Why do my friends send me those awful emails....?

[MissMillie]

You know the ones--the hate-filled right-wing garbage about how everyone better learn how to speak English and believe in God because the majority is tired of being oppressed....

I have friends who KNOW that I would never agree to such trash, but they send this shit to me anyway.

No, I'm not sympathetic to your biases and prejudices.
No, I'm not going to forward it.
Frankly if it didn't come from you, I wouldn't even open it...

So why do they waste my time w/ this SHIT!!!!

I would be so much happier if they just sent me a short email that says, "Hi, how are you?' but I never get that. I only get the "Andy Rooney says" and "Robin Williams says" baloney.

/rant

[AlCzervik]

1. i get them as well from one of my friends and i bounce them right

back to her. Her asshole boyfriend sends them to her and then she forwards them to me.

[khashka]

2. Because you're nice?

And haven't yet figured out that being a bitch is a necessary life skill? Lieing works too - tell them you rarely read your email and it'll probably bounce...... doesn't have to be true....

Khash.

[MissMillie]

3. Think maybe I should respond by forwarding my emails from Kerry?

I don't suppose that would go over very well.... but maybe that's the point.

[grace0418]

12. I've actually started doing that with my father-in-law

He sends all the same crap to me. If it's some stupid urban legend or even the fucking Andy Rooney thing, I respond with a link to the snopes.com page proving that it's false (and it's ALWAYS false in my experience). If it's one of those fucking "opinion" emails about speaking English or supporting the president or whatever fucking crap, I respond with an "opinion" of my own. Of course, my email is backed up with verifiable facts so it's actually logical and coherent. I also make a point of reminding him that Jesus probably wouldn't have approved of such exclusionary and judgmental statements (he's devoutly religious but fairly ignorant). It takes time but I think I may actually be getting through to him. I figure if he's so easily swayed by the nonsense in those emails then surely I can sway him with rational thought. Right? I hope...

The good news is that I think he's actually been forwarding my responses to the idiots who send him that freeper crap in the first place (I suspect he actually forwards every single fucking email he gets). And he actually sends the urban legend emails to me first before forwarding them. Why can't he look them up on snopes.com himself? That is another question. But at least some of the more impressionable members of the family are no longer getting all those dire warning messages about computer viruses, hypodermic needles in theater seats, gangs targeting you on the highway, having your kidneys removed, etc.

[NewWaveChick1981]

4. My mother's husband gets them and just forwards them on to

anyone and everyone he knows. He's a good guy in all but one respect---he's a FReeper through and through. He and I are polar opposites on every political issue I've ever even thought of. I've gotten to the point that I just delete everything he sends except for the occasional personal email. I just judge 'em by subject line. I had asked him when he first started his RW spam campaign that he not send them to me, but he keeps doing it anyway. In order to avoid pissing my mother off by making waves, I just make use of my delete key.

My sister and brother feel the same way about the daily spam, but they do what I do and just ignore it and put it in the trash.

I rarely if ever send out jokes or forwarded emails, and I hate for my inbox to be cluttered with that kind of garbage.

[Love Bug]

5. I used to get those but I hit "reply all" and sent them back with

the appropriate snopes.com link debunking the message. For some reason, I don't get those kind of emails any more. Funny about that.

[LSK]

6. im sorry you have friends who are like that

Do you really need them?

:shrug:

[Ariana Celeste]

7. I hear that

Personally, I had to block my Grandpa's wife after a few months, it got so bad. She knows I'm a liberal, she knows where I stand on the issues, she knows she knows she knows. Lol. At first I ignored them, and then I tried to discuss the issues, and then she talked to me like I was just some kid who didn't know any better (Granted, I *am* young, but I check facts and sources and read news from several sources including news from other countries, rather than just FOX News and propaganda emails. But, I digress.). After I found out that she wasn't just sending these emails to me and family and her friends- that after a forwarded message from my mom , she added my mom's list to her own, and started forwarding them that hateful crap, too- I blocked her. I just couldn't handle it anymore. She never sent me any personal messages anyways, and if she needs to contact me, she can do it through my mom. Not like my Grandpa uses email and he's the one I care about.

When I forward messages to people, I don't just include everyone in my address book- I send them to people who I know will appreciate them.

[ThomCat]

8. I do what Love Bug does.

I hit Reply All and send a response debunking or critiquing the original e-mail. People learn pretty quickly not to send me stupid, republican, racist and/or historically inacurate stuff.

