The $1.98 Opera Circuit Revisited: 21st Century Communications and Trending

Those of you who have known me for a lllllooooonnnnnnnggggg time may remember the series of articles I wrote in the late 1980s and early 1990s, called “Singing on the $1.98 Opera Circuit.” These articles were all about young opera singers starving for our art, as we built up our resumés. Wacky things seemed to happen in every production (opera company sued by blind bass player, citing discrimination against the visually impaired; three conductors in a row come down with pneumonia before opening night of the show; rehearsal space burns down after volunteers throw linseed rags in a container on the hottest day of the year… stuff like that), and it seemed only right to document these happenings.

I may have those original articles somewhere, but here is a new one. And I mean NEW.

This is a story from a friend of a friend.

This friend of a friend sang for an event, and one of the other singers came up to her afterward. “I love your voice,” this lady enthused, “I would love to talk to you about this classical music group I am trying to put together.” The friend thanked the woman and said she would enjoy speaking to her about it, at some point; she didn’t have a business card handy. The woman said, “oh, that’s okay; I can get your email address from the conductor.”

My friend thought nothing more about it. Weeks passed, busy and full of adventure, heartache or whatever.

Suddenly, from out of the blue, a Doodle poll message appeared in this friend’s email inbox. The poll was requesting that people fill in dates to meet about a new Opera Company. My friend gazed at the many people who had been sent the email in utter bewilderment: reviewers, composers, directors, and singers were among the people whose names and email addresses she could identify. My friend, being rather busy at the time, decided not to respond; she and the woman organizing this new “classical music group” hadn’t actually had a conversation. If my friend had known the venture was an opera company, she would have declined immediately because of the huge amount of travel that would be involved, and the number of other projects she was involved with. She figured that if she did not respond to this unsolicited poll, the non-response would be understood as meaning “I’m not interested.”

Well, reminder messages started coming in. As well as messages from a messaging service that requested the information of the recipient in order to read the incoming message. My friend didn’t really want to be receiving ever more communications from yet another message service, and with the recent hacking incidents occurring across the entire spectrum of retail and other computer network services, she didn’t want to give her information out to one she had never heard of that had “terms of service” small print. So, she was never able to read the additional messages.

Finally, another email, addressed to slightly different huge group of people, arrived in her inbox. This message contained a rebuke to everyone because they had not answered the request for Doodle poll responses.

“‘If you do not fill out the doodle pool, I may have to start calling monthly mandatory meetings,’ was the officious threat.”

“You’re kidding! But,” I said, as we were talking about this over coffee, “you hadn’t agreed to do anything, had you?”

“No!” she said, “I never spoke to the woman prior to getting spammed.”

“Wow.”

“I am not the only one irritated. One of the reviewers who had been among the group emailed replied to everyone, asking how could they get off this list, as requests to be deleted from it had gone unanswered.”

The three of us had our heads together, but fell silent. There was quiet coffee sipping. The whole thing was just too ridiculous.

“So, finally, I did respond to one of the emails, saying I could not commit to anything, at this time. I figured it would all stop, after that.”

“I gather it didn’t?” I asked.

“Well, she wrote me back, telling me she would keep my name, and to let her know when I was available.”

“So, what are you going to do, now?” asked my friend.

“I was hoping you could give me some ideas… See, I just got another email with the ‘company roster’ attached. I am listed as a ‘comprimario.’”

“No way!”

“Yes!”

“But, you never, like, auditioned or signed a contract or anything…”

“Nothing. And now I don’t want to get near this thing with a ten-foot poll. If the gal running it is so pushy with all these unwanted communications, I cannot even imagine actually working with her.”

“I don’t get it…”

“Well, I think she is trying to validate her start-up by including the names of people who have a presence in the music community. I mean, I think I am being used…”

“Sort of a weird compliment. Geez…”

“I don’t think I can get off the list! And I am worried that being on it will come back to haunt me, at some point. I mean, what if this group is bad or a scam or something?”

“Crazy! Most of the time, we are trying to get on a list, somewhere… I don’t know what to tell you. This is really the most bizarre thing I have ever heard of.”

“Maybe I should fill out the Doodle poll, make myself unavailable for all the proposed dates?”

“That might just mean you’d be required to come to mandatory meetings.”

We laughed.

But really, although this is a joke, it isn’t funny.

Privacy Matters: Hot On the Trail of Ms. Gloria A—!

