stop fowarding

September 14, 2008 10:51 AM

Please do not forward chain letters, urban myths presented as truth, potentially offensive jokes, videos or photos without being asked or first receiving permission.
posted by signal (62 comments total)

I have a feeling you're about to get a lot of these.
posted by cjorgensen at 10:54 AM on September 14, 2008

Passive agressive dot com.
posted by fixedgear at 10:54 AM on September 14, 2008 [4 favorites]

I typically just tell them they are idiots, that usually takes care of the problem...
posted by HuronBob at 10:57 AM on September 14, 2008

Wow, talk about a pointless project. Honest businesses generally don't spam - trust me, I've tried getting spam by signing up for *many* newsletters, sending email, etc - and spammers don't care about their victims. Even if it works, it doesn't; how are the spammers to know who not to spam?
posted by Foci for Analysis at 10:58 AM on September 14, 2008

Wow, talk about a pointless project. Honest businesses generally don't spam - trust me, I've tried getting spam by signing up for *many* newsletters, sending email, etc - and spammers don't care about their victims. Even if it works, it doesn't; how are the spammers to know who not to spam?

I think this is aimed at "spammers" of the Grandma-with-computer-and-too-much-free-time variety rather than the OMG-GET-HYOOGE-PEENZORS variety.
posted by Inspector.Gadget at 11:01 AM on September 14, 2008 [3 favorites]

Thanks No is better for this purpose, if only because it doesn't collect anyone's e-mail addresses.
posted by emelenjr at 11:05 AM on September 14, 2008 [6 favorites]

I think this is aimed at "spammers" of the Grandma-with-computer-and-too-much-free-time variety rather than the OMG-GET-HYOOGE-PEENZORS variety.

Indeed. I actually wrote a personal blog post about this recently in the hope of hitting all my friends and family after I realized that my "private" address (which I only give out to friends and family) had almost 700 spam e-mails, while my "spam" address (which I've given to several multinational corporations) had something like four. E-mail forwards are the real problem, in my experience.
posted by middleclasstool at 11:11 AM on September 14, 2008 [2 favorites]

I had to remove my email address from my profile because of a similar jokey post. Think before posting this crap, please.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 11:11 AM on September 14, 2008

Thanks, signal, for posting this. Perhaps the average MeFite is so culturally and technologically savvy that they don't deal with too many chronic forwarders, but this site offers a real value to people struggling with them. The few times in my life I've had to ask someone to stop spamming me with forwards, I've always felt embarrassed and I would have happily used this site to mitigate that.
posted by chudmonkey at 11:12 AM on September 14, 2008 [1 favorite]

Actually, my family is so guilty of this shit I have the 3-step process down:

1. Dear ___, please do not spam me at work or I'll get fired and then you will have to provide me with a place to live.

2. If it's not just 27 "funny" cartoons about Obama, women vs. men or stupid petitions, the above is followed by (link to snopes proving child isn't abducted/substance was removed from medication 14 years ago/WalMart doesn't own Lowes, etc.).

3. Implementation of filter that autodeletes any future email from said address.

these typically all happen within 20 minutes of each other, so the dumbass' personal feelings and/or ability to learn from it is moot.

Then when (offending relative/dumb friend) asks why I never showed to someone's wedding/funeral or responded to something genuinely important, I blame it on my IT department. Then, continue to have no contact with said person and pray they never find me on Myspace or anywhere else, which they probably won't, as their learning curve is sufficiently steep to prevent online stalking of any variety.

Dumb friends and annoying family members are so unbearable in real life, I can appreciate technology aimed at reducing interactions with those people... I'm just surprised there are several different sites aimed at dealing with this situation.
posted by Unicorn on the cob at 11:17 AM on September 14, 2008 [2 favorites]

I hate brainless forwarding.
posted by wrapper at 11:24 AM on September 14, 2008

I'll stick to sending them a link to Snopes debunking whatever gibberish they've forwarded my way.
posted by porn in the woods at 11:26 AM on September 14, 2008 [5 favorites]

I've brainlessly forwarded this to everyone in my address book.
posted by ColdChef at 11:27 AM on September 14, 2008 [1 favorite]

Things like this won't work, because the people sending the emails plain don't care:

But in any case, no one is stupid enough to really believe such a story. The coworkers or relatives who fill your inbox with urban legends and hoaxes may not be the sharpest tools in the shed, but none of them is stupid enough to believe this. And neither are those people who claim that they do believe it.

