GILEAD: Greed and Human Suffering

Below is a letter I wrote. Perhaps you will post it to your blog.  Gilead will certainly see it because they are watching you.

To the Board of Directors. Gilead Sciences.

Hello.

My name is David. I am 58 years old. I live in Michigan. I am afflicted with HCV. I am disabled. I receive $733.00 per month from Social Security. I have Medicaid but no Medicare. You have a cure for HCV. I cannot have this cure because it costs too much. Medicaid will not pay for it. So I live in fear for my life every day.

But Your response is: “Who cares you say. We must make a profit. We must please the stockholders. One life or one hundred fifty million lives will not stand in the way of our personal successes and our increasing profits.”

  Okay, so you simply don’t care. Your moral values are self-evident. You likely believe that this attitude is normal when actually it is somewhat psychotic. Morbidly narcissistic at the least. The logic you use is, “I am better than other people. I deserve to have wealth and power despite the fact that people must die for me to succeed.  Hey, I worked hard to get where I am.

 Does this sound right?

Perhaps it does. Most narcissistic individuals feel this way. The logic sounds good but there is a problem. You are human just like all those people you have chosen to kill by not saving those you could save.  You experience the human emotion of fear just like everyone else. You are eventually going to die just like everyone else. No amount of money or power can alter this fact.  Surely You fear death. Perhaps not consciously but the fear is there. If you are not already, you are getting old. The older you get the greater this fear becomes. 

You obviously don’t believe in God because your actions are truly godless.

  So you think that you won’t be going to hell when you die.  You will experience hell however, here on earth. You are driven. You love life. But life will be taken from you. You will eventually beg for your life, when you are old and infirm. Perhaps you will contract an incurable illness and suffer horribly.  Get the picture?

Of course, you believe that your actions against others less fortunate are warranted. You believe that you will create a legacy. You will be a business legend. Your loving family, who you actually love less than you love yourself, will be by your death bed and mourn your passing. Right? 

Well, think again.

Your children and siblings, if you have any are anxiously awaiting your death so they can spend your money.  You don’t believe this because you are narcissistic but it is true nevertheless.  Other people don’t like you, they merely pretend to so as to gain your favor.  Your wife, if you have one, hates you because you are domineering. She stays with you because you have money.

This is who you are.

Respectfully

David L.

Post Script:

Gilead was a mountainous region east of the Jordan River, situated in modern-day Jordan. It is also referred to by the Aramaic name Yegar-Sahadutha, which carries the same meaning as the Hebrew Gileed, namely: “heap [of stones] of testimony”

Balm of Gilead was a rare perfume used medicinally, that was mentioned in the Bible, and named for the region of Gilead, where it was produced. The expression stems from William Tyndale‘s language in the King James Bible of 1611, and has come to signify a universal cure in figurative speech

“Gilead” mentioned in the Book of Hosea may refer to Ramoth-Gilead, Jabesh-Gilead, or the whole Gilead region; “Gilead is a city of those who work iniquity; it is stained with blood”