Dear Street Canvassers

Stop.

I know your plight—I've defended you for years: making the case that you work for righteous causes, that organizations like Planned Parenthood and the ACLU needed to scrap for money to stay at the vanguard of politics, that the urbanites who resent you daring to talk to them in public (gasp!) were the first to kvetch if your organization couldn't keep flush.

But I just can't anymore. You guys are like kudzu. Everywhere, aggressive, tenacious, invasive.

There are swarms of you nowadays—not just a sprinkle in front of Nordstrom like in the old days—but packs of you all over downtown sidewalks, in neighborhoods at every major intersection, outside every damn grocery store. You stalk people as they walk, hector them from down the block, and become petulant if we don't baby your feelings. I give money and time to the DNC, Environment Washington, PIRG, Planned Parenthood, and the ACLU. I used to be a door-to-door canvasser and I will still give at my door. But not another penny or second to you mercenary canvassers hassling me on the street.

And to the folks who run organizations that hire canvassers, this fundraising tactic (the relentless street harassment) isn't simply an inconvenient necessity, it's a liability to your own cause.