Looking Glass

“The Four Pillars : Supply Company, Support Company, Myself, You”.“Two-three years struggle”. “Time”. “Money”. “Discount”. “Levels”.“Everybody in the world is a consumer”. “Nobody believes they can besuccessful”. “Our support group”. “Make a difference”. Stop her with aquestion and she impatiently waves it away to tell you all this will “helpyou achieve The Dream.” Display scepticism and she will assault you with acontemptuous “Don’t you want to own your life?” Then she will cast a sadlook at her partner and sigh, "she has conditioned himself with negativity".

A pause while you guiltily consider your failing. But, and here shebrightens. And you brighten, relieved at the possibility of salvation. Theman hands her a glossy brochure. She opens it to show you pictures of plump,smiling, white couples. "Look at them! You too could be a Diamond!"Salespeople. They are crawling out of every crevice these days.

When I’m not waving away a succession of hopefuls selling detergents andkitchen products from the door I’m fending off persistent callers on thephone. I came back from a trip recently to find my mailbox and my e-mailcrammed with strangers trying to sell me antique furniture, save a childschemes, stock market tips, shopping sites and baby clothes. A manpurporting to be a life insurance agent called. "I topped the agents examlast year. This year I will be number one in India." If I will do my bit andlet him sell me a policy of course. A well known deitician’s office calledoffering to sign me up for an eight-week course. No, I said, not interested.

"What about someone else, someone in the family?" Got to be a fat ladysomewhere! A construction company sent literature on house repair schemesand new apartment complexes. A financing outfit called as they do every sixmonths offering bigger and bigger loans. And of course the couple mentionedearlier, selling nothing more than the act of selling.

Who are these people? How do they get my name? How do they know where toreach me?

The answer isn’t particularly mysterious perhaps. Apart from the random hits salesmen doing the rounds on the phone or in person — databases getexchanged, information is shared or stolen. A couple of months ago I got anew credit card. Within weeks I became the target for all sorts ofunconnected luxury schemes. A rival credit card company even sent a mailerpushing their own product and offering to take on previous debts. Thereshould be a law against this. But if there was it would probably beimpossible to implement.

For these are the inevitable byproducts of liberalisation. The result ofhectic production and fierce competition. Gone are the days when the onlyinterruptions in your daily life were the man selling Bengali sarees at thedoor and a mystery gift from Reader’s Digest. Today just about everythinghas to be pushed, prodded and jammed into your face making skillfulnavigation a necessary adjunct even to a simple visit to a bank or adepartment store : skitter past the man with the teabags in six fragrancesand find your nails grabbed by the woman with the buff stick. Go up to theteller, the sulky one you have been seeing for ten years and find herbreaking into a beauty contestant’s smile and pushing a pamphlet into yourhand.

It is an inevitable process. More goods mean more crowding and greatereffort on the part of the manufacturer to get the customer’s attention.Advertising the self-proclaimed supporter of your right to choose has beendoing it for years and what this is is just an extension of the same. It isin fact, it could be justifiably argued, in the interest of the client to beable to view, sample and examine what they are about to buy. Certainly.

And yet, I think it is a matter of concern. It is perhaps something we needto think about. The fact that we have given and will be giving increasinglygreater space to a new value system. It is a system in which it is okay toacquire information by stealth, to boast, to exaggerate and stretch thetruth if necessary to make a deal. To invade other people’s privacy. Todisrespect their right to decide by asking “why not?” when they say“no”. To pester in the hope that they will cave in. To identify theirpsychological weaknesses and push an advantage. To threaten, to createfeelings of guilt and inadequacy. To turn on fake responses: praise when asale is forthcoming, condemn when it is not.

To treat every person as nothing more, nothing less and nothing apart from apotential consumer.