See, JT's task is to help the software by listening to the call and then repeating what is said into the machine, using a slow monotone that will make it easier for it to translate. And one thing you find out by doing that job is old dudes really jam on phone sex. This would be totally fine, if they weren't using a captioning service that requires him, a person sitting in an office surrounded by other people who aren't hard of hearing, to repeat everything that is being said in a loud, clear robot voice. Are you picturing this?

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Here, let this website help you.

"One guy called a sex hotline," says JT, "which I got to start mentally preparing myself for, during the interlude of sexy waiting music (cheesy porn music embellished with a tasteful sprinkling of women orgasming). When the call was connected, I transformed into a woman wearing a bikini because I just got out of the pool and I was all sorts of wet. And all my coworkers around me knew it. Then, the heavy breathing and dirty talk started, and I had to caption the entire thing sounding like I was a Dalek in some really fucked up Doctor Who porn parody."

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"EJACULATE!"

Our other source, Sarah, actually had it worse just by virtue of possessing a female voice. For some guys, that's all it takes: "Late at night, we get people calling in from hospitals and institutions trying to jack off to the operator. A guy asked me to call a number, and it rang about 20 times until it reached voicemail. I asked him what he wanted me to do, and all he said was, 'Redial.' This happened three times, so I called over a supervisor. The supervisor got on the line and immediately disconnected the call. Then, he turned to me and asked, 'Did you not hear him jacking off on the line?' I could hear noises occasionally, but it didn't register."

Now, the next thing you need to know is that there is a sort of Prime Directive when it comes to doing this job -- the operators are just transcribing what's said; they're not a part of the conversation. It's actually against the law to intentionally alter what's being said to a client ... even if the operator knows the client being lied to, scammed, or insulted. "Even if it's something simple, like someone trying to remember the name of an actor or what day it is, you can't help," says JT. "One time, two women were trying to remember the name of a celebrity, and I accidentally said it. I don't think either of them realized it was me, and they just kept talking. But, I technically broke the law."

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HR makes you take a "Resisting The Pullman/Paxton Correction" class.

Sarah works for TTY, which is a government-funded service, and, again, she has to studiously transcribe without judgment, even during the terrifying calls from the aforementioned prisons and institutions -- racism, insults, and elaborate curses included. "I have to repeat, verbatim, what someone is saying, even if it's something that, in any other situation, would qualify me to get an exceptional beating."

And sometimes they really, really want to jump in. For instance, if you've ever been around old people, you've probably noticed three things about them: A) They are your future and you should be terrified of death, B) They tend to be pretty gullible about new technology, and C) Since all their friends are probably dead (like yours will be someday!), they love a good chat whenever they can get it. That makes them a huge, fat target for scammers. "Scam calls are the worst, and we get them all the time," says JT. "But, no matter how hard Grandpa Joe is falling for a scam, all you can do is caption what's going on as accurately as possible."

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"Yes, I am the President, Prime Minister, and Prince of Nigeria."

Now, if they hear an emergency take place (say, someone is assaulted in the middle of a call), they can report it. But, otherwise, they're just impassive observers. "One woman talked about how she was in bed, and three men pulled her out so hard, she dislocated her shoulder," says JT. "Then, she said that they made dinner for themselves and told her if she wanted any, she'd have to get up and get it herself. That's abuse, plain and simple. She was clearly old and didn't have the strength to take care of herself anymore, so her caretakers (or three oddly considerate kidnappers) decided to rough her up a bit."

Keep in mind, that call wasn't to the police, she was just telling the story to someone. That is typical -- only one in 14 acts of elder abuse are ever reported to authorities. That's usually because the people being abused are worried it will get their caretakers -- almost always family members -- in trouble. But, unless a crime is occurring, the operators just dutifully transcribe the awful story and move on to the next call.

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It almost makes you wish for geezer phone sex. Almost.

And when there is an emergency, well ...

"This happened to one of my coworkers," says JT. "Fortunately, it only took the ambulance about five minutes to get there, but everything up to that moment was a frustrating rush against the slow, meticulous guideline of captioning." Sarah's view is even more alarming: "Captioning emergencies doesn't happen often, but when it does, there are so many roadblocks that the likelihood of failure far outweighs any positive outcomes."

In fact, the possibility of you straight-up dying because they couldn't caption fast or accurately enough to save you is significant enough that JT's company's liability waiver for 911 calls encompasses pretty much every possible situation, including, "delays, transmission errors, network outages, acts of God, or other occurrences" that may arise from using their service to call 911.

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"We tried to call your heart attack in, but then the plague of frogs hit, soooooo ..."

Though we suppose if your emergency call gets disconnected due to a literal "act of God," maybe it's best if you just ... let the act take its course. There's no reason to make a paramedic risk getting struck by a bolt of wrathful lightning when your beef is clearly with the creator Himself.

"Customer service never has any patience for the people who need their help the most," says JT. "I captioned a customer service rep who had a really thick accent and who eventually got so frustrated, he dropped the accent and started cussing out my client -- all of which I had to speak in a monotone voice and caption to this poor guy who just wanted to know how to pay his bill online." We're assuming that guy somehow knew the call wasn't being monitored for quality assurance purposes.

The job also makes it very clear that customer service reps have absolutely no idea how to explain things in simple terms once they figure out the client sometimes thinks he's still in 'Nam. "A customer service rep will say something like, 'The start button is at the bottom left of the screen,' and the client, predictably, just gets more confused. They could have said something like, 'The start button looks like a flag,' but they don't have time to care and then everyone involved gets frustrated."

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And, suddenly, both ends are just getting "fuck" over and over again.

Because, obviously, it's Nana's fault that guy had to get a customer service job at the cable company because the thought "Who needs a GED? The economy's fine!" was a trendy life philosophy back in 2008.