Hate the Sin, not the Sinner

I'm a huge fan of Thom Hartmann.  I think he has one of the most brilliant minds going and can present his position in a thoughtful (if not always concise) manner.

This is why I was so disheartened recently to tune into his radio show and hear him speaking about telemarketers as if they were barely human.  A caveat here:  to be fair to Thom, I only heard about about 10 minutes of his segment on telemarketers so it is possible that any negative attitude I originally picked up was eventually reevaluated.

And I'm certainly not trying to imply that I enjoy getting telemarketing calls. They are intrusive and I found them particularly so when my mother was dieing and I was certain every time the phone rang that it would be the call telling me to hurry to the hospital. I spent weeks on red alert and every time the phone rang, dread flowed through me.

What bothered me about this particular segment on the Thom Hartmann show was the ire which would rightfully rest on the industry istelf but instead was directed at the telemarketers themselves.

I came upon the segment as Thom was playing a recording of the way a sales-person had been dealt with by an irritated callee. In the recording, the telemarketer called what he believed to be the name on the list only to be told that he called a residence where a murder had taken place and that the police detective didn't believe he was simply a telemarketer. In fact, he believed there might be  reason connected to the murder that the telemarketer called and the detective proceeded to brow beat the caller, insisting he tell him why he called. Does the telemarketer have some connection to the murder victim? Perhaps the two had a homosexual affair. And all the while you hear the fear and confusion in the telemarketer's voice.

Of course, this isn't a murder investigation that the telemarketer has chanced upon. It's the owner of the phone number that has come upon the telemarketer's list and rather than simply saying "no thanks" and hanging up, this fool decided to put the telemarketer, who is simply trying to earn a living, through hell.

What fun! What a stitch! My sides have literally split from the hilarity!

Only, if  you really think about it, it's not really that hilarious.  It's kind of sick and I'm surprised that Hartmann, who normally seems very reasonable, wouldn't pick up on the mean spirited nature of this attempt to "deal" with a telemarketer.  In fact, as I listened to them talk about it, the tone implied that telemarketers were little more than vermin. A pest to be eradicated.

And they can be pesty, don't get me wrong.  Telemarketing calls can be annoying; it's one reason I let the answering machine pick up my calls (and anyone who really wants to talk to me will leave a message that I will answer).  But telemarketers are also human beings, most doing the only job they can to do to put food on their table. Oh, not that calling some ignorant louse to try to sell them something they probably don't need isn't a dream job.

Okay, let's be honest, it isn't.

The past 30 years have seen opportunities for the average person to make a living disappear thanks to the outsourcing of many industries. Many people found themselves wearing a telemarketer head set as a last result (and even that industry has been outsourced). What are these people supposed to do?

Part of the problem is the unrighteous righteous anger far too many people feel.We are, in general, a self absorbed species, so we think our "issues" are the most important things in the world. Don't think a few steps ahead; don't consider the other person on the line.  Five seconds of your time has been compromised so of course you have the right to terrorize another individual to prove your point.

I work at a library and a community newspaper. Once I needed to switch my shift at the library and I dialed a co-worker from my job at the paper to see if she'd be willing to make the switch. Her son answered and because they had caller ID, was under the impression I was someone from the sales staff of the paper looking to sell a subscription. Before I could get a word out, I was told they weren't interested and hung up upon. Now, as an editorial assitant for this paper I've been through this before. People love to send in their calendar items and wedding announcements to the paper, free of course, but if someone should need to contact them for a clarification of someting, well, that's a different story.  Again, rather than find out what the person wants, they assume it's a sales call and either hang up, or are loaded for bear when you talk to them.

So of course I called my library co-worker back. I needed the switch. The son answered but simply hung up. I called back two more times and by the third, the son at last asked, "What is wrong with you people?" to wit I had to ask, "What is wrong with you?  I work with your mom at the library and would like to talk to her if that would be okay."

Now, if this kid had had the courtesy to treat me like a human being and speak to me for five seconds the first time I called, it would have avoided the ten minutes of back and forth that followed. But because telemarketers are not considered human beings, they're not afforded the courtesy of five seconds to find out if in fact they are trying to sell something.

But that would require people to get over themselves for a few moments to ascertain what the call is about. I admit freely, I screen my calls. Because I have to deal with the general public for a good portion of the day, I have to admit, when I get home the last thing I want to do is talk to anyone, even people I know personally. I figure, I'll screen my calls and anyone who thinks it's important enough will leave a message which I'll answer. I get a lot of hang-ups. Which is fine. Occasionally, though, I do slip and answer the phone only to have someone trying to sell me something. Do you know what I do?  It's revolutionary so bear with me on this, but what I do is refuse the offer and hang up. I know, crazy, right? Oh, it's not the same as spending 20 minutes concocting some fake crime scene, but it works pretty well.

