Several years ago, when I still had a landline, I got a spam caller. I answered in the normal way, and dude launched into his spiel. I managed to quell the red mist forming in front of my eyes long enough to ask him what he was calling about. He gave the short pitch and asked if I was interested. I said something vaguely positive, and he launched into the long spiel. At that point I very gently put the phone down and went back to whatever it was I’d been doing, and sort of forgot about the call. Several minutes later the phone went quiet, followed by an interrogative sound, a short silence, and another interrogative sound. At this point my attention was back on the phone, just in time to hear a torrent of expletives flowing out of the earpiece.
I can understand that you felt bad when people were mean to you for wasting their time trying to sell them dubious products and services. The point of Jolly Roger is not to make the people who knowingly sell dubious products and services to feel bad. The point is to have the sales staff spend more time on the phone so it becomes unprofitable for the telemarketing business owners to continue scaring, conning, and ripping off the elderly, immigrants, and ignorant people.
So far this is a proposal but it looks like by next year or so it will be the law. Currently we have an opt in register for people who don’t want to be cold called. I’ve been on it for years and it’s worked perfectly, I changed phone numbers nearly two years ago and the new one has actually never been called by a marketeer. The new law would likely gut the industry so no surprises they’re lobbying their asses off, so far without success.
We’ve had an opt-in Do Not Call list in the US for over a decade. It’s useless in the face of robo-dialers located in other countries controlled by scammers who view the US as an endless source of gullible rubes with money just begging to be taken.
