Telephone scamming goes on everywhere, I imagine, but somehow the Academy
of Telephony and Thimblerigging (AT&T, by coincidence) has pinpointed our
community for extra effort.
We are supposed to be intimidated by a voice coming over this
newfangled talk box, or senile enough to be convinced that we all have grandchildren
unjustly jailed in Mexico. Some of us are, unfortunately, and are taken for
varying sums of money despite weekly warnings in our community newspaper.
Others succumb to threats that their electrical service will be cut off unless
they pay ransom immediately.
For this latter scheme to work, the voice must be authoritative, and
fluent enough in the language to sound like a representative of a major utility
company. That’s one side of the industry, and it has no redeeming features.
The other branch, while even more annoying, does serve a social
function. It provides entrée to the job market for recent arrivals. Almost all
the calls I get, and at times there can be two or three in a day, are from
people to whom the language is obviously of only recent acquaintance.
That creates an extremely frustrating situation: you can’t insult the operatives who call you. I’ve tried. I’ve used
every obscenity I know, suggesting feats of physical insertion I know to be realistically
impracticable -- but they don’t
understand. They plow ahead with the sales story, not realizing that
they’ve been told off in terms a native recipient would respond to with, if
within reach, a poke in the speaker’s eye.
What use, then, are the carefully hoarded obscenities you so
seldom get to use if not to tell off a telephone scammer? Yet what should be
the satisfaction of letting loose to verbally demolish an adversary becomes in
this case a futile gesture. You have brought up your most devastating
linguistic artillery but the target, armored with unknowingness, doesn’t feel a
thing. New arrivals should be required to take classes in Obscenities, especially
if they’re going into telephone work.
