Don't Talk to Strangers!

Imagine the unimaginable: you come home from work after receiving an emergency telephone call, to find that your house has burned down and that your children and the babysitter have been killed in the fire. Or perhaps you hear a bang late at night and come out of the house to find your dear son or daughter in a pool of blood after having been shot. Or your neighbor has been found in the living room of his house with a nose packed with Peruvian marching powder and his throat cut to the spine. After being questioned and consoled by the firemen and policemen you, while still in a daze of shock, are standing on your front lawn and a man or woman you don't know comes up to you with a microphone in hand and a videographer in tow and starts questioning you about what happened and how you feel. You feel punch drunk, but because you've been raised to be polite, you answer the questions put to you by the electronic intruder.

The next day you turn on the television and see the person who was questioning you roughly describing your situation. Then you see yourself in a state of extreme emotional distress babbling almost incoherently. And after fifteen seconds the news anchors are talking about the birth of a panda at a zoo. Your tragedy is worth fifteen seconds. Your loss is worth no more than the birth of a wild animal.

Or you pick up the phone one day and a voice says that a poll is being taken. They want to know if you think whether George Bush is an angel sent by God or the demonic spawn of Satan. You think about the question and decide that you are more unhappy with President Bush's performance than you are happy with it so you answer that you think Mr. Bush is, while mistaken in several of his actions, is no more demonic than the innocent babe resting in the bassinet in the next room. The pollster says, "I've got your opinion, thank you." A couple of days later you pick up the paper and read that 60% of the populace thinks Bush is evil and wonder, "Who would think such a thing?" Upon further thought you realize that you said that you did.

Think about it. In the above cases you made statements that were abridged, edited or assumed. Or your emotional state was taken advantage of. The people who asked you the questions made money by asking the questions. You made nothing. In fact, you may have even been made to appear ignorant, ridiculous, racist or sappy.

Years ago, while making the mistake of watching the local television news, there was a story about a family perishing in a house fire. The father was at work at the time of the fire. He rushed home. He was a recent immigrant from Mexico. His English was poor at best. A field reporter for the television station stuck a microphone in this poor man's face and asked, "Do you think this tragedy could have been avoided if you'd had a smoke alarm?" The poor fellow, confused by the question and in a state of extreme despair, answered "yes" despite the fact that he more than likely didn't understand the question. It was apparent that he only answered the question to get the geek with the mike away from him.

There was also the fad of the "how do you feel?" question. A woman survives the slaughter of her family by her PCP crazed husband. Minutes after she has made her statement to the police a "correspondent" shoves a microphone in her face and asks, "How do you feel?" She's still stunned and is trying to take in the enormity of the situation. All she can manage to say is something like, "I feel bad." As far as the television news broadcast is concerned, that's the end of the story. She comes across as a woman who did not love her children. She just "feels bad." That particular mode of questioning ended soon after a man had lost his family in a tragic incident and when asked by the news snoop, "How do you feel?" hauled off and punched the news guy in the snoot. The news, being the news, did not realize that by the punch the man was answering the question through action rather than words. He felt like he'd been blind-sided in a worse way than the newsman was. In each of the above instances the news person was paid to ask questions. The questioned were paid nothing.

Here's the point of all the above mess. There is no reason for the average citizen to answer questions put to them by the news media or opinion polls. There is no legal or moral obligation. There is no monetary obligation. When a news man or pollster asks a person a question the news man or pollster is being paid. The queried is paid nothing and risks being misquoted, edited, purposely misconstrued or being made to chose between opinions that one really does not hold.

My dear mother, the ever young Duchess Nib, was once asked to make a statement on film endorsing a supermarket. The endorsement had the possibility of being used in a television commercial. When approached with the offer Dutchess Nib asked, "How much will you pay me for this." The answer was, "Why, nothing! But you may be on television!" To which dear old Mum replied. "Being on television doesn't pay Mimi (the chambermaid)." Mumsey has always had an eye for the adding to the Nib fortune -- such as it is.

Now, think about it. News people are paid to ask questions. Pollsters are paid to ask questions. You, on the other hand, pay to ask questions of your doctor or lawyer or mechanic or beautician. Is there not something wrong here? In each of the above examples the questions refer to something that is important to one, not the world at large. The questions are not asked to make money nor out of idle curiosity or public entertainment. One asks questions for a specific purpose. But, let's face it, news is pretty much a form of entertainment these days and polls are useless because they are only a moment in time. You pay to ask questions that are more important to you than the questions asked by newsmen and pollsters are to the public at large.

So, taking a leap, if you are asked by a news man what you thin, how you feel, who you are, the proper reply is, "How much will you pay me for the answer?" If the answer is "Nothing," walk on. If a pollster calls you and asks your opinion ask the question, "How much will you pay me for the answer?", and the reply is, "Nothing. This is a poll.," the proper response is, "You get paid to ask the question. I expect to be paid for the answer. No jack, no answer. See ya at the track."

Don't talk to strangers unless they've got money for answers. Are your opinions or feelings worth any less than a movie actor's or hootchie momma singer's?