Basically I trimmed the fat. Everyone whom I barely knew, didn't know that well, only met once, never met at all - they all got Unfriended.
Some of them were also old friends that I just don't socialize with any more.
I wanted to get 250 even, but I discovered I was unwilling to part with 2 more of them.
Some of the people I did keep were Canadian celebrities I have only met once or twice, so but I ended up unfriending at least 30 celebrities - especially politicians.
I probably could have unfriended many more, but that would likely have been upsetting to some people.
There may even people I later re-friend again, which means they will have earned their place. And others in the future whom I unfriend, so maybe someday I will reach that nice round number of 250.
I did this partially for privacy reasons. The more friends a person has on Facebook that you barely know, the less privacy you have - and the more likely that your privacy will be invaded.
I have also been updating my privacy settings. I would like to be able to update them further to tighten up security.
A friend of mine today told me how he was being harassed by debt collectors who are using fake names / fake personas and pretending to be fake lawyers.
It is the kind of thing you hear about in scams involving Nigerian princes.
You know the scam. They contact you offering money, then tell you to contact a lawyer who will help arrange the transaction, the (fake) lawyer then claims they can only process the transaction for a fee. Usually a ridiculous amount like $5,000.
At which point, if you actually pay them money you are clearly a gullible moron.
So the same thing is now happening with debt collector scams here in Canada.
The Canadian (assuming they are in Canada...) debt collector threatens to sue you for the debt (whether it is a real debt or just a scam) and then they "hire" a fake lawyer - who is just them using a fake name and not a real lawyer - who then proceeds to harass you with fake legal documents sent in the mail to get you to send them money in the hopes that the debt collector/fake lawyer will stop harassing you.
My friend explained that they will go to extreme lengths to make the fake lawyer look real.
They will list the fake lawyer in lawyer directories, having a website for the lawyer (which will usually be really small and incomplete), a LinkedIn account for the lawyer, etc. But if you dig deeper you will discover that the fake lawyer doesn't have a Facebook page, that there is no records of them graduating from any law school, and that the person does not exist - although they will use a common name. Not John Smith obviously, but instead will make up a name that sounds real and when googled does come up with results of people living elsewhere - but the fake lawyer in question will not exist or have the bare minimum.
A Facebook page that was only ever used once.
A Twitter account that is mostly empty.
A LinkedIn account with very few colleagues / no real colleagues.
Etc.
They will not have anything that isn't free. For example a listing in the Yellow Pages, because that costs money.
Now real lawyers do sometimes get hired to sue people for very large debts. That does happen. But when their retainer fee is $5000, you can be sure that they are not being hired to track down and harass people who have debts less than $25,000. It just isn't financially worth the trouble of suing people for small amounts when the cost of the lawyer is so much.
Imagine for example suing someone for $20,000 over a debt (a real debt) and paying the lawyer $5,000 in retainer fee. Even if they are successful in court, there is still no guarantee the person will pay them. The person could declare bankruptcy, they could move overseas and refuse to pay, they could "disappear" into northern Ontario and live in a cabin / drop off the grid for a year, etc. So the people suing would have lost $5,000 and still got nothing.
Suing people for money really only makes sense when the following criteria are met:
The person you are suing has lots of money. Suing the poor is pointless.
You are suing for a large amount. At least $25,000.
The debt needs to be real. Not some phony scam.
The debtor needs to have a contract with debtee*.
* The last one is actually really important. For example lets say someone had old credit card debt, and the credit card company sells that debt to a debt collection company for pennies on the dollar. So for example if someone owed MasterCard $20,000, MasterCard sells that debt for perhaps $200 to a debt collector. MasterCard's contract with the borrower is then finished. The borrower had a contract with MasterCard. They do not have any contract or agreement with the debt collector, which means they are under no legal obligation to pay them. The debt collector will then proceed to harass the person in hopes of making a profit off of the purchased debt. In this example, if they manage to get $400 out of the person then they just doubled their money.
And they do it via threats of legal action, fake lawyers who do not exist, fake legal documents that are not real (or filled out correctly), etc.
