a sign of the times...............

i live at the junction of two streets, right at the t. the street in front of my house runs for 2 blocks in either direction and deadends. on the right side, there are 10 houses but only one is occupied.
yesterday, my phone went out. for the fourth time in a year someone had pulled onto the deserted street, pulled down the phone line and absconded with it. the repairman was telling me today that they only stole about 25 feet of it, which has a really small scrap value. like i said, this is the fourth time this has happened.
the telephone company gave me priority service because it happens so often, which is a good thing since i have a health problem that might require a 911 call. in the past i've had to wait up to 10 days for service. all together, this is the seventh time since november a year ago that my phone has been out. the pissy part of it is that i don't have a cellphone and refuse to get one. i also have dial-up internet (yes, dial-up. and it works wonderfully for me. and i only pay $9 a month for it, so eat your heart out).
i knew that the scrappers have been stealing air conditioning to get the scrap value, but phone lines? i might add, this happened between 9anm and 11am, in broad daylight. the repairman said that the problem is out of control. what is going on in the world?