When my husband and I settled in the small community where we now live, we got new phone numbers. This was the year 1999, and cell phone usage was not as ubiquitous; most people still had landlines. We each got separate lines because my husband uses the phone much more than I do, and experience had already shown that I would end up being a de facto secretary.

I had already experienced many phone calls such as this: “Do you know where he is? I need to speak to him right now about…” Most of the time, I could not help such callers. Things improved a bit after he got a cell phone; at least I was able to call him to let him know someone needed to speak to him right now.

So, now that we were married and settled into our new home, we each had (and still have) our separate lines. We also have cell phones.

When we got our land lines, little did we know that my husband had actually signed up to be harassed by phone, daily.

The quarry is actually not my husband, but one Gloria A—, and her overdue account is quite old, being as, apparently, she had my husband’s number before my husband did.

The calls started coming in almost immediately. Messages were left on the answering machine. Call immediately to clear up this complaint!

My husband dutifully called the number. He explained to the person who answered the phone that he was the new owner of this phone number, was obviously not Gloria A—, and please stop calling.

The man on the other end of the line asked, “Do you know Gloria A—?”

“No,” my husband patiently answered, “we just moved here.”

The man then got surly, “Well, we have found that people who say they don’t know the people we are looking for really do know them.”

“This number may have been hers before, but we moved to this house and the phone company gave me this number; it is mine now.” My husband tried to reason.

The man persisted, “Can you tell me how to get in touch with Gloria A—?”

“Look,” my husband said, “I am telling you that I do not know Gloria A— and you don’t believe me. If I were to now suddenly say I know Gloria A—, would you believe me, then? This is my new phone number, and I have nothing to do with this. Please stop calling.”

And so it is that the calls have been coming regularly, between 9am and 10am, every morning. My husband tried several times to get this to stop, to no avail. So, we screen the calls and let the answering machine collect the useless messages.

Although the calls originally may have come from one company, they are now coming from another company. I’ll tell you the name of this company because they are quite notorious, and they will probably think of it as publicity: Debt Recovery Solutions. This company specializes in what are known as “zombie debts,” that is debts that have gone uncollected from other debt collection agencies. These other agencies have given up but, believe it or not, they sell these uncollectable accounts, rather like the old junk bonds the banks used to sell, to much more sleazy operations down the debt collection food chain.

Most often, “zombie debts” are old phone accounts, or book and music club accounts that went delinquent ages ago. And I mean, these debts are really old, quite often more than 8 years old. Many times, these are not even legitimate claims—the debt had either actually been paid and not properly posted, or was subsequently cleared, but the debt file still exists because it was sold to this other operation, having never been properly cleared up. These accounts are all beyond the statute of limitations.

Debt Recovery Solutions leaves at least one message on my husband’s answering machine, every day.  We have received messages from actual people, telling us to call a toll free 877 number. Sometimes, however, the message is a prerecorded one, saying “Hello, this call is about a debt collection. We need you to return this call immediately. If you are—” and here there is an abrupt cut in by different mechanical voice, “Gloria A—” which then cuts back to the original mechanical voice, “please press 1 now. If you are not,” cuts again, “Gloria A—” cut, “please press 2 now and stay on the line.”

Really?! If you were Gloria A—, would you accept such an invitation? And if you are not Gloria A—, but somehow foolish enough to press 2 and stay on the line, I wonder what will happen? I suspect you will just be signing yourself up to continue to be harangued by some abusive nitwit for years, because you obviously are in cahoots with Gloria A—. What I know for certain is that pressing 2 and staying on the line will not be a way to get them to stop calling you.

And, so the calls and messages have continued, even unto the present day.

At a certain point, the National Do Not Call Registry came into being (in 2004, after a court challenge), and we registered our numbers right away, thinking this might solve the problem. Unfortunately, this does not solve the problem. Collection agencies and Charities are still allowed to call any number they want. And I think that carpet cleaning companies are also somehow allowed, although they shouldn’t be; perhaps they are illegally registered as charities. But it doesn’t matter; the unwanted calls continue.

Debt Recovery Solutions is the end of the line for zombie debts, I suspect. They have managed to bully many people into paying them money that should not be paid to them. The hapless victims think this will get these bottom feeders off their backs. Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth, as you can see by doing a simple search on the web. Debt Recovery Solutions is a prize bully. Known for putting dings on credit ratings, this company cannot be reached with certified cease and desist letters, and you cannot fight them through the legal system, apparently.

