Last year, my phone was stolen. It was the saddest thing that has ever happened to anyone in the history of the world, I’m sure. But, OK, I recognize that there are much worse things to happen in your life than to have your phone stolen, and yet it is still very frustrating, and maybe the word “upsetting” would even be appropriate in this instance. Anyway, I filed a police report, and the next day I went to buy a new phone, assuming, perhaps naively, that AT&T, a business to which I had been a loyal customer for years, would sell me a new phone at a discounted rate (a special Victim Of Non-Violent Crime Pricing Plan, or something), maybe make me resign a two-year contract, and we would all move on with our lives.

NO! In fact, AT&T would only sell me a phone at the Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price, which, in case you don’t know, is A RIDICULOUS PRICE. I explained to the people that my phone had been stolen, and I showed them the police report. I explained that all I wanted to do was spend money to replace something that was taken from me and to continue to pay them money each month for the privilege of continuing to be their customer. I explained that I could understand where they were coming from if I was just being capricious, or had dropped my phone in a toilet as I leaned down to do cocaine off the tank. If I had walked in and said “baby wants a new phone, this phone makes me sleepy!” then it would have been totally reasonable to demand that I pay full price. As it stood, I literally just wanted a fucking phone so that I could call my parents and tell them what had happened.

Despite numerous phone calls with customer service (which are exceptionally difficult to make WHEN YOU HAVE NO PHONE BECAUSE OF HOW IT WAS TAKEN FROM YOU) and a trip into the store, I was eventually told that I could replace my phone with a WORSE PHONE than the one that was stolen from me, for an incredible $400, which they genuinely considered (and told me as much to my face without smiling or laughing or having blood come out of their eyes) to be a generous discount price, and the only catch (as if $400 is not A PRETTY BIG CATCH) was that I would STILL HAVE TO RESIGN A NEW TWO-YEAR CONTRACT. Oh perfect. Do you want me to have sex with you as well? Should we also have sex just to make sure that you get something out of this, AT&T? 

What a shitty company! With really shitty policies towards their customers! Especially considering that they make their money off of the SERVICE CHARGES associated with the phones, NOT THE PHONES THEMSELVES.

It is weird to complain about all of this months after the fact, at a time when OIL IS POURING INTO THE OCEAN AT AN ALARMING RATE. But it is possible to be mad about two things at once. And here is the thing: I had every intention of writing AT&T an angry letter, putting it in the mail, and moving on with my life. Except that even in this, AT&T fucks its customers over, because there is literally NO PUBLISHED ADDRESS, PHYSICAL OR ELECTRONIC, FOR CUSTOMER SERVICE COMPLAINTS. Oh these fucking guys!

So please join me in my Internet Campaign to Destroy AT&T. Either reTUMBL this at your leisure, or you can insult them over Twitter at @attnews. What else are you going to do? Go outside and enjoy the summer afternoon? Get real. Besides, what is the Internet for if not symbolic but ultimately ineffectual demonstrations of populist SPIRIT? Well, right. It is for videos of kittens. But after videos of kittens it is for symbolic but ultimately ineffectual demonstrations of populist spirit.

And scene.