the daily snivel

Early one morning after a long night studying for exams last December, I was unceremoniously awakened by my ringing telephone. Instead of the call being from someone I actually wanted to talk to, it was a telemarketer. In fact, I was called by a very nice and excruciatingly persistant voice who sought some of my money on behalf of the Police Association of Ontario. The PAO, I was told, was a non-profit organization engaged in outreach to troubled youths in programs like "Fishing with cops." The sales pitch went like this: by providing underprivileged and "at risk" kids with positive role models who would take them fishing and expose them to the positive benefits of the outdoors and try to steer them away from trouble, the PAO hoped to improve community relations and make the streets safer.

This seemed like a laudible goal, to be sure, but it was just before Christmas and I was none too wealthy. I told the persistent voice that, as a student, I did not have a lot of money to give. Ah, the voice thought: opportunity! The price just kept going down. I didn't have to give a hundred bucks. I didn't even have to give fifty. There was also a twenty dollar donation well within the price range of students like me. Couldn't I see my way to giving such a worthy program twenty dollars?

And yeah, I'm ultimately a soft touch when it comes to improving communities, and so they had me. I pledged twenty dollars and they pledged to send me a donation package in the mail. They did, too.

And what does it say? Well, it does mention the "Fishing with cops" program. Yes it does. It gets three whole lines in the letter I received, at the very end, after this part:

"This year your generous donation can help provide the resources for several programs and initiatives to improve the quality of life in Ontario including: The PAO's Lobbying Efforts for a safer Ontario through improved law enforcement and criminal justice programs. Key items on our agenda this year include legislative initiatives for a more accountable Young Offenders Act. The PAO is working to address the Public's [sic] concerns that the pending Youth Criminal Justice Act will not hold young people accountable for their actions and for truth in sentencing. In addition, PAO is also calling for a federal corrections and parole system that will end 'Club Feds' and keep dangerous criminals in secure jails where they belong. Our goal is to stiffen sentences for violent offenders and address shortcomings in the corrections and parole systems. The campaign focuses on establishing longer minimum sentences, reasonable parole standards, higher security incarceration for violent offenders, an independent review of sentencing and greater voice for victims in sentencing decisions."

Which is to say that the PAO is actually engaged in political lobbying in support of a right-wing law and order agenda which, as any good criminologist knows, accomplishes very little in terms of actually reducing crime and making streets safer for anybody. Ontario's criminal justice system is already clogged with a backlog of thousands of criminal cases. The system is strained for an adequate number of judges and Crown prosecutors (and legal aid funding for defence counsel) to effectively deal with these cases. A political lobby to spend money elsewhere on imposing tough sentences means spending money on new, larger prisons, more prison guards, and the costs of incarcerating offenders. Punishing criminals may be politically satisfying, but you have to address the root causes of crime to see progress. For more expansion on this rant, I'd recommend Elliott Currie's Crime and Punishment in America: Why the Solutions to America's Most Stubborn Social Crisis Have Not Worked, and What Will.

Even with politics aside, I'm thoroughly irked that I was promised one thing and sold another. Nowhere in the carefully scripted sales pitch was this intense lobbying mentioned. But I'm stuck giving them twenty dollars because they've been sending me letters every two or three weeks reminding me of my pledge. What's a boy to do? Bitch. That's what I'm doing here. I'm also including a note on the memo of the check and on the pledge form itself that my money is to be spent on the "Fishing with cops" program and NOT political lobbying. Fat chance they'll actually do that, however.

Let this be a lesson to me, and to you: ask questions instead of accepting easy answer.

Also, someone needs to invent a "Tele-Zapper" that actually electrocutes the telemarketer, and doesn't just confuse them.