Why do they send you this stuff? Because you're nice and they really, really want you think just like them. Because you're smart, and if you agree with the e-mail it validates them.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

9. Did you tell them (your "friends") you don't want to get these anymore?

[u4ic]

10. My sister would send me

crap like that. CANADIANIZED, too. What idgit thought, "oh, I'll Canadianize this piece about the US being in the Iraq war?" :wtf:

It had to do with a Muslim woman wearing a BURKHA who went into a shop and said something about leaving her country alone (Iraq). Some dim witted freeper in the store piped up and said "how dare you say that to us, we're FREEING YOU" by being in your country.

I hit reply all, and they not only got some disgusting photos from Abu Ghraib, but a looooong tally of the human rights abuses going on in Iraq. By the US. Then had to explain Canada didn't have any troops there. :eyes:

Hmmmm...interesting....never got anything like that from her again...

[sbj405]

11. I got one from my dad today

It's strange, he's probably the most apathetic person politically I know. I don't think he's voted in over 20 years. He just forwards shit. All sorts of shit. Today was the one about how we're not going to have anything to do with anyone that's not helping us in Iraq.

[jobycom]

13. I always write back long-winded debunkings, complete with name calling

They usually stop after the third one. And who knows, maybe they even learn something.

[Random_Australian]

14. Invite them into Nigerian scams in return.

[NMMNG]

15. Probably the same reason fundies evangelize ceaselessly

They probably think they'll win you over eventually. :eyes:

[Neoma]

16. Go incognito.

[KurtNYC]

17. why aren't there left-leaning spam emails?

We could be making up all kinds of BS. It could be fun. No fact checking. No truth encombering on the stories. Here's one off the top of my head....

Ronald Reagan's warning to George W!

David Huckelberry, the former personal diarist of late Ronald Reagan, related this story to a close friend. His friend couldn't keep this a secret:

When Ronnie was in the last throughs of Alzeheimers, he still had some very lucid moments. His legendary recall of names, facts and places came back to him, albeit in fleeting moments. One night in Santa Barbara he called out to David at 3am. He told David to "get that Bush kid on the phone" (that was his name for George W. Bush).

David told him that it was the middle of the night. Couldn't it wait? But Ronnie insisted. So David got patched through to the western white house in Texas. David, wanted to know what was so important that it couldn't wait until morning and he also had come to recognize the moments when Ronnie was 'his old self.' He listened as the two leaders talked. This is what he heard:

"Whatever you do, don't occupy Iraq! You will regret it if you do. No country in history has been able to occupy and hold a foreign nation without bringing about it's own demise. We knew this when we got the soviets to invade Afghanistan. We knew that if we kept them there long enough, the Soviet Union would go bankrupt. And it worked. Don't fall into the same trap! The fate of this great nation is at stake. Don't occupy Iraq!"

The call ended. But David was forever struck by what he had heard. Years later he found he could not keep this to himself. If Ronnie was to give this nation one final gift, this would be it. So David wrote this story and began to send it to everyone who would listen.

You can help this country benefit from the last nugget of Ronald Reagan's wisdom. Forward this email to at least 6 people in the next 20 minutes. Do it now. Make a wish and say "Saint Teresa" Spin around 5 times in a circle and then press "Send." You're wish will will come true in 10 days.

If you are reading this in English thank a teacher. If you are not being tortured by muslim extremists thank Ronald Reagan.

[txwhitedove]

19. Excellent start for left-leaning spam email!

:rofl:

[Rhiannon12866]

18. I get them too, from people who should know better.

To be honest, I'm not sure that all of them get it.:dunce:

Sometimes I write back and explain...:eyes: I haven't heard much from my aunt after I did that. :-(

But I also refuse to pass them on...:grr:

[NewWaveChick1981]

20. Update: POS garbage from my mother today

OK, so I opened my email early this morning, and what should appear but a forward-of-a-forward email from my mother from the National Family Council or some other such garbage urging every "good American" to sign their petition against "homosexual marriage." :puke: I fired off an intelligent but terse retort to send to my mother, telling her that of all people, she has a gay son (my brother), and I'd at least hope that she would be compassionate enough to want my brother to marry the right man if he came along so that my brother---HER OWN SON---would be happy. I put all of my thoughts down, then I decided not to send it to her. That would do nothing but stir up a HUGE hornet's nest, so I thought better of my actions. I'm NOT signing that fucking petition, and if she asks me about it later, she'll get the FULL earful! :grr: But right now, it's better that I not send it. :)

At least I vented, though.