Turned off voice mail and let it ring till they give up.

they give you two options - press one to be connected press two to be removed from the list.

if i request to be taken off the list it hangs up
if i request to be connected with someone it hangs up.

so why do they even bother calling?  just to annoy us?

They're phishing for valid numbers to repeat-call and try to scam. If you respond by pressing anything at all, it registers your number as a valid number with a live person at the other end. That kind of number is valuable to scammers.

Read some of the other posts in this forum, reporting on other numbers. There's a lot to learn about what's going on out there, and how to protect yourself.

Called a very used business back line and didn't leave a messge

Hang up no message.