of Bashar Al Assad's alleged chemical attack. A claim refuted by the photographer Marco di Lauro, who actually took that photo, saying it was from Iraq in 2003 and adds that he nearly "fell off his chair" when he saw it being used to promote a war in Syria. As of now the only ray of hope is that America's trusted camp follower Britain has not fallen in line yet. Not because it does not want to, but because the opposition is proving to be a hard nut to crack.

As for the media, which is now at best an extended arm of corporate communications, the less said the better. In this era of embedded war correspondents we cannot even dream of expose like Pentagon papers that happened during Vietnam war.

And thankfully for our leaders, the attention span of our modern day youth is as narrow as their smartphone screens and their sense of history is next to nothing. Hence things like Vietnam war, Napalm attacks and My Lai massacre hardly ring a bell. So they needn't fear any needling questions from them and continue selling the same old snake oil of 'national interest' to further the agenda of their real constituency - the arms dealers.

Cartoon source: Facebook

Also Read: Bangalore Beat