16 Nov 2004
I Finally Got Called

Last night around 7pm the phone rang, and the caller identified herself as being with a public opinion polling organization. She asked if I was agreeable with taking a few minutes for her survey, so sure: my opinion was finally going to count!

The questions concerned the recent election, and were mostly of the sort "Did you see this ad, did you see that ad", and then "How truthful do you feel it was? Very truthful, somewhat turthful, somewhat untruthful or very untruthful." Not a whole lot of latitude in these - no nuance permitted!

After about ten minutes of this question and answer session, she needed some demographic info. I didn't expect her to have a category for "Heathen" or "Asatru" in her list of religions, but apparently there was a write in slot for this, so I spelled it very slowly. But what came next was shocking: she asked my occupation and I replied, "I'm a farmer." Silence. She had no entry under her "occupations" list for "farmer". And no write in space, either. "OK", I asked, "how about something else in the agricultural arena?" Nothing. She finally settled on "self-employed", which while true, is not exactly right.

Talk about feeling marginalized! I wonder if the pollsters ever eat, and if they do, where exactly they think their food comes from? Do chickens just spring into the freezers in the store? Does a cow graciously raise itself and then dissolve into steaks?

There's a serious disconnect in this country ... when a society becomes so "urban top heavy" that folks in the cities have no regard for where their daily bread comes from (besides the bakery!), the overbalance is bound to lead to a fall. It's just a question of when.

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