Today I did a survey.

(3 June 2006)

Yes, I am a sucker. When I answer the phone, and the caller doesn't speak right away, I usually just hang up. Because I don't wanna speak to telemarketers. Actually, a few weeks ago I was getting around 6 phone calls a day from telemarketers. So I turned off my ringer for a few days. (One of those days happened to be a day when people I actually knew called to talk to me. Which happens, like, never. So, there would be silence, and then I'd hear my own voice on my answering machine---because I have an actual machine, and not that Bell service that costs $7 a month---and it was bizarre. But the cool thing about answering machines is that you can pick up and talk to the person leaving the message. Totally useful for screening calls without paying for Caller ID, which I won't do.)

Anways, right, I'm a sucker. Also, I'm gullible. Sometimes. So, today, the phone rang, and I was feeling nice, or something, so I didn't hang up right away. (Maybe my reflexes were just slow, or perhaps I was secretly hoping it was a friend calling. Alas.) It was a woman who wanted me to do a survey. First, she asked if there was a male over the age of 18 in the household. I said no, relieved that I was seemingly off the hook. But, alas (again), apparently women over the age of 18 were good enough to be second-choice.

I asked what the survey was for, who paid for it, etc. She said she didn't know, or perhaps she was told not to tell me. It was all about a potential bank merger in Canada. And some questions about the current government. Oh, I forgot to mention: I HATE SURVEYS. They are ridiculous. Let me explain with examples. The woman asked me how much I agreed or disagreed with certain statements ("Some people might argue that...."). One was, "A bank merger will mean the closure of some bank branches." Well, this could be true. But how can I know anything about it?! And so many of the questions were like this, asking my opinion on things I couldn't possibly really have an opinion about! It was so vague that it was completely useless. Should Canadian banks have a larger international presence? Will this be good for the Canadian economy? Will it make it more difficult for small business owners to get loans in Canada? Uh, how the hell do I know! Show me the details of any arrangement, let's have a discussion about it, and then maybe we can have a few opinions. But even then, I can't predict the future, and neither can anyone else. Grrr. Surveys.

What is the point of a survey, then? I guess one can compare answers of different people. But that only tells you about the differences between people. I seriously doubt any survey of this nature could truly predict what public reaction would be to a potential bank merger in Canada. So the point of it must be so that someone (the banks? the government?) can claim to have gauged the public sentiment. Democracy, you know. But this is pure hogwash. Sigh.

But, then again, maybe the results of these kinds of surveys really do have some influence on policy, be it corporate, political, whatever. Because maybe the people paying for and seeing the results of the survey do take it somewhat seriously. (I can't see why, but maybe they are genuinely trying to figure out what people think. See, I'm also naive, or perhaps it's just my youthful/eternal optimism. Or just plain dumbness.) If the results are taken seriously, then isn't it better that people like me take the time to participate? Better me than someone else, right? Someone who forms opinions based on hardly any information, which I try to avoid doing. Usually.

Will I ever consent to do another survey again?