And in some cases debt collectors are apparently now running scams, because they have realized that the debt doesn't even need to be real. They just need to harass people until they get the money.
The whole conversation reminded me of James Veitch. A comedian who makes fun of email scams by playing along with them.
Now all joking aside...
Pretending to be a lawyer and harassing people for money. Shouldn't that be illegal?
And it is illegal. Because it is FRAUD. And possibly Grand Larceny if the amount is over a certain amount.
The problem is that the scammers / debt collectors are using fake names, and the "fake lawyer" does not exist. So how do you prove who was sending the fake legal documents and pretending to be a lawyer?
The problem is it is very difficult to prove. And most people don't go through the effort of trying to expose the frauds who are claiming to be lawyers.
So here is a challenge for anyone reading this. If you know of a fake lawyer / debt collector, please leave their name and supposed location in the comments below. This way when people google that fake lawyer / debt collector's name and city, this blog post will come up in the google search results and people will be able to instantly recognize that the person in question is just running a scam.
A friend of mine did this on Facebook. Here is what happened. And I shall colour code everything to keep it easy to follow and understand.
First, context, he was responding to a video about a Millennial who got offended by a Hula dancing bobblehead on the dashboard of a Lyft driver. In the video the young woman (who speaks like a Valley Girl) harasses the driver and is rude to him, accusing the driver of "Cultural Appropriation". She then proceeds to threaten the driver, claiming she is famous and that she will embarrass him on Gawker.
To which my friend said:
"Millennials are very frivolous and idealistic. The problem is when they say stupid idealistic things they make their whole generation look stupid.
And talking like a Valley Girl like definitely won't like help either."
To which a Millennial named JD responded:
"So why isn't that applied to every generation? We don't Blast Boomers as being stupid because of Ford, or any number of prime examples But yet here you are blasting millennials as a generalized whole because one stupid person made a fool of themselves."
To which he said:
"Because Millennials have a reputation for being idealistic, frivolous, easily manipulated, easily upset, obsessed with social media, uneducated, pampered, lacking skills, and unmotivated.
Thus when a Millennial says something stupid and idealistic, their reputation for being idealistic and uneducated becomes signatory of problems plaguing their whole generation.
Babyboomers have different qualities/failings. But they are comparatively realists with a sense of humour. Generation Y (my generation) are overeducated sarcastic pessimists."
JD:
"So in other words mediatized pretensions"
Response:
"Oh yes. Forgot about that one. Millennials are Pretentious. Give a Millennial a Youtube channel and watch how big their head gets."
JD:
"what is appalling is how readily and blatantly degrading, condescending, and better then thou you are towards millennials as a whole. If you even remotely acted like this towards black people, or women, or asians, I doubt you would find it remotely acceptable."
Different person:
*gets popcorn ready in anticipation of a good old fashioned Internet butthurt showdown*
Response from my friend:
Posts an emoji of a cat sleeping and says: "Sorry. Was there a Millennial talking? I fell asleep from boredom.
Gnight."
JD:
"Well since i annoy you so much and you despise me so much. Your quite the arbitrary and prejudiced ass"
Response from my friend the next morning:
"See? The Millennial just proved how Millennials behave.
He got upset very easily. No sense of humour. Is so pampered he just expects people to do as he pleases. Frivolous insults.
And easily manipulated. I didn't even have to try.
Thank you JD for taking part in this demonstration."
Friend who posted the video:
"How did I sleep through this?"
His response:
"To be fair I slept through most of it too. ;)"
Followed by a cat eating a hamburger, fries and pop emoji.
But wait, this story doesn't end.
JD the Millennial in a bit of idealistic and overly sensitive rage, then unfriends his Facebook friend.
My friend later discovers this and posts on his own Facebook page:
Overly sensitive Millennial
unfriended me because I said
Millennials are overly sensitive.
Irony. :)
A different Millennial named KS responds:
"As a more relaxed defender of Millennials I will just say that whenever older people say or do dumb shit we generally attribute it to the individual but when a Millennial says or does the same thing it is pinned on our generation as a whole."
To which my friend responds:
"That is almost exactly what I said.
