Here in the wonderful United States of America, we are well on our way to declaring English to be our official language. Senate Bill S. 2611 passed 62-35, and now needs to pass the House of Representatives. Having lived in Texas and Los Angeles, I almost thought we’d make the official language Spanish. But I was wrong.
So let me tell you how infuriated I get when I have to do extra work because I follow the damned rules. As if it’s not bad enough to have to deal with automated telephone systems, I am now asked to press 1 for English
Excuse me? I’m pretty sure that I am the default. I shouldn’t have to do jack squat to speak English[1].
And that upsets me to the point of abusing customer service representatives (who are, by the way, quite possibly the most abused people in the world).
So my ultimatum is this: if you ask me to press 1 to speak English, I am not going to. I am going to sit there. And wait. And if I get disconnected, you will lose my business. If I get forwarded to an operator, I will then tell them about my new refusal to press 1 to speak English, at which point they will roll their eyes and forward me to the proper Indian-speaking rep.
Furthermore, my solution to the afflicted situation is simple, and done by most responsible-behaving organizations: quickly state “Habla ‘espanol’ a hablar Espanol”, or something like that, pause for 3 seconds, and carry on in English if nothing is said.
But I’m not done yet. I am uninterested in treating the effect, but not the cause. Once English becomes the official language, we can get to the root of everything. Thus, I am in support of the recently proposed bill that requires general English understanding to acquire US citizenship.
Once we’re there, I am then in favor of allowing absolutely anyone who can grasp this to become a US citizen, so long as they don’t commit violent crimes.
In conclusion, I will no longer press 1 to speak English.