Beating Around the Bush by Art Buchwald Page B

stay with me until it works?”
    “Of course. That’s what friends are for.”

Losing Your Identity
    ONE OF THE THINGS people worry about these days is losing their identity. There is something frightening about someone stealing your name and using it to charge everything from bedroom sets to Lexus convertibles.
    This is how it is done. You order a camera and give your credit card number to a clerk. Someone in the store steals the number and sells it to a gang of Russian thieves in Los Angeles. They, in turn, sell your name to a group of con men in Nigeria, but your identity doesn’t stay in Nigeria long. It is traded to a master of forgery in Marseilles, who trades it to a gang in Buffalo.
    Now your identity is in play.
    The Buffalo gang works on the telephone. One of the members says he is you and orders a motorcycle, a trip to Tahiti, theater tickets to La Boheme and gifts adding up to thousands of dollars.
    He has a post office box in Ottawa in case someone is trying to track him.
    When you get your bill, you call your credit card company.
    The credit card contact says, “How do we know you’re you?”
    You say, “It wasn’t me and you can’t charge me for all the things I didn’t order.”
    The contact man says, “You are a victim of identity theft, one of the greatest crimes in plastic history. Why didn’t you tell us at the beginning that someone else was using your name?”
    “That is a poor excuse. I didn’t know until I got my statement,” you reply.
    “If we issue another card, you have to promise not to tell anyone what the number is.”

    “How can I charge anything if I can’t give anyone my number?” you ask.
    “You can, but if you use it there is a good chance you could lose your identity again. But not to worry. We will be on the lookout for the person using your card.”
    “Well, at least I can get back the real me,” you say.
    “Yes and no. Someone may steal the number on your new card and pretend he is the real you.”
    “Suppose I get a card in the name of another person so I would have someone else’s identity?”
    “The people in Buffalo would soon find out about it and you would be swimming with the fishes.”
    “This must be happening all the time. Isn’t there some way you can stop it?”
    “People pretending they are other people is one of the oldest scams of the human race, but it has never been more profitable than it is right now. At least your family knows who you are.”
    “I’m not so sure. The joker with my card charged a mink coat to my account, and when the bill arrived home my wife wouldn’t believe me that someone else bought the coat for his girlfriend.”

Whose Reality Is It?
    TELEVISION KEEPS GETTING BETTER and better. At one point, it was just an entertainment medium, but now it deals with all the problems of our society.

    You can find a wife on TV and also a husband. You can get therapy for any difficulty—from depression to bed-wetting.
    The network shows feature couples who have committed adultery and daughters who hate their mothers.
    If that isn’t enough, there are shows where you can get a divorce and ones that have a judge decide a legal dispute between a claimant and his landlady, or determine if someone got diddled by his car mechanic.
    There are child custody shows and programs for people with bulimia.
    And there are, of course, reality shows.
    Where do the producers get the people who appear on their shows?
    We have to assume the people want to air their troubles for their fifteen minutes of fame. Also, it’s cheaper to wash their dirty linen in public.
    There are talent agents who book people for these programs.
    I sat in the office of Sam Starquest, one of the hottest flesh peddlers in the business.
    A secretary came in and asked, “There is a lady outside who was abused by a priest and is willing to talk about it on the air. Do you want to see her?”
    “No, I’ve already got too many people abused by priests. They’re very hard