-- slacktivist
posted by bonaldi at 11:37 AM on September 14, 2008

AnonymouslyMakeYourGrandmaCry.com
posted by XQUZYPHYR at 11:49 AM on September 14, 2008 [16 favorites]

I was going to argue that debunking is always useful even if futile in many cases, but a poster to the Slacktivist comments did a much better job than I could:

I have not given up debunking, and I'll tell you why.

Years ago in college I took a class in computer-simulation design. The final project was a simulation on the subject of our own choosing, and I decided to simulate the spread of rumors through a population. I essentially used an epidemiological model, and included controls to configure various probabilities--the odds that someone who believed a given rumor would relay it to someone else; the odds that the someone else would believe it, and so on. I did my best to put these values into ranges that matched real-world behavior, and then I twiddled the knobs to see what would happen.

One of the knobs controlled the probability that someone who knew a story to be false would forcefully debunk it whenever s/he heard it. And that knob turned out to be astonishingly sensitive and powerful. In the hundreds of scenarios I ran, I found that a tiny shift in the probability of that one factor--a difference as small as one part in ten thousand--could be the difference between a rumor being universally believed (except for a handful of skeptical cranks) and a rumor being universally forgotten (except for a similar handful of credulous cranks).

Sometimes it took quite a long time for false rumors to be completely quelled. And the simulation didn't take into account a change in the odds over time, as debunkers grow demoralized and give up challenging the rumor when they hear it. But it seems to me that just strengthens the argument for debunking--there should be as many people linking to snopes and hitting "reply all" as possible, so that there'll still be enough as their numbers dwindle. Every little bit helps.

Yes, of course there are malicious actors out there. Of course there are people who want to infect everyone's brains with viruses and then exploit their symptoms for financial or political gain. Being an antibody is (I'm not religious but I can think of no other way to convey this) a holy cause, requiring faith.

Posted by: Evan

posted by benzenedream at 11:58 AM on September 14, 2008 [34 favorites]

absolutely. But this isn't debunking, it's saying "please stop sending shit", and that's not going to work. They like it!
posted by bonaldi at 12:03 PM on September 14, 2008

I opted out of all this by choosing family and friends who don't forward this kind of crap. Surely you all did the same, or are you all too stupid to remember the form you filled in before your birth that gave you these options, and have since become atheists in order to distance yourselves from you bad decisions? If so, you can get around it. The next time you are asleep and dreaming, go to the menu screen, select 'options' and 'create new character'. This will erase your current playable character, but the only other alternative is using the delete button on your email application - and if this sort of thing is really a problem for you, then you may be better off starting from scratch.
posted by Elmore at 12:06 PM on September 14, 2008 [4 favorites]

I always assumed their was some forgotten machine hidden in a closet at GOP HQ that did nothing but scrape Republican talking points from the ether, add some web 1999 graphics, maybe a picture of an eagle, the twin towers, or a soldier, and the email them to every citizen in the United States.

Sort of like a Wall-E of conservative chain emails.

In truth, though, these religious types have been so thoroughly programmed to rebuff scrutiny that any reply linking to Snopes or whatever will just make them madder, make them more the victim and ramp up their email drive.

There is a war on email facts from liberals, and every click on "Send" is another baby saved.
posted by plexi at 12:11 PM on September 14, 2008 [1 favorite]

From the slacktivist essay:
The dossier/Snopes approach doesn't work because it attempts to apply facts and reason to people who are not interested in either facts or reason.

The dossier/Snopes Democrats' approach doesn't work because it attempts to apply facts and reason to people who are not interested in either facts or reason.

ftfy
posted by dhartung at 12:11 PM on September 14, 2008 [2 favorites]

My brother likes to forward me Powerpoint presentations (seriously -- Powerpoint???) of silly signs or whatever. My former boss likes to send my (in one email alone) 35 separate jpegs of dogs in crazy situations, or bears, or what not.

I just don't open them.
posted by potsmokinghippieoverlord at 12:21 PM on September 14, 2008

We're all sending this to our mothers.
posted by An Infinity Of Monkeys at 12:27 PM on September 14, 2008

I enjoy reading Snopes, but all these political/culture-wars emails are a bit baffling. I've never seen a UK equivalent (which is surprising, considering the braindead comments of all political stripes on places like the "Have Your Say" page at the BBC News website. It's fairly obvious who is forwarding these emails on, but where do they come from in the first place? They also seem to be overwhelmingly right wing - is that really the case?
posted by WPW at 12:27 PM on September 14, 2008

I just forwarded this post to everyone in my contact list!
posted by trip and a half at 12:40 PM on September 14, 2008

The Spamela's of the world will think you're just being mean, but really, I prefer personal emails rather than the those bulk deals -- but those superstitious chain-mail deals (send this in the next 3.5 minutes and your wish will come true! If not, you will be cursed with bad luck!) are just evil dumb.