And I listed the stereotypes of how Millennials behave (like getting upset easily, being easy to manipulate, being overly sensitive, no sense of humour) and then he went and proved it for me by doing exactly those things.
And I don't feel bad about it because I barely knew the guy, but what I did know is that he was one of these easily offended Millennials.
I asked him once: "You going for a smoke?"
And his response was: "Yeah. You got a problem with that? It is none of your business!"
Me: "I was just asking."
He immediately assumed I was judging him and got offended by the remote possibility that I was judging him.
And ultimately what I really ended up judging him for was how ridiculously overly sensitive he was."
Different person responds:
"Thank you for listing these stereotypes. I value your opinion so I would like to ask how you propose Millennials overcome the stereotypes you have listed?"
And response:
"Well lets see what the stereotypes are: Idealistic, frivolous, easily manipulated, easily upset, little or no sense of humour, obsessed with social media, uneducated, pampered, lacking skills, and unmotivated. Logically in an effort to combat these problems they should: ☆ Start with turning their cellphones off. Spend less time on the internet. ☆ Learn to relax and take a proverbial Chill Pill. Meditation would be handy too. ☆ Don't believe everything they hear / don't do what they are expected to do. ☆ Learn what it is like to fail at something without being given a gold star for participation. ☆ Learn actual skills that are useful in the real world. eg. Tweeting is not an useful skill, despite what Donald Trump says. ☆ Take their Idealism and use it to actually become motivated to do something with their life. ☆ Do something that is serious and important instead of wasting time and effort on meaningless friovolities. ☆ Learn to take a joke."
Different friend joking responds:
"That's it! U triggered me. #unfriended ps. c u tonight"
The friend with the popcorn from the previous comment:
"Weak sauce, and a waste of popcorn. Hope the next one is feistier than indignant."
To which my friend responds:
"The Millennial Ragequit. Having been raised on participation stars they have no stomach for failure and a hard fight.
Think of it like going to a boxing match between a Generation Y and a Millennial, and the Millennial thinks he will win because he has been rewarded all his life just for participating, but is inexperienced and the moment he encounters difficulty he quits out of frustration.
Meanwhile the Generation Y is a pessimist. They know all about failure. They are experienced from many fights. They know no fight is ever won easily and that it takes determination and patience."
So really it doesn't take much to annoy a Millennial. They are so sensitive you can beat them with a dismissive yawn, a cat emoji, intellect and humour. And because the Millennial lacks both skills and experience, they are helpless against such an experienced combatant.
For reference, here are the definitions courtesy of a few Google searches:
1. the generation born in the 1980s and 1990s, comprising primarily the children of the baby boomers and typically perceived as increasingly familiar with digital and electronic technology. Generally perceived to be pessimists.
1. a person reaching young adulthood in the early 21st century, reaching the age of 18 sometime between 2001 and 2009, and raised on technology and pampered by their Generation X parents. eg. "the industry brims with theories on what makes millennials tick"
Cen·ten·ni·al
senˈtenēəl/ noun plural noun: centennials
1. a hundredth anniversary. eg. "the museum's centennial"
2. A person reaching young adulthood between the years 2010 and 2016. Perceived to possess many of the same qualities of Millenials, but more so because the standard had been set by the Millennials.
1. the generation born after that of the baby boomers (roughly from the early 1960s to late 1970s), often perceived to be disaffected and directionless, but also considered to be realists.
1. a person born in the years following World War II, when there was a temporary marked increase in the birth rate between 1946 and 1964. Baby boomers were highly influential on the economy and culture of the latter half of the 20th century. eg."America's health care costs are expected to soar as baby boomers become senior citizens"
1. a person who survives and remains alive after the complete financial destruction of the world, similar to what is described in the biblical book of Revelation, during which others will have died. eg. "the sole survivor of the Trumpocalypse".
2. a person born in the year 2017 or any year during the Trumpocalypse.
3. a person who survives World War 3 and the End of America.
In the future the word Trump will mean to cheat, someone who cheats, or someone who goes mad with power and launches nuclear weapons in an attempt to destroy all of mankind.
