How many people really give thought to the fact that we're supposed to like crappy service? Sure your told this and that, but when did most people decide to give up independent thought? This isn't my own personal paranoia, it's all over television and the radio. It's things like, getting worse service for higher prices (hello airplanes....), or purchasing products are at a premium and finding out they aren't yours (hello music industry...) or how about the discouragement inherent in voting (The 2008 Presidential elections, anyone....)? Maybe it's just me.
I'm not really that old persay, but I remember when consumers had fair rights and you could have a disagreement with someone and you could agree to disagree. Apparently everything's become so divisive that's becoming a bigger and bigger problem for people. An example, politics. In the United States, we are supposed to have a multiparty system. In case you didn't know, multiparty systems generally consist of more then just two parties in the political process. Somewhere along the line, most Americans seem to have forgotten this little fact, now it's Democrats or Republicans, Red vs. Blue, Conservatives versus Liberals, in other words it's all B.S. When your given a chance to vote, most people (myself included at times) don't fully appreciate the freedom of being able to decide for themselves. I used to be one of those people "Back in the Day..." as they say, I used to listen to the angry gangster rap and be all "down with the man" and this and that, but it wasn't because I had a reason to be, it was because I was slowly hypnotized into believing that's how I was supposed to feel, I was subliminally co-erced or as Malcolm X famously said "I was hood-winked, bamboozled, led astray,run amok...." It didn't take overly long for my cognitive abilities to kick in and say "hold on, dude, think for yourself..." Sadly, alot of people these days don't have the same cognitive abilities. Republicans have branded themselves as the right wing, conservative, Christian party. They represent the old guard, the standard of American values. The Democrats on the other hand have branded themselves the liberal left wing party, as far as the media espouses Democrats don't have any similarities with the Republicans, Republican = pro-life, Democrat = pro-choice, Republican = solid Christian, excuse me as John McCain put it Judeo-Christian values, Democrat = multi religious beliefs, monotheistic, polytheistic, Patriarchal, Matriarchal, etc...
This simply isn't the case, both parties have a lot of similarities but that's all drowned out by the media hype. Most of the times you have a choice, it becomes drowned out by the pomp and circumstance of smoke and mirrors. See, we're not supposed to think for ourselves, we're supposed to do what we're told, believe what we're told and doubt or cast aspersions on anyone that dares question that which is believed to be the "gospel" (religion pun intended). Don't get me wrong, stereotypes do serve a minute purpose, they give us an inkling on how to deal with a specific type of situation. The problem with stereotypes is often their used to instill fear or racist beliefs in people and that's never of use to anyone. I'll give you a typical stereotype. Tech support phone calls are routed through foreign countries. This is usually the case, of that I don't deny, I honestly don't remember the last time I called tech support for anything and spoke to another American on the line. Now that's not to say, foreign help desks are bad. I'm sure some are quite good, BUT, for the end user it can be a massive headache and can actually turn them off to ever buying from that company again. It has nothing to do with patriotism, it has to do with convenience and trust me trying to decipher what each other is saying is far more exasperating to both parties then the reason for the phone call, but I digress.
We're talking about stereotypes and their uses the aforementioned scenario brings to mind two different thoughts, the first is sub-par service, the second is a aggravating phone call. The stereotype should actually help with the situation however. If you know the person on the other end is going to be fluent in another language and yours may be a distant third then there's no reason to get upset when they don't understand you. You should also alotte additional time for the phone call and you shouldn't get frustrated by the experience because really, it should be expected. If anything, a good experience should be bumped up to excellent because your expectations should have started off low. But back to the main point, you have a choice in this situation as well, don't deal with that company, not the tech support people, they're doing their job, the company you purchased from however should be penalized. They know the situation, they know customer unhappiness, but because its cheaper, they outsource and so they should reap the full gamut of good and bad from it. You have a choice to end or perpetuate the cycle of poor customer experience.
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