I have an idea to cure them with an email that says, "If you send another one of these ever again, you will be cursed forever! Muah ha ha!"

And everyonee else lived happily ever after...
posted by Alexandra Kitty at 12:40 PM on September 14, 2008

I think the key phrase to utter when dealing with unconvincables is: How do you know you are right? Every time the madness comes from their mouth, ask that question.

The hope is it'll start them thinking about what percentage of their news they get from rumor and Drudge. If they're going to learn to stop passing things around, it's going to have to be a decision they arrive at themselves.

That's long-term of course. Short term, go to town on the sucker.
posted by JHarris at 12:41 PM on September 14, 2008

But, "I love you and so does Jesus" forwards are my mother's entire reason for living.
posted by ethnomethodologist at 12:50 PM on September 14, 2008

I enjoy reading Snopes, but all these political/culture-wars emails are a bit baffling. I've never seen a UK equivalent (which is surprising, considering the braindead comments of all political stripes on places like the "Have Your Say" page at the BBC News website. It's fairly obvious who is forwarding these emails on, but where do they come from in the first place? They also seem to be overwhelmingly right wing - is that really the case?

Forward spam mostly falls into 3 distinct categories: pictures/videos of stupid stuff that someone thought was hilarious, warnings about some horrible danger (every single one of which is thoroughly debunked on Snopes), and political activism. The latter is almost certainly coming from specific activist groups doing "grassroots" campaigning.

I get jokes, pictures of cats, etc. from relatives and less tech-savvy acquaintances. If you think about it, it's not much different in principle than what is going on here, or Reddit, or in IRC channels which get lots of links dropped in them. It's just that this particular form of viral meme propagation is a pretty stupid and annoying way of doing it, thus mostly stupid and annoying people do it. Which in turn causes most of it to be stupid and annoying. But, they probably genuinely believe they're sharing something interesting. This, I think, is why the political ones tend to be right wing, which is mostly made up of really dumb people.

What baffles me the most are the one's that make totally false claims about the danger of some product or chemical. Every single one of these are false. Who starts these and why? I mean, I understand why they get forwarded by people after they come into being, but how did the first person come up with the idea? Since they are totally fabricated, it must be malicious, but to what end?
posted by cj_ at 1:13 PM on September 14, 2008 [2 favorites]

Oh, forgot about the Jesus stuff. SO TIRED OF FOOTPRINTS IN THE SAND.
posted by cj_ at 1:22 PM on September 14, 2008

i just snoped a list of 99% total strangers on a forward about bill cosby running for president or some such nonsense. the originator of the forward emailed me back with 'i know! i know (it's false)! but cosby's such a standup kind of guy! and when's the last time you were able to write in anyone?' so. he acknowledged it was a load of crap, but then defended it. ass wipe.
posted by msconduct at 1:31 PM on September 14, 2008

So, let me get this straight... This is a website that collects the email addresses of people most likely to forward viral junk to all their friends and loved ones? If I were an email marketer, I'd probably be willing to pay an awful lot of money to get a list like that.
posted by Dave Faris at 1:45 PM on September 14, 2008 [2 favorites]

...and then I asked the Lord, 'Lord, but what about those times when I looked back and only saw one set of footprints in the sand?' And the Lord said, 'That was when I slingshotted you, like, all the way into space. lol.'
posted by Stylus Happenstance at 2:00 PM on September 14, 2008 [8 favorites]

AnonymouslyMakeYourGrandmaCry.com, posted by XQUZYPHYR

I briefly considered sending this to one particularly egregious forwarder in my family, but it seems like such a chickenshit way to give her a bad day.

I much prefer the ignore/delete option... not much effort and karma points for tolerating bored grandma's lofi social networking attempts.
posted by letitrain at 2:12 PM on September 14, 2008

Shouldn't it be "StopForwardingTo.Us"? Because if they're using the "us" as part of the phrase, they've got their direct and indirect objects all mixed up. Why would I want to forward you? Where are you going?
posted by blue_beetle at 2:17 PM on September 14, 2008 [1 favorite]

Bullshit, Jesus, Those Are Obviously My Footprints.
posted by xil at 2:18 PM on September 14, 2008 [1 favorite]

I was one of several recipients of a friend of a friend's mass forward e-mail (he must have fished my address out of some birthday evite), and the message went on about staying away from soda cans because some virus spread from rat urine in the factory blah blah bullshit bullshit. I immediately googled and found all the necessary red flags. I hit "reply to all" (about 120 people) and wrote the following...

