At this point I have two people standing behind me waiting for their turn at the information rape desk, and my face is beginning to turn purple. "My God!" I think, "next they'll be asking for my Social Security number!" "I prefer to not receive phone calls." I tell the young pimply faced clerk who's probably too young to date my daughter. "Sir, we don't share any information, it is all confidential." he croaks. "What if I don't want YOU to call me or send me anything?" I rationalize, knowing that the people behind me are becoming impatient. Don't they realize I'm standing up for my rights, for THEIR rights? "Okay, we'll just leave that blank for now." he states, implying of course that the next time I want a battery or .15 cent alligator clip, I'll be spreadeagled before the mighty Radio Shack marketing machine once again. I accept this compromise simply to end this ludicrous exchange, feeling both hassled and violated at the same time. I "took about an hour on the tower of power" as Zappa would say.
Radio Shack has the strangest business model I've ever been subjected to. What do they even do with all that information? I don't receive anything in the mail from them really except around Christmas time, so why the mailing address? If they are gathering this obscene amount of personal information for dark marketing purposes, I've not seen the expected result of mountains of circulars and emails yet. I hardly receive anything. What DO they do with this information? Is this a front for some Black Ops type branch of the military? The census bureau? Homeland security? I guess if you're a member of a terrorist cell, you have to get your batteries somewhere that the homemade bomb timers need. I guess...
Heck, if I at least received some coupons, discounts, prizes, frequent buyer miles, SOMETHING...I could partially accept this intrusion into my personal life. However I get nothing. Zip. Zilch. It's as if the information goes into some forgotten database in the middle of Siberia, with non-english speakers opening the complex every few months to clear the dust from the server fans and that's about it.
But I know better. At least I suspect that there are more devious mechanisms in play then even that.
I have a sneaking suspicion that when I get that call on my cell phone (they had my old number) asking me about student loan consolidation, that Radio Shack is somehow responsible. The call for carpet cleaning. Penguin Windows. Money for toothbrushes for toothless vets. The children's abuse society. Battered grandmothers. It's really Radio Shack. They are not in the business of selling batteries, they are in the business of selling lives. Information that in the wrong hands can help shape your remaining existence into a struggle for peace, quiet, and an unlisted phone number. Which makes old pimply face a liar right? Well, these poor saps just might not know. They swallow the corporate babble mission statments hook, line, and sinker. They're just kids, trying to survive like many of us in a hard and shaky economy. They are not the Wizard behind the screen, they are simply flying monkeys, clueless of their contribution to the destruction of my life's privacy. I forgive them, I've always been an advocate for the front line soldiers after all. It is the generals that are usually corrupted.
And the stores themselves? They're not too shabby and far as man cave shopping goes, full of cheap electronic toys. Then you quickly realize that they all look the freaking same! You've got your slightly overpriced high end electronic goods from brand names you really don't trust all that much, cell phones, low end musical equipment, clips, wires, diodes, transistors, and of course, batteries. Kids fresh out of high school in white shirts and black ties swarming upon you before you have a chance to pull the list from your pocket. Weird, often out of the way locations that are always one big room with four walls, a counter, and some variation of small merchandise islands in the middle. You wouldn't know a Shack in Nebraska from one in New York, completely homogeneous. There is not another business model out there that resembles this warped strategy. How do these guys even make a profit? They are like cockroaches after the nuclear fallout, scrambling along oblivious to the plight of every other breathing being on earth, collecting their scraps. Never going away.
There is a dark purpose to Radio Shack, but I can only speculate as to what it is. Maybe I really don't want to know. They might have to kill me after all, or worse force me to wear that short sleeved white button up shirt with the cheap black tie. Sticking my nose forever more into other people's personal business simply so they can run home and bring junior the juice for his remote control car. A member of the Radio Shack SS, armed with only enough knowledge to steer you towards the wrong part that is so NEAR right that you fall for it, ensuring another visit to our hallowed dungeon of techno-crap within the day. And knowing my luck I'd probably pull the weekend shift to boot.
So the next time you walk into Radio Shack, I suggest that before the door even closes behind you, that you drop your pants and underwear and simply assume the position. It just makes the job easier and quicker for the pimply faced clueless goons, and why make the other poor saps in line behind you wait longer then necessary?
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