While the notion of concocting said crime scene to freak some telemarketer out sounds really clever and cool, let's look at it from the telemarketer's point of view, remembering again how this is a human being trying to earn a living and possibly doing the only thing they were able to get to put food on their table.

This poor guy might have been in his fourth hour of his work day. Fourth hour of calling people and having them hang up on them or worse. It's doubtful this is his dream job, but it might have been all that was available. So he's trying to make the best of it. He's expected to call a certain number of people within each hour. Perhaps he gets into trouble if he doesn't make the quota, even if he manages to make a couple of sales. And how many sales is he likely to make? How many is he expected to make? His call quota is monitored. His call technique is monitored. By hour number four, he's just trying to get through it all so he can get home and relax and forget about all the negative energy he's had to endure that day just to earn a living. He calls the next number in the que only to discover that it's the number to a house where murder has been committed. And now the detective who has answered the phone is implying that the telemarketer might somehow be involved in the crime. Even if the callee had the decency to at some point come clean and admit to him screwing with the telemarketer's mind, imagine the adrenline going through this poor guy's body (from the clip I heard, it was incredibly uncomfortable). Now, for his efforts to be a good worker, the telemarketer gets to go home still hopped up from the creepy little experience he had that afternoon. At the library, I have an argument over some guy's late fine and it stays with me. I can't imagine how long something like a fake crime investigation will linger (if, in fact, the guy is lucky enough to discover that it was all bullshit). 

Oh, sure it sounds fun. Let's stick it to the telemarketer. But if anyone in society is capable of empathy anymore, put yourself in the telemarketer's shoes.What a horrible experience that must have been. And all because he had to pay the rent that month and that was the only paying gig he could find.

What I found interesting, from the admittedly little I heard on the Hartmann show, was that no one suggested writing in to the company and asking that they reconsider their telemarketering procedures. In other words, the genius who concocted and acted the story of the crime investigation when that one poor telemarketer called could have used that "creative" energy to contact the company with which the telemarketer was associated and let them know how disatisfied he was with their sales procedures (one has to also ask if this fool took the time to fill out the "do not call" list that was available a few years ago). I would guess he's furious that telemarketers intrude upon his time. Yet he seems perfectly okay with spending that oh so valuable free time to concoct sick little scenarious to scare the crap out of people simply trying to earn a living. 

And Thom Hartmann seemed to applaud this. Which, again, is what I find so troubling because Hartmann usually seems to support the average Joe trying to earn a living. I wouldn't be quite so concerned if Hartmann had suggested taking time to write to the companies sending out the telemarketer hounds to ask them to ease up. This is where the ire should be directed. The telemarketer of today is not that much different than the door-to-door salesman of yesteryear. Here's the thing: We've benefited greatly from technology, but one of the drawbacks of technology is that the door-to-door salesman is able to call us and call us with shark-like precision thanks to the sort of technology that brought us the Internet, smartphones, apps and all the fun stuff we take for granted. We want to be slick but we don't want to acknoweldge the responsibilites that come along with it.

I differ with Hartmann when it comes to our view of the human species. He sees a species to which compassion and sweetness is normal where as I believe that humans are, by nature, greedy. Like most other organisms, our prime code is to survive and that while we have the great potential to rise above it, our basic instinct is to be selfish and to survive. And it is this basic instinct that causes people not to look beyond our own experiences and to see what sort of misery my occur thanks to our actions. We can rise above it, but it requires effort and our willingness to exert that effort seems to be dimishing.

To see telemarketers as human rather than as the vermin known as "telemarketers" takes effort. It takes us putting ourselves in their shoes and asking, "How can I make this end so that both parties can go home without the acid of anxiety eating away our stomach lining?" Telemarketers aren't saints, but they're not demons either. They're simply people trying to make the best of what life has handed them. Does it really hurt us so much to remember that and treat them like human beings? 

War on Reason

No Virginia, there is no war on Christmas.  It was something invented by fools like Bill O’Reilly to…well, who knows why.  Why would someone look for problems where none exist?  To bolster weak positions?  To bolster weak egos?  The people behind the War on Christmas talk a big game about the greatness of this country then completely trounce upon one of the core principles that make it great.

Semantically yes, they have a point when they say Christmas is about Christ.  That’s where the “Christ” in “Christmas” comes from.  What they conveniently forget, however, is that the people who made up the holiday Christmas (oh let’s call them Christians) did so by hijacking other celebrations, such as the Roman celebration of Saturnalia and the Germanic celebration of Yule, and slapping the Christmas label on this time of year by claiming that Christ was born on Dec. 25.  Now the time of year wasn’t the only thing said Christians hijacked to create their tradition and the fact is that this follows in a long line of religions “borrowing” from each other (though none stole a tradition and made it their own as well as Christianity did).  But to insist that this time of year must remain sacred for one dogma is an insult to that good portion of the world who doesn’t believe in that dogma yet also holds this time of year dear.

