From: Amara Graps (amara@amara.com)
Date: Sun May 12 2002 - 17:35:52 MDT
"Hubert Mania" <mania@welfen-netz.com>:
> > I accept the luddite label, if you convince the GEZ* that I don't
> > have a television. They don't seem to believe me.
>
> That`s a fact. They don`t believe you don`t have a TV set. It`s beyond
> their imagination. Someone without a TV set is suspected to hide his radio
> and TV before the eyes of the authorities.
Yes.
>After a while they will probably
> send an agent to your door who will try to convince you to let him have a
> look into your living room.
Yes, they did already. (I wasn't home)
>That`s no joke. I have experienced this in
> those years when I did not have a TV set. The agent will keep on talking :
> if you got nothing to hide. . . bla bla bla. Tell him politely that he
> should go to hell.
I would rather _not_ be polite... this issue makes me furious.
>The only way - as far as I know - to get rid of these
> fees is to tell them you have moved to your partner`s home and even then
> they will send someone who is trying to verify it and take a look - as I`ve
> experienced it just one year ago. I did not let him in, though my partner
> and I actually only have one TV screen.
The Neapolitans have a wonderful solution to this problem.
(Those authority-bucking Italians in Napoli generally don't agree to
any kind of authority, they're interested more to make a game out of
it.) You see, this kind of law exists in Italy too.
When the GEZ-equivalent (RAI) person comes to their door to check if
they have a TV, they give him a broken one.
"Oh, my TV ? It's broken. I have no money to replace it. Please take it."
Apparently there's a market for broken TVs and radios in Napoli,
for performing exactly this function.
(I love this story, and it's true)
Amara
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