Yesterday after a meeting in London and a couple of pints I was approached by a 20-something woman who asked if I had a moment. I certainly did have a moment, so here is our (annotated and slightly abridged) conversation:
Woman – “I work for Amnesty International and they are doing a £27,000 ($50,000 CDN) charity drive to raise money. Do you feel that women being beaten and raped is a problem?”
Now, at this point what could I have said? I mean, honestly, did she want me to say “no”? If this was some religion I probably would have, just because it is fun to debate with religion, however I played the innocent and said “yes”.
Woman – “Were you aware that up until recently it was not a criminal offense for a woman to be beaten unless the woman filed a formal complaint? That means that a man could beat a woman in front of a police officer and the officer could do nothing about it.”
This I had a hard time believing. I truly believe if an officer was watching you being punched by someone he would help you, but then again this is England. However I nodded politely and looked “shocked”.
Woman – “Amnesty International was instrumental in stopping this and now abused woman have better avenues for protecting themselves.”
I could have corrected her and said: “No, they have better avenues for prosecuting/removing the abuse once it is done”, however I let her continue.
Woman – “What are you in Leicester Square for?”
Me – “I had a meeting earlier today, and had a couple pints with a coworker and I am now waiting to meet a friend for dinner.”
Woman – ”Interesting you say pints…”
Interesting? That isn’t interesting, it is a loose segue into your question about how I spend my money… oh and also if you were to ask ask any man on a Wednesday night in England what he was doing, the word “pints” is bound to be in there.
“… because for just the price of 1.5 pints a month you can support this important cause.”
Two things here:
- “What cause? You have told me that you already “solved” the only problem you mentioned to me.”
- “But then I would have 1.5 pints less each month, you bitch!”
I let this slide, and I was glad because this is where it gets fun!
Me – “Do you have some literature I could read on this topic? I am not really familiar with Amnestity International…” ( A bit of a lie really, but she doesn’t know) “… and I would like to learn more”
Woman – “Yes, and for just £0.20 a day you can receive all the details on our organization”
Me – “I don’t think I will be donating today, but I would love to read more on…”
Woman – “Well, due to the cost we cannot just give out literature.”
Me – (jaw dropped, a charity that doesn’t want to promote themselves?) “Ok, do you have a website I could view?”
And here my friends was my favourite part of the conversation… I want to point out that this next line is the factual quote that this woman said to me:
Woman – “By the time you view our website 260 women in the UK will be raped.”
I want to pause here to apologize to those exactly 260 women that were raped between yesterday at 6pm and today at 9:30am. I really am sorry that you had to be raped due to my neglect in not donating 1.5 pints to this cause. I wish you all the best and hope you receive the treatment and care you deserve.
My immediate response was this:
Me – “Sorry, but really you can say that about anything: 1250 African children will starve by the time I view your website, 180 Big Macs will be consumed in Brighton by the time I view your website… That really isn’t an argument for you not to give me the web address.”
She of course was not amused at my apparent disdain for her attempt at guilt. It was at this point I realized this woman was working on commision and that the facade of actually caring for these women was replaced with the greed for her portion of the £27,000 Amnesty has for this endevour.
Here is where I smiled and wished her good luck and we parted ways. It is sad that the only mechanism this woman had was a guilt trip about raped women to try and convince me her charity was worth supporting. It is also sad she tried to con me out of 1.5 pints, so she could get money to buy herself pints.
For more information on Amnesty, I googled this: http://www.amnesty.org/
Stopping abuse 1.5 pints at a time
Yesterday after a meeting in London and a couple of pints I was approached by a 20-something woman who asked if I had a moment. I certainly did have a moment, so here is our (annotated and slightly abridged) conversation:
Now, at this point what could I have said? I mean, honestly, did she want me to say “no”? If this was some religion I probably would have, just because it is fun to debate with religion, however I played the innocent and said “yes”.
This I had a hard time believing. I truly believe if an officer was watching you being punched by someone he would help you, but then again this is England. However I nodded politely and looked “shocked”.
I could have corrected her and said: “No, they have better avenues for prosecuting/removing the abuse once it is done”, however I let her continue.
Interesting? That isn’t interesting, it is a loose segue into your question about how I spend my money… oh and also if you were to ask ask any man on a Wednesday night in England what he was doing, the word “pints” is bound to be in there.
Two things here:
I let this slide, and I was glad because this is where it gets fun!
And here my friends was my favourite part of the conversation… I want to point out that this next line is the factual quote that this woman said to me:
I want to pause here to apologize to those exactly 260 women that were raped between yesterday at 6pm and today at 9:30am. I really am sorry that you had to be raped due to my neglect in not donating 1.5 pints to this cause. I wish you all the best and hope you receive the treatment and care you deserve.
My immediate response was this:
She of course was not amused at my apparent disdain for her attempt at guilt. It was at this point I realized this woman was working on commision and that the facade of actually caring for these women was replaced with the greed for her portion of the £27,000 Amnesty has for this endevour.
Here is where I smiled and wished her good luck and we parted ways. It is sad that the only mechanism this woman had was a guilt trip about raped women to try and convince me her charity was worth supporting. It is also sad she tried to con me out of 1.5 pints, so she could get money to buy herself pints.
For more information on Amnesty, I googled this: http://www.amnesty.org/