A few years ago, I temped in the Legal department of a Minneapolis-based investment company. One day, as part of some settlement or deal, I was asked to make some copies.
But not just any copies. Copies of about 19 different bearer-negotiable bonds, each worth somewhere north of 200,000.
You do realize, I said to my supervisor, that I could walk out of here a millionaire today.
She gave a long look, the kind mothers reserve for microencephalitic male offspring, and said, "We'd find you."
So it goes. I took a lot of shit earlier this week for posting an appeal for community assistance at various places: Big Orange, Booman Tribune, ePluribus Media, here. People were suspicious of PayPal, which doesn't surprise me; I've heard that before.
But they were also suspicious of my cause. Some of them thought for sure they smelled a rat. How do we know this story is legitimate, they wanted to know? How well do you know this person, and in what capacity? How do we know what he's going to do with the money?
What can you say? I know this person about as well as you can in the blogging business. No, I haven't met him face-to-face. But I've spoken to him on the phone and via e-mail many times, worked on a project together. I have no reason to believe that he is anything other than who he says he is, or that his situation is any different. And as I said on the first thread, if this person is a con artist, he's an exceptionally stupid one, having wasted hundreds of hours at the least setting it all up. It'd be easier to get a day job.
In the end, we can't say for sure that the 1's and 0's that make text appear on our computer screen are created by the people who purport to have made them. Just ask the perverts who think they're setting up a "date" with a 14-year-old, only to discover they've been talking to Frank from the local sheriff's office.
And what guarantees do we have in real life? I've lost track of the number of times I've been had as a pastor dispensing church funds. I've developed what I think is some pretty good radar for scams, and I still get taken. I've had friends who married what seemed like their dream wife, only to discover she wasn't who she said was, at all. (I'm sure the same thing happens with husbands.)
Look, I'm not trying to say that there's no reason for people to be suspicious. Of course we should be suspicious. If anyone else had written what I wrote this week, I'd be a little leery, too. We need to exercise due caution, and some of the stories I've heard this week bear stark testimony to just that.
But I want to tell you another story: back a few more years, even before I worked in Minneapolis, my dad--also a pastor--got a call from a man having car trouble. So Dad checked him as best he could, and went out to see what he could do. Well, you guessed it: he came home $30 lighter, and pretty sure that the money wasn't going to fix any car.
What are you going to do about it? I asked him. Will the church pay you back?
He just shook his head. "It's all part of the game," he said, or words to that effect.
I didn't get it then, but I do now. You help people out, and you will get beat. It's inevitable. But it's also necessary. Without vulnerability, there can be no community. And without community, what's the point? I may yet be proven a monkey on this deal, but I'd sure rather have that than sat on my hands and done nothing, or even worse, not had the opportunity to "meet" so many wonderful, generous people.
And if this does turn out to be a scam? Well, we'll find my friend, and then life will go on.