{"id":115461,"date":"2021-06-24T03:18:07","date_gmt":"2021-06-24T10:18:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=115461"},"modified":"2021-06-24T03:18:07","modified_gmt":"2021-06-24T10:18:07","slug":"values-and-vultures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/06\/24\/values-and-vultures\/","title":{"rendered":"Values and vultures"},"content":{"rendered":"

Laksiri Warnakula\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

You must be wondering: What has\nthe first got to do with the other; I mean the two words that appear in the\ntitle. Vultures have no moral values and as such they are not qualities that\nyou can associate, even in your wildest of dreams, with those rapacious, avian\ndesert-dwellers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, this is what happened. The\nother day, I saw this photograpgh on Facebook, of a vulture of the Kalahari\ndesert. The award winning photo shows the raptor amidst a cloud of dust, while\nthe rest of its wake were busy nibbling and snacking on the  skeleton\nof a camel (not in the photograph but the following narration), one more gone\n\u2018the way of the desert\u2019, in the end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now back to the question: What\nmade me put these two words alongside each other that are otherwise\nincomparable beyond imagination. How could someone in his\/her right mind\nentertain such an incomprehensible thought?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anyway, as I kept looking at the\nphoto, something slowly emerged from the periphery of my mind and then quickly moved to the centre. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

They were the images of\n\u2018vultures\u2019 in human form, waiting at every turn to pounce on the hapless and\nthe helpless.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the sake of limited space, I\nwill start from the beginning of the viral epidermic to the present, though it\nis in fact a long story now seventy years old. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

First it was the \u2018Facemask\u2019 that\npeople had to buy in a hurry. When the ferocity and the danger of the virus came\nto be known, waking up the people from their slumbers, the panic\nbutton was hit and so was the buying-frenzy. Masks were sold without any\nprice-controls whatsoever and the vultures were getting multifold returns. So\nwere the sellers of other products with vulturine appetite for profits. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Advance forward skipping many\nexamples of \u2018human vultures\u2019 in action, following are the saddest of the story\n(in my opinion), so far, given in summary though: the PCR test, the quaratine,\nthe false lab. reports in regard to PCR test (as one lady patient reported in\nsocial media websites) and then how a baby, who was found to be PCR test\npositive and the following bitter experience that the parents had to undergo at\na private hospital (again according to social media sites), and lastly the\nvaccination program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now as far as the \u2018quarantine\u2019\nprocedures go, we all know how it is handled by whomever, and them only going\nby profit and zero-customer care. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And I have nothing new to add to\nthe vaccination-programmes many of which are set-up and conducted in a disorganised\nmanner, while the intervention of another set of those human vultures was seen\ngetting in the way of the health officials carrying out their duties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lastly some two hundred odd of\nthem sitting near the \u2018Oya\u2019 seem to have no qualms whatsoever about the\n\u2018importing of luxury vehicles\u2019 costing millions to the country, which is short\nof financial resources and still fighting a health crisis of unimaginable\nproportions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dear Mr President. Please begin\nfrom the ones around you and then work all the way down to the bottom, getting\nrid of these vultures in human form, who do not hesitate to put their personal\ngains before everything else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A sink hole is in the making and\nunless immediate measures are taken to stop this vulturine behaviour of some,\nwe will all be sucked into it before long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Laksiri Warnakula <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Laksiri Warnakula\u00a0 You must be wondering: What has the first got to do with the other; I mean the two words that appear in the title. Vultures have no moral values and as such they are not qualities that you can associate, even in your wildest of dreams, with those rapacious, avian desert-dwellers. Well, this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[157],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-115461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-laksiri-warnakula"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115461\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}