November 10th, 2004
If you phone a bank or an insurance agency or some other largish bureaucracy office, you will undoubtedly get an automated telephone system. I actually don't mind these nearly as much as some people; a lot of information can be gathered more quickly by a system (e.g., a bank account number) prior to one-on-one time. So the real conversation--the meat of the matter, usually--is handled by real people. Just as long as you trust the organisation you are phoning.
I even recently got a telephone system that I only had to speak to. The conversation went something like this:
[Female voice cooing in a tone I can best describe as warm and--er--inviting]: "This is the automated telephone service for XYZ Corp. ... Let's start with your customer number, shall we?"
[Me]: "Did you really just say, 'Shall we?' OK, OK ... if we must ..."
"I'm sorry, I did not understand that number, please repeat it."
"You're sorry? I'm the one who isn't following the script, and ..."
"I'm sorry, I did not understand that number, please repeat it."
[Controls self enough to recite number]: "1234567-8"
[Spoken as though I'd just performed some heroic feat of pleasure on her in the bedroom]: "Thank you!"
"I bet you say that to all the guys ... but what do you say to the women?"
"I'm sorry, I did not understand that request, please repeat it."
"So ... what are you wearing?"
"I'm sorry, I did not understand that request, please repeat it."
"I want to talk to a real person!"
"OK, please wait ..."
... and "she" was as good as her word: Despite my best efforts, my customer number got entered, and my account information was up on the screen in front of an abusively pleasant young man waiting for me.
* * *
But before all of this nonsense on the telephone, there was something else that was announced to me:
"In order to serve you better, this telephone call may be monitored or recorded."
There is also a variant:
"This call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes."
I just hate it when people say shit like that. My rapidly-shredding intelligence gets bruised and insulted by such obvious crap. If they were street thugs, they would probably say, "Please hold still while I bonk you over the head and steal your money for quality assurance purposes." Or perhaps someone might say, "These credit card numbers are being stolen and used in order to serve you better."
I mean, this is in line with what PR firms and Public Spokespeople discovered long ago:
Just say anything. Don't worry about how absurd or how much of a lie it is. Sure, some people will cluck their tongues and get upset with you ... but most people will just accept it, and nobody will do anything about it anyway!
* * *
I know that I belong to a smallish and shrinking group of people who get really up in arms about large corporations and governments having free and easy access to our private information. Most people look at us as though there is something slightly wrong with us, or as though we are being unnecessarily uppity about something so harmless as an address, our age, our favourite authors, etc.
That shrug of the shoulders "What me worry?" attitude shows lack of imagination, shows lack of healthy fear for the evil that people can do, shows a lack of a nervous system about the rights that are eroding under our very eyes. In short, it shows a lack of social intelligence.
It's not about--and has never been about--the fear of "being caught" doing something I shouldn't be.
My closet contains no skeletons. But that doesn't mean I will mindlessly throw the door open so that everyone who has the money and control can poke through it and look at my underwear.
It's not just a matter of principle, either. Historically, every population that has had its power usurped through ever-more-intrusive information gathering has had its rights stripped in larger and larger swaths, ultimately leading to impoverishment and enforced servitude. The bizarre notion we seem to have that it can't happen to us here in North America in the early 21st Century is just stupid. What makes us think we are any better or safer than the Romans, or the Babylonians, or the Germans or Spanish or Italians of the 1930s, the French prior to the French Revolution, etc.? What makes us think that our "modern" information gathering efficiency in the form of computers and databases make us any better--or even any different--from other cultures?
If we don't fight it, we lose everything.