The hustle has been ongoing for some time. It’s everywhere, on every device, insinuating itself into our lives. No escape, even though we know the deplorable enticements are either overstated or certified false. Swindlers are at our door and bilkers in our homes, and apparently there is little we can do about it. Of course, these stinkers have always appeared in our country’s history, but now we have computers, televisions, and smart phones, so we’ve become instantly available to the schemers.
Every day, every channel, every hour, injury attorneys clutter our lives with their over-the-top television commercials, suggesting we might make a big haul of money from a car accident or some other mishap. Don’t worry! We need not pay a thing unless they (the lawyers) win a judgment. Flashing six figure numbers across the screen, they implore us to call right away to find out if our misfortune is worth their time. A case involving death can be a jackpot for those still breathing and looking for someone with deep pockets. And when the case is settled, well guess who gets a massive paycheck? Yup, the attorneys reap wads of money from your injuries and pain suffered. Somewhere between 33% and 40% of monetary judgements awarded from injury cases typically go to lawyers. They often take it from insurance companies, the very businesses we send our money to each year, so we are covered against liabilities. I’m visualizing a snake eating its own tail.
Shortly after we roll our eyes while watching the fifth injury lawyer ad in the last twenty minutes, we are entertained by one of those obesity drug ads promising joy and happiness all our days if we shoot-up their drug, which will cost us up to one thousand bucks a month. Never mind that the same drug is ten times cheaper in most other countries. Never mind that your health insurance will certainly NOT cover the expense. Never mind that the side effects include suicide and death, rotting teeth, double-vision, diarrhea, headaches, and chronic depression. Like the attorneys, the pharmaceutical companies litter the airwaves doing their come-hither spots. Whiter teeth, clearer skin, better lung capacity, and a dozen more not-fully-explained medical complaints you are told to mention to your doctor, who may be eager to get a cut of the money from drug reps. It is estimated that over half of all practicing doctors receive kickbacks from pharma, rewards which may include free meals, speaking engagements, or honoraria for travel.
Impulsively, we switch channels to a football game. Wait! What’s this? Without understanding all the jargon, we realize the ad is promoting gambling on the game about to kickoff. That’s right. “You betcha.” We can bet on the over, the under, the number of turnovers, the player who scores the first touchdown, or just about any sort of side bet imaginable. Why not place a bet on the color of the Gatorade which may be poured over the winning coach’s head? Plus, small wonder, the betting site apparently is almost guaranteeing we’ll get $100.00 even if we lose. Really? How is that possible?
Because prop betting presents danger to the integrity of the sporting world, some legislation is certain to curb wide-spread gambling ads. Already several MLB athletes were charged with influencing games by tanking certain pitches for the benefit of out-of-country bettors. Pitchers Emmanuel Clase de la Cruz and Luis Leandro Ortiz Ribera of the Cleveland Guardians will go to trial in Brooklyn, NY sometime soon.
I’ll bet on one outcome: lots of people do what I do: silence the offensive commercials on television by muting them. I block ads on my computer. And I flip the radio dial when “Kars for Kids” ads come blaring into my presence. Who are those kids, anyway?
We are a country shamelessly on the take? Just call us chumps, suckers, the targets of beggars and grifters. How many times have you received an email thanking you for ordering some service you don’t have or want, and you know immediately that someone in a foreign country (probably) is trying to scam you by somehow coaxing you to divulge a credit card number or who knows what else?
Admittedly, ethical concerns have been part of American life since we decided to dump English tea shipments into the Boston Harbor, and those concerns continue to be part of who we are. Fraud is a business here and now. Cheating is smiled upon and tolerated as a matter of daily life. President Trump has made swindling de rigueur. “Don’t fall for it” is the advice given to all of us, but generative AI tools and autonomous AI agents add alarming new ways for fraudsters to steal money and disrupt.
Until something monumental changes, scammers and grifters will attack us without much risk of being caught. All we can do is check daily for hacking on accounts and build failsafe online protections, as well as being constantly aware that attacks are coming. And even that will not be enough to stop thieves from trying.
While a few agencies do exist to fight illegal and unethical scams and frauds, judging by the number of attempts we encounter each day, nothing effective has been realized. Isn’t reasonable that telecom and digital platforms could police fraudsters upstream before they reach the masses with their scams? Isn’t reasonable for the FCC and FTC to do more to stem the flow of predators on our domestic networks? And isn’t reasonable that state legislators press for no-fault insurance laws which would lessen the need for all those annoying attorney spots on television?
For now, we are targets, a nation of potential suckers!