Legally, you are entitled to at least $1000.00 if a case goes to court and you are innocent. But guess what? You will have to hire a lawyer, and guess what, there are tons of bottom feeding attorneys out there who specialize in this kind of litigation. (Perhaps these attorneys are actually clandestine employees of the debt collection agencies, themselves, and this whole racket is a system that is self-perpetuating.) And I have read, among the many consumer complaints I found online, that even if you can contact the company, bring them to court and prove your case, the dings stay on your credit record, are not removed. Somehow, the company cannot be compelled to clear things up. Seven years of bad credit luck ensues.

Where does this leave us, with regard to truth, justice and matters of privacy? The only conclusion one can come to is that There Is No Such Thing As Privacy and your life is irrevocably open to such unwanted intrusions. Companies like this are an untraceable menace, seeming to exist beyond the arms of a legal system that really doesn’t care to bother with protecting consumers from phone harassment.

My husband and I consider, from time to time, giving up the phone number. He mostly uses his smart phone now. We do get many calls on this landline, from people who have known us for a long time, from family, friends and neighbors. We have never met Gloria A—; as far as we know, she does not live in our community.

I think the reason we have kept this phone number, despite the continuing aggravation, is because we feel somehow protective of Gloria A—. This all might be over the last bill she was sent for the number that is now my husband’s. If she moved without a forwarding address, that bill would have gone into limbo. All of this bother could just be for a partial month’s phone bill from 1998.

The messages are left daily. We delete them from the answering machine.

After more than 15 years, they are still hot on your trail, Gloria A—! Watch out!

Austerity For ALL!

There has been a great deal of political talk about security in this century. Growth is the security of organic life. The security of the imagination lies in calling, all our lives, for more liberty, more rebellion, more belief.  

 - Muriel Rukeyser

Men may lack vocabularies, but men in danger share more thoughts than they are given credit for, because they share the same dilemma. Let death draw near, and all men gathered together in twos or threes cease to be shy in their discussion either of it or of life. No school of philosophy can boast a better teacher than peril, when it approaches at a pace lively enough to be contemplated. 

- John Mason Brown

I must say that I find the political stance of conservatives, worldwide, quite amusing. 

The idea that there must be austerity, in these times of world financial crisis, might make sense if the austerity was intended for each, according to their ability. Strangely, the austerities are only meant to be experienced by those people who already experience austerity; the austerity that threatens to be meted out does not cut in all directions. The same breath that proclaims austerity for the rest of us also says that the wealthy should not be taxed, if we want the wealthy to invest in the economy, to create jobs. 

How could anyone believe such rubbish--this is the very thinking, championed by Reaganites and Thatcherites, who double-teamed it to deregulate and privatize, that ultimately led to the disaster we are all trying to live through now. 

The Third World War, in essence, has arrived! It is characterized by a the complete abandonment of any notion of collective endeavor, by which all might be raised up. Can any of you remember when it was a goal to end hunger? Instead, what we have is an overall sense of shameless individualism. Drill, Baby, Drill! is the shrill cry from Wall Street and The City. Think not what I can do to help you build your investment portfolio, but what I can do to fleece you! The environment be damned, I want you to drive your old beater until fossil fuels are but a memory. This shameless and amoral attitude is not limited to investment companies, insurance companies, the banking industry and corporate manufacturing; the Pod People have taken over your unions, your municipal governments, your primary, secondary and higher education systems, your political parties, your government buildings. Moreover, we have been trained to the idea that equal opportunity toward materialism, toward having (of the same rather than the unique) is synonymous with freedom.

Let's face it: bankrupt politics and policies, promulgated by politicians that have been bought by the so-called "Free Market," are bankrupting our municipalities, the very places that need infrastructure and job development, and passing the costs of bankruptcy on to you and to me.

Career politicians, so far removed from what actual people have to deal with in the world that their bankrupt policies created, dole out clichés from the Reagan/Thatcher playbook, and expect us all to pay their salaries, not to mention their pensions and their healthcare. There is no austerity for them, and neither for their masters. Our politicians are willing puppets, because the system they steward feeds them. This is why the so-called "bipartisan" political realm looks and acts like a circus. 