Sam,

I've met you a couple times, and you seem like a pretty sharp guy. So I'm wondering why the hell you'd forward everyone such a stupid story, especially when a simple fact check on google yields the straight answer.

http://www.snopes.com/medical/toxins/raturine.asp

You're college-educated and should know better. I don't want to see you end up as that weird dude on a soapbox yelling "danger" to people on the street.

~Jerome

His reply?

I'm sorry everyone.

I got a couple private messages from friends of his thanking me.
posted by Christ, what an asshole at 2:23 PM on September 14, 2008 [14 favorites]

When our grandparents and parents die and we are old our inbox will be hopelessly barren and we will regret doing this to someone who likely wished us nothing but innocent happiness.

In my case, I know that very soon the forwarded jokes and patriotic Powerpoints coming from 'oldgrandadwr' will cease forever. It is sad to ponder: Who among us markers-as-read and deleters-of-all will assume this lofty mantle?
posted by resurrexit at 2:31 PM on September 14, 2008 [6 favorites]

Oh and on preview, that slacktivism essay is good stuff. I didn't even consider that these "such-and-such a product is dangerous" viral rumors originate from the competition.

Did he ever get around to writing part 2? I couldn't find it.
posted by cj_ at 2:35 PM on September 14, 2008

Brilliant. You could confront these people, but say they're some rabid neo-con uncle who sends blatantly outrageous and false propaganda out as truth and you don't want to hurt his feelings.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/immigration/taxes.asp

If it is anyone else closer to me, I'll just tell them to fuck off.
posted by hellslinger at 2:36 PM on September 14, 2008

MeTa
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 2:40 PM on September 14, 2008

Oh, forgot about the Jesus stuff. SO TIRED OF FOOTPRINTS IN THE SAND
He asked, "Lord, what about when there was only one set of footprints and also a straight line with bootprints on one side and small, round circles on the other?"

The Lord replied, "Those were the times that I carried you, and we were joined by a pirate pushing a wheelbarrow."

(Peter Rogers)
posted by stace at 3:05 PM on September 14, 2008 [3 favorites]

So, let me get this straight... This is a website that collects the email addresses of people most likely to forward viral junk to all their friends and loved ones? If I were an email marketer, I'd probably be willing to pay an awful lot of money to get a list like that.

What's good for the goose is good for the spammer...?
posted by Alexandra Kitty at 3:09 PM on September 14, 2008

emelenjr wrote: Thanks No is better for this purpose, if only because it doesn't collect anyone's e-mail addresses.

Also because their HTML code is pretty. I am in favor of pretty source code.
posted by ryanrs at 3:17 PM on September 14, 2008 [1 favorite]

Not sure about everyone else here, but my family members, at least most of them, seemed to outgrow this stuff. When my father (who is a very very annoying individual) first discovered this type of crap -- more the jokey emails than hoaxes or right-wing rants -- he would clog my inbox with them. I ignored them, but then my brother pointed out what a dick he was being and my father toned it down a bit, and eventually when it wasn't new, he stopped being interested.
Then my grandfather-in-law discovered the internet a few years later and,lo and behold, exactly the same joke emails were sent to us, now by him. Again, we just ignored/deleted, and now the novelty has worn off, he doesn't send as much crap.
My mother still forward the odd 'ZOMG needles in movie chairs/food poisoning/women attacked in cars' hoaxes and also the cutesy chain-mail 'send to all the women you know/friends/whatever' emails that inevitably have graphics of kittens. Again, I just ignore, and she is sending less of them.
However, if someone sent me one of those weird right-wing political emails (I think most of my friends know better) I would slam them. Someone I worked with once sent me one (it was about the twin towers) at work, and we both work for Defence. I emailed him back and told him to not send me anymore of that stuff, and what is more I thought it was against work email policy (no idea if that is true). He never did it again.
posted by Megami at 4:59 PM on September 14, 2008

so, uh, is this where the dead baby jokes go?
posted by heeeraldo at 5:29 PM on September 14, 2008

I had an aunt who did this kind of thing -- and what was worse, she did it at a time when I still had dialup. Anti-Clinton propaganda, "if you're a woman please read these tips to protect yourself," Christian glurge...she sent it all. And it took long enough to download my email as it was, and when some of it was long things from her to half her address book, I'd just sigh and delete.

