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The Starving Telemarketer
A telemarketer claims thousands will starve if junk calls are prohibited. |
| WmB: |
why hello, my name is william b... |
| PCI |
And mine is Bob Bulmash |
| WmB: |
this is not hate mail just a letter simply showing you
the other side of the story. |
| PCI: |
My response is not to criticize your position,
but rather to present the position of the majority of private citizens in
the nation. (Don't bother challenging my contention. I know the nation's
mind on this. The statistics I rely on are published in telemarketing trade
journals, business magazines, and government studies.) |
| WmB: |
I am a telemarketer. |
| PCI: | And I am an average person (when it comes
to viewing a telemarketing call as it effects my right to be
left alone). |
| WmB: |
When a telemarket calls you next time, think about the fact
that on the other end is a human being, working, making a living just like you do everyday. |
| PCI: |
For the most part, I accept your description.
But when you purport that a telemarketer's way of earning a living is similar
to that of myself or the majority of other private citizens, you are wrong. A telemarketer's job is to act in such a way (in concert with his/her employer) so as to inject him/ herself into another's private residence. That is not something that my work, nor that of the majority, entails. Nevertheless, aside from this 'telemarketing peculiarity', I consider most telemarketers to be just regular folks. |
| WmB: |
So you would rather millions of telemarketers be out
of work, (which means people starve) than you be "BOTHERED". |
| PCI: |
That's a specious argument which puts you
at a disadvantage. The fact that you use hyperbole to make your point undermines
what you are trying to accomplish in your communication to me. called, The anthem of the telemarketing industry is: "We do not want to call people who do not want to be called." This is a reasonable statement, and one that I consider to be true. Yet, that is exactly what makes the industry sociopathic, in that, if telemarketers did not call those who did not want to be called, they would only be calling 16% of the population (those who either did not mind or enjoyed receiving junk calls). But there is a larger problem inherent within that 16%. They are the ones who are either elderly/lonely and enjoy a call from ANYONE or those that do not get 'many' such calls due to their economic standing within society. |
| WmB: | Our goal is not to bother you, but (most of the time)
to offer you a product or service, |
| PCI: |
Perhaps your motive is not to bother us.
But your intent is to maintain a business practice that most Americans consider
antithetical in polite, socially responsible behavior. Folks just don't want
to be bothered by an entity which considers its business practices superior
to our privacy rights. |
| WmB | wich if you would listen for a moment you might find is usfull to you. |
| PCI: | Come-on. The average telemarketing call
fails to get the compliance of the called party, more than 95% of the time.
Furthermore, there are millions of US businesses. Your sense of telemarketing
indicates that you consider it appropriate for every business which offers
a consumer product or service, to call every resident every year. Is
that an appropriate burden for residents to bear. After all, if your firm
makes telemarketing calls, why shouldn't all firms make them. |
| WmB: | You are may not have found that usfull service or product
any other way. |
| PCI: | When telemarketers sell bona fide anti-gravity
machines, I'll believe that. |
| WmB: |
and i leave you with these final words... we are not
a bother. |
| PCI: |
The majority of Americans say you are wrong
in your contention. |
| WmB: |
You do not have any controll of a "bother" all
you have to do is hang up. |
| PCI: |
H.U.H? The average person does not want
to be in a position to hang-up on anyone. That you propose we do something we do not enjoy is another aspect of your
vaporous argument. Most folks are not comfortable with rude behavior, whether
their own or that of others.
Furthermore, I feel that the most egregious aspect of a telemarketer's call is not the telemarketer's pitch, but rather that telemarketers call us from what we are doing in order to present a solicitation which telemarketers know (empirically) will most likely result in the disturbance of a person's fundamental right to be left alone, without any benefit to either the caller or the resident. That, my telemarketing friend, is the benchmark of a sociopathic business practice. Bob Bulmash - Private Citizen, Inc. |