Author’s note: I hated wandering around London and being constantly badgered by Chuggers or Charity Muggers trying to get you to sign a direct debit. So I started this, but obviously never finished it.
The Metropolitan Police has issued a stark warning about the dangers of charity collectors on London’s streets, claiming that they now oppose a greater threat to public order than “vandals, muggers or, God help us, terrorists”
The warning comes on the back of an increasing incidence in the number of disturbances involving charity collectors prowling the capital city. The collectors, typically students working on commission, accost the public and use various techniques to persuade them to part with their money for charity. Originally these included, “being very annoying”, “using puppy eyes and a hurt expression when ignored” and “trapping your victim in a corner and telling them it was your birthday.” However, as competition has increased, charity collectors have employed increasingly desperate measures to persuade an unwilling public to part with its money.
The first of these to emerge appeared late last year when Friends of the Earth used a giant fisherman’s net to ensnare large numbers of passers-by. This was justified originally as a publicity stunt to show the plight of dolphins caught in trawlers’ nets. However, the metaphor was taken further when a number of collectors appeared in the middle of the net to represent “evil voracious sharks.” To show the terror a dolphin must then feel, the collectors insisted that everyone signed up for a direct debit to the charity – or else.
From then on, according to charity expert Derek Gadd, it was declared open season on “tourists, children, pensioners, anyone.” Parents were bought into a state of penury as toddlers signed up for massive monthly payments to the Great Ormond Street Hospital. Pensioners blew their children’s inheritance on donations to Help the Aged and several Irish American’s were unable to fund their return home after donating to the Republican Families’ Support Fund.
From this point on, it became inevitable that the different collectors would form themselves into tribal based gangs, complete with uniforms, initiation rites and secret code words and that turf wars would break out between them. The first recorded incident, on Leicester Square, took place between the ‘Shelter Hood’ and ‘Age Concern Massive.’ Both groups arrived at their favourite pitch on the corner of the square and refused to give ground.
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