Then one day i was trying to get my email and it hung up for a solid HALF HOUR on one message. I also had people send me files of things, so I hung in there -- and when it finally finished downloading, it was an image-heavy post of a bunch of male senators' heads photoshopped onto cheesecake models' bodies, and the punch line was "and they're all still prettier than Hillary!" I kind of snapped. Then I got an idea.

I sat down and drafted the following email, trying to make it sound as "form-letter" as possible:

"Hi! I have dialup, so I have created a filter on my email account to block emails with big file attachments or lots of pictures. If you're getting this message, that means you tried to send me something that was deleted from my inbox because it was too big. Please send me a short email telling me what you were trying to send and we can make other arrangements. Thank you."

I sent it to her. I saved a draft, and for the next couple weeks, whenever she sent me a mass-forward I sent her that. In a couple weeks, she stopped sending me forwarded stuff. That was two years ago and I haven't seen another forwarded thing from her since.

...She also never tried to email me to say "yeah, I was sending you this poem, how can i get it to you?" I wonder why.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:14 PM on September 14, 2008 [1 favorite]

I really liked what was written about debunking above, but I have mostly stopped doing it, at least for harmless urban myth stuff. here's why:

"Snopes Hurt."

I would like to add that term to Urban Dictionary. It's kind of like being "butt hurt." This is what happens when you give a Snopes link to someone who just told you "shit" stands for Shit High In Transit. They really, truly believe it. They can't believe how clever they are for knowing it.

And then you blow it for them. You smack them in the face with incontrovertible proof. You have an entire well-resarched page with cites from the OED explaining the Germanic origins of the word "shit" from the year 900, and they have, "but my dad's friend's uncle told me..."

People get pissed. In my experience they won't admit they're wrong- they'll mumble a half-hearted repetition of their original sad justification under their breath, skulk off, and never ever forgive you. That's why I stopped doing it.
posted by drjimmy11 at 6:28 PM on September 14, 2008 [7 favorites]

I really like the comment by resurrexit. I get annoyed when my elderly relatives send me stupid stuff and more times than not I gently debunk it via snopes. One day these folks will be gone. Forgiving these little quirks is best. As it may well be a pain to delete the stuff, I know that that 95 y/o granny (yeah she is) has wits enough about her to know how to email. In the not so distant future she will no longer... boot up.
Thanks resurrexit. I needed that.
posted by shockingbluamp at 7:08 PM on September 14, 2008 [1 favorite]

Yeah: it's cognitive dissonance or something like that. They send you some fuckwit urban myth, and however politely you explain the problem, they metaphorically stamp their little feet and come out with some justification like "it was sent in good faith, and I won't tell you next time".

I'm currently getting loads of PowerPoint presentations of the Cracked Pot story (it must be doing the rounds locally). Guy fetches water with two pots. One is cracked and leaks. It gets depressed. Owner explains that he knows about this, and has planted flowers which the cracked pot waters. Moral: God knows our flaws and uses them to create beauty.

I'm tempted to alter the ending to Moral: if you're incontinent, walk near flower-beds and you can water them as you go.
posted by raygirvan at 7:17 PM on September 14, 2008

Yeah: it's cognitive dissonance or something like that. They send you some fuckwit urban myth, and however politely you explain the problem, they metaphorically stamp their little feet and come out with some justification like "it was sent in good faith, and I won't tell you next time".

So? No more e-mail forwards. Let them wallow in spam and willful ignorance, as long as they don't include Big Ole Wet Blanket You. Being the Wet Blanket saved me a lot of horseshit e-mails. My previous job, they were endemic -- I honestly don't know how the company mail server held up under the strain, small as it was. I was inundated with crypto-racist, jingoistic, "simple wisdom" horseshit from managers until I finally got tired enough to start linking Snopes and laying down actual facts about Islam and US foreign policy. I have little doubt that that circle-jerkery continues within the company to this day, but after about three or four responses, there was blissful silence in my inbox.
posted by middleclasstool at 9:04 PM on September 14, 2008

I am enormously flattered to receive an email to "the 11 most gorgeous, wonderful women I know" from several acquaintances. I just figure they really know 10 best girl friends and are stuck for the 11th that the forward describes. They are happy and I do not Reply or Forward it to any more gorgeous acquaintances.
I have sent Scopes links to many, many people. Why are college educated people so gullible?
posted by Cranberry at 10:09 PM on September 14, 2008

