Some friendly advice

My posts have been fairly grim lately. Lots of heartbreak and anger and not much levity. So I'm going to turn the light back to my "day job" which is actually just my "not quite so stupidly late night job," telemarketing.

No matter how much you think you hate telemarketers, if you are a jerk to us, we hate you more.

Let me say that again.

You may hate telemarketers a lot, like a whole lot, but we hate you more.

You see, think of the numbers involved here. Perhaps you did something stupid online and you are getting a "ton" of telemarketing calls for a day or so. Maybe even as frustratingly often as 10 calls a day or so. You finally snap and call the next poor sap that gets connected to you (we DO NOT DIAL THE PHONE OURSELVES) a "stupid fucking dipshit piece of crap why don't you get a real job?" And slam down the phone or hit "end" or however you terminate calls.

Then you go on with your day.

My terminal is connected to hundreds of calls in a day. Hundreds. Not all connect, but many do. I speak to dozens of people in a four hour period. Maybe 2 or 3, sometimes none, sometimes 5 or 6 people are actually nice to me during the shift and I might get leads. The rest are either completely dismissive, or total assholes.

And then there are the ones who stand out.

"Why the FUCK would I need that? Don't you do your FUCKING HOMEWORK BITCH?"

"Didn't you know you are calling a business to dipshit asshole MOTHERFUCKER?"

"NO! I don't fuckin' need anythin' you fucking piece of shit!"

These are all quotes I have actually heard.

I would like to point out something to those who hate telemarketers and like to treat us in the manner illustrated above.

I know where you live.

Now I am an honorable and reasonable human being and would not retaliate in any way against the poor frustrated souls who treat me with such vitriol and vulgarity. Also I want to keep my job.

But if you just told me that I mistakingly called a business, and then curse me out violently, you better be very very glad you got ME, because I won't Google your phone number to find out what the company is and then Yelp about your fantastic interpersonal skills. If you threaten to come to my house and ruin my dinner with my family, remember that I did not make any direct attempt to call you, it is a computerized system using publicly available information, and while you have no idea from where I am calling, I have your home address in front of me. If you threaten to call the police on me for doing my job, remember they don't like being harassed by drunk jerks who think that somehow their personal lines are sacrosanct. They aren't.

Just remember, next time you take in that deep breath to be a total asshole to a telemarketer, chances are, they know exactly where and who you are. And not everyone is as reasonable and law abiding as I am.