We are, to a greater extent, unwilling puppets. The blame has been put to us, for electing these very officials. I submit that this is yet another case of "blaming the victim," but I concede that there is an element of truth to the assertion. Where is the truth of it? Well, when our economies shifted, in the wake of deregulation that paved the way, from manufacturing to finance (along with it's ugly twin real estate development), the attitude shifted from fiduciary responsibility to unfettered greed. There has been another economic shift, however--one just as devastating. 

The shift has gone hand-in-hand with the move from manufacturing to finance, and it has been fueled by the very technologies that have given birth to social networking, fostering elitism and bolstering a false sense of individualism, one that values the one-line chat quip or the anonymous reactionary rant over a stimulating discussion of actual values between people who stand face-to-face in order to work together.

How can this be? The very medium that has seemed to offer greater democratic action for average people, in such movements as "The Arab Spring," have been used by their creators and primary corporate manipulators, the gatekeepers, as it were, of a worldwide system of corruption.

Does my statement mean that I am a morbid conspiracy theorist? No, not at all, not at all. I may be reading history a certain way, but it is history that I am reading, and the indicators have been hiding in plain sight. I need go no further than the recent and continuing Murdoch Hacking Scandal. Who was Tony Blair serving, while visiting Murdoch in Queensland? Was he serving the British Public or was he serving Rupert Murdoch? He has testified that Murdoch was attempting to pressure members of Parliament to call off the investigation. What does this mean for the public, wherever Murdoch media enterprises exist? It means nothing less than that influence of the filthy rich cuts in on your free speech, not to mention your expectation of privacy or truth in reporting/advertising.

Social media allows us to communicate internationally--as long as political forces don't censor the internet, as in China, Cuba, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran, and other countries. Interestingly enough, most of the countries that sensor the internet have repressive governments. The other end of the spectrum is the Murdoch variety, where the internet so free it is mined for information that is used to make money, and possibly ruin lives. On the one hand, there is the hyper-regulation of closed-government, on the other, the unprotected world of deregulation and the so-called "open" government "free market" fracas. In both cases, the people in control are people of power and wealth, people with no self-control, who are all too willing to tell you how to live, just so long as they don't have to live that way themselves.

Additionally, the internet is also used to fuel identity politics. With our good intentions, many of us seek to establish greater freedoms and foster choice for all. We sign up with groups that claim to be for the purpose of activism toward the social values we say we desire. But then these groups tell us how to think and how to act and how to vote. Unwittingly, we have allowed ourselves to become pawns in what ends up being an identity politics smokescreen. Someone else writes the letter, we just click the button.  Sorry to burst the bubble, but that really isn't how democracy works. 

Obviously, equal rights and social justice should be for all, but the way it plays out, sometimes it seems as though rights and justice are for some, even few, rather than for all. While we are all arguing identity politics, war crimes are being committed all over the world, by ours and perhaps every government. People in all parts of the world are being abused and denied access to food, shelter, clean water. But because we are bickering about how one kind is either oppressed or even entitled over another kind, we don't see the larger issue, that we are all being oppressed and used, if not abused and denied. And we are all guilty of denying that humanity is one kind and that all are entitled.

In short, for the "freedom" to "share" our thoughts, we pay. We pay in the way our every move is documented and analyzed for what we do, who we like, how we live, how we spend, so that we can be objectified in the morass of unfettered materialistic capitalism that aggregation feeds. We pay, and we will pay until there is nothing left to pay with.

There is nothing left to say about this, except that fools and their money are soon parted. Do you resemble that remark? I know that I do, and I suspect that you do, as well. Not always by choice is this true.

Remember this during the upcoming election season, particularly when some talking-head tells you that you need to be austere in your spending (what little you have) for the good of everyone and that public programs should be sacrificed for the good of the system. That is one horse the talking-heads will ride. And then they'll attempt to ride another, at the same time, and you know what that will be. 

If austerity is the solution, then austerity must be for ALL--one for all and all for one (--or it should be for no one)!! No more bond issues to grease the wheels of a few, no more tax breaks to business entities and moguls with offshore accounts, no more municipal shell games with taxpayer money, no more bailouts to banks who run citizens into bankruptcy with service-charges, and no more of all the rest, while denying basic needs to those who have been ground down in the fallout of World War III, the invisible war declared on you and on me.

If we believe that what we think matters, we need to read more (to be better informed), we need to talk more (not merely exchange chat quips and tweets), we need to rise up on our hind legs and declare ourselves to be active members, all for one and one for all, against the bipartisan circus act that will keep telling us we have to pay the price for their bad and self-interested, self-perpetuating policies.