I infected my family with a dose of The Gullibility Virus in about 1998, and I've hardly heard a peep since.
posted by darksasami at 2:33 AM on September 15, 2008 [1 favorite]

I used to have a special email address on my server where friends could send most of these stupid chain letters and general idiocy. My ex and I would then prepare a scholarly treatise, clarifying said claim and it's basis in reality, which could then be sent on.
posted by Samizdata at 3:36 AM on September 15, 2008

Nobody ever sends me this kind of crap. Suddenly, I'm so very, very lonely.
posted by box at 5:12 AM on September 15, 2008

*grab's box's address, fires up Thunderbird*
posted by middleclasstool at 6:14 AM on September 15, 2008

My sister sent me exactly ONE rightwing nonsensical forward. I debunked it, never heard another bit of such nonsense out of her. (but suspect she's still gone looneytunes right).

I have only 2 friends that forward funny stuff. I'm happy with that, it's usually good, although one gets a bit racist on occasion (South African). I've told them both 'thanks', as I enjoy much of it. The racist crap I sometimes try to correct, but that's difficult when it's across cultures.
posted by Goofyy at 8:12 AM on September 15, 2008

As many have noted, there's just no way to win with some of these people. A co-worker forwarded the old "ADD YOUR CELL PHONE TO THE DO NOT CALL LIST BY TOMORROW OR FACE DOOOOOOOM!" story to most of the office last week, and I politely pointed her to the appropriate Snopes article. She immediately called me and said "No, I know, it's probably fake, but I thought everyone should know, just in case." I responded with a slight hum, to which she responded "I take it you don't agree?"

Later, she warned us all that PBS might lose its funding.

Sigh.
posted by SpiffyRob at 9:46 AM on September 15, 2008

Snopes Hurt

I have caused this and it's not pretty. Makes for awkard meetings later on. I don't get why people can't just be wrong and move on. You thought all my credit card info was on that hotel key. It's no big deal.
posted by Big_B at 10:13 AM on September 15, 2008

Forgive the slight derail, but I think it's very telling that according to Snopes, there are :

6 entries for John McCain (3 true, 3 false, and one undetermined);
7 entries about Sarah Palin (3 false, 3 mixed, one undetermined);
1 entry about Joe Biden (undetermined);
33 entries about Barack Obama (20 lies, 4 facts, 6 mixed, and 3 undetermined).
posted by Dave Faris at 10:18 AM on September 15, 2008

I have a friend who used to send on everything anyone ever sent him to everyone he knew.

I have another friend who posted, on his website, an anti-forward policy: "Each time you forward some useless e-mail to me, I'm going to escalate what I send back to you from the following list." The list that followed included things like a boring limerick, an essay we'd analyzed in high school English class, a collection of two weeks' worth of useless e-mail forwards, a graphical warning sign about not petting flaming radioactive dogs, three dozen links to the Hamster Dance, and the Book of Mormon in plaintext.

I tried a variation on the first friend. I told him I was very interested in reading anything that he himself had written with the idea that I would read it, but not so much in things that he hadn't written. He kept forwarding. I told him every forward would be answered with a collection of all the forwards I'd received. He kept forwarding. I sent several such collections. He kept forwarding. I sent Genesis, chapter 1. He kept forwarding. I sent Genesis, chapter 2. He kept forwarding. I sent Genesis, chapter 3, and a note asking how long he wanted to keep going. He stopped. He's a Bible-reading Christian, but there are some things you just don't need in your inbox.
posted by eritain at 10:39 AM on September 15, 2008

I got a very racist poem sent to me from an old schoolmate, called 'Ode of [sic] an Asylum Seeker'. I sent back a polite but terse response, asking why she thought I might want to read such a thing, and never heard from her again.

I get forwards from my sister all the time, mainly 'send this to ten friends and your wish will come true, delete and bad luck will come' - not nice when feeling vulnerable. I lost patience with it when I got the Jamie Bulger e-mail...
posted by mippy at 12:43 PM on September 15, 2008

For what it's worth, I used to work at a software company where my boss sent me a forward of some right-wing drivel by Charlton Heston. I replied to the effect that I didn't understand why he had sent that to me and that I didn't think it was appropriate to discuss politics in the workplace. The next day he fired me.
posted by matildaben at 5:58 PM on September 15, 2008