Daniel Neman: We're surrendering our privacy for a bag of M&Ms

I am now at the age when I am convinced that the world is going to Hades in a handbasket.

And I have proof.

Obviously, this is not a new or unique idea. People of a certain age — my certain age — have been making the Hades-handbasket connection from time immemorial. Even Pollyanna, in her later years, was saying, “They just don’t make handbaskets like they used to.”

My particular proof, which I like to think is indisputable, involves vending machines. Vending machines, and the way companies now have no compunction about collecting what should be our most private and intimate personal information.

My company’s break room used to have vending machines. Big, solid vending machines of the sort that could kill you if they tipped over on you.

There is something particularly satisfying about a vending machine. You put in a few coins and they work their way through the mechanics with a rewarding thunk (vending machines that take credit cards just don’t elicit the same pleasing response).

You push a couple of buttons to make your selection. The spirals start to turn, and your bag of Fritos makes it almost all the way to the edge before getting stuck. You reach your hand through the bottom slot to try to pull it out, but you’d need at least two more joints and a longer arm to have any success. You try shaking the machine, but then you remember the thing about it tipping over on you.

You pound on the Plexiglas window and walk away, frustrated but secretly thankful you didn’t eat those extra calories.

As I said: Satisfying.

But my company recently took away our trusty vending machines and replaced them with a grab-and-go concept. The selections sit right there on shelves, out in the open, under the watchful eye of a 24-hour camera, enticing you to buy.

Naturally, the prices are higher than they had been in the old machines. A bottle of Coke is now $2.19, where once it had been $1.75 (and by “once” I mean “in January”). A bag of Red Hot Riplets is $1.79 where formerly it had been $1.25.

But mere price gouging — I mean price increases of a very reasonable 43% — is not enough to start the swift descent to Hades. For that you need personal information tracking.

Of course, personal information tracking has been around for several years. When you buy anything on the internet — a refrigerator, a pair of shoes, a case of motor oil — you invite the seller into your life to learn as much as he can about you and to use it against you in the guise of advertising or marketing.

That is the world in which we now live. I get it. I don’t like it, but I get it.

But here we’re talking about a lousy bag of M&Ms — which costs $2.09, by the way. We’re talking about a 20-ounce bottle of water, which somehow costs more than the M&Ms. We’re talking about Little Debbie’s Oatmeal Creme Cookies.

We’re selling our souls for a bag of Cheetos.

The company that runs the new setup has a privacy notice on their web page. It runs 18 pages. They must assume, quite naturally, that no one would read 18 pages.

I read it.

I should mention that it is not as bad as it could be, at least not for us here at the newspaper. At some of their locations, they collect and store biometric data. That is, they literally keep your fingerprints on file. That’s not creepy, or anything. Besides, they cross their hearts and promise not to use them for any nefarious purposes.

Still, it’s bad enough. If you sign up for their app, they will collect information about your name, email address and GPS location, and may add your gender, birthdate and job title. They’ll keep track of what you buy and where you buy it, your favorite products and your social network preferences. They’ll even keep records of what websites you visit.

If I want a bottle of root beer, I don’t want the people selling it to me to know about my interests or my habit of looking up the names of character actors in old movies I happen to see.

Because of California’s strong privacy laws, the company also has to disclose that it collects certain categories of information.

Under the category of Protected Classification Characteristics, the company admits that it collects at least some, though not necessarily all, of these traits: Age, race, color, ancestry, national origin, citizenship, religion, marital status, medical condition, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, veteran or military status and genetic information.

And they have disclosed this information to their affiliates, service providers and customers. The customers, in this case, are the schools and business and newsrooms that place these vending concepts in their locations.

No thank you. If I want a bag of Doritos, I’ll buy it at a store. With cash. And I’ll carry it home in a handbasket.