This brings me back to one of the things that make this country great.  The Founders, in their far sighted wisdom and perhaps having witnessed their share of religious squirmishes, decided that everyone should have the right to worship (or not to worship) as they pleased.  So strongly did they believe in this that they put it in our Bill of Rights.

That’s a scary thing for Christians for in their philosophy, it’s not only sinful but dangerous not to acknowledge the glory of the Christian God.  And I must point out in all this that I refer only to intolerant Christians for I know there are Christians out there who couldn’t care less if someone wished them a “Happy Holiday.”  No, to intolerant Christians, turning our collective back on God could cause all sorts of calamities to befall the country.  It’s a fear that makes them pine for “one nation under God” and helps them forget how important a freedom of religion is (because without religious freedom, they might be the ones persecuted one day.  I mean actually persecuted as opposed to the persecution they’re imagining because FOX told them to). 

The term in question seems to be the insidious “holidays” as in “Happy Holidays” (though I’m sure “Seasons Greetings” is considered just as powerful a weapon in the non-existent War on Christmas).  These are two harmless sayings that I remember in cards and decorations as a child. 

It is true that the term “Happy Holidays” has been replacing “Merry Christmas” with increasing frequency over the years and here’s why: Because we have a vibrant country with a variety of religious philosophies (including those people who hold no religious views).  These people work hard, play by the rules, and pay their taxes.  Why then is it so terrible to honor the diversity, include everyone, and call it a “Holiday Tree”?

To whine about this is akin to the fools in the United States House of Representatives wasting time in November voting to make “In God We Trust” our national motto despite the fact that a good portion of tax paying citizens don’t trust in the Christian god (or any god for that matter).  We had a perfectly good motto, e pluribus unum, “Out of many, one,” that honored the country and the diversity of its people, but those who would vote to change that motto and disenfranchise a portion of this country aren’t interested in honoring their fellow citizens.  They’re only interested in proving a point:  God rules and unless you can get on board the Christian train you’re not invited to the party.  The irony there is that Saturnalia, the festival appropriated by Christians for the purpose of Christmas, was a festival where everyone was invited to take part no matter what they’re religion was.

To put it on a personal level, I was raised a Catholic (left the faith when I was 14) so calling this season Christmas is a very ingrained thing even though I no longer believe in Christianity.  Having worked in public service for years however, I’m aware that while not everyone celebrates Christmas, they may celebrate a particular tradition at this time of year.  Plus, I appreciate that this time of year could be important even to those who don’t celebrate a religious tradition.  After all, the secular New Year’s isn’t far away.  So when I send someone on their way, I am more likely to wish them “Happy Holidays” because I don’t want to assume what creed the people follow.  That to me is more respectful to fellow Americans.

The word "Christmas" in this song is not going to stop me from loving it. 

Stores have taken this tack the past few years and their attempt to be respectful to their customers is grist for the mill for the pea brains trying to pump up this mythological idea that there’s a War on Christmas.  It’s the stores business to make a welcoming and comfortable environment for every customer not just a small minded sect who has decided their god is being dissed because the store is trying to be all inclusive.

Yet now there’s a list made up by the American Family Association (AFA) that grades stores on what it feels is the aiding and abetting the enemy in the War on Christmas based on how often they use the term Christmas (not that the stores have stated that they’re against Christmas, just that they haven’t used the Big C in their advertising and such).  Even if the store sells Christmas items, if it doesn’t blast out the term Christmas in all its advertising, it’s on the AFA list of stores censoring Christmas.  In the economy we’re struggling with now, these intolerant fools are going to slash at a store because its managers had the audacity to want to make everyone feel comfortable.  This doesn’t sound like a war on Christmas.  This sounds like a war on tolerance.  A war on the very philosophy our Founders believed in.  You are not supposed to be punished because you don’t bow down to a particular creed.

I’ve had people wish me “Merry Christmas.”  I’ve had people give me religious gifts.  And I could be petty and become insulted over these people assuming I am of a particular faith.  But how stupid would that be?  These are tokens of someone’s affection.  No matter what god they believe will bestow it, they’re wishing me peace.  How could I be so rude as to throw that back in their face?

But this is a concept very foreign to those actually waging a war at this time of year.

And I can imagine after being in charge for so long, that it must be tough for some Christians to give a little when it comes to tradition.  After all, I’m sure there were faithful celebrants of Saturnalia who didn’t appreciate it being swiped by Christianity (we won’t even go into festivals like Easter or Halloween).

But it’s 2012. We need to start growing up.  No one is denying anyone’s right to celebrate Christmas.  Those who use the term “holidays” are merely trying to honor the fact that this time of year does and should have resonance with a variety of beliefs and we can all enjoy it if we can just freakin’ learn to get along!