Comments on: Email Forwards and Social Networks

By: Capri

Capri — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 18:13:57 +0000

Nike’s post = spam – we’re not talking about loneliness and being lovelorn.

By: Capri

Capri — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 21:34:53 +0000

It does go both ways. The leftists just don’t complain about their own forwards while blasting all around the net how REPUBLICANS ALWAYS PASS ON CHAINLETTERS!” It’s made worse by the republicans that do pass on chain letters, and they need to stop it and realize they are getting manipulated by hoaxters and spammers. Like I said before, I’m so damn sick of right-wingers and/or Christians indulging in chain letters while just about anyone else out there who hates chain letters as much as I do, turn out to be left-wing or anti-Christian as well as against chain letters. I’m also sick of right-wing and Christian people ignoring and refusing to listen to me when I tell them to cut out the chain addiction and why!

By: Marlena

Marlena — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 17:22:53 +0000

To History Enthusiast:

I am not so sure about your “it goes both ways” post, at least that has not been my personal experience. I am a Liberal and very rarely do I get forwards of a political nature from my fellow Libs, I have, however, received many, many Conservative forwards, most of them full of lies and distortions. I have, on more than one occasion, told these people to stop sending me such garbage, even then some of them have persisted. I have lost friends over this and I have come to believe there is a real difference between Conservatives and Liberals in this regard.

By: Capri

Capri — Sun, 17 May 2009 07:03:59 +0000

Forwards definitely still exist and go around like wild fire. But now they’re more likely to be emails advertising the latest craze of a music video or something else from a site like Youtube. Who else has gotten the Il Divo “Amazing Grace” viral video, or that 47-year-old lady singing on America or Britain’s Got Talent, I don’t remember which, or the two-year-old singing “Our Father” ? These and all other forwards crop up in text messages and on web forums and social networks, which is why I eventually got rid of Facebook’s not so “super wall” and not so “fun space” Facebook groups are perpetuating forwards too, the number of groups that shout out how to lower gas prices or sine the “Jamie Bulger” petition, even applications are just chain letter forwards. The “Dr. Phil Personality Test” is actually a chain that has been made into a blasted Facebook quiz app for crying out loud! And I get mostly forwards of the feel-good kind, which do anything but – and make me pretty sore at my friends for losing their common sense and forwarding this sappy spam. Seriously, getting 10 copies of some badly constructed chain letter is not going to determine that you have 12 true friends or that you are a caring true friend! Do people really think I’m thick enough to believe that? I didn’t think they were until they sent the blasted junk of this sort. What I’ll do with urban legend forwards is to reply to all with the url or article debunking the legend, and then remind whoever sent it to stop passing on chain letters. And don’t get me started on the sick/missing kid hoaxes and fake religious chain letters, I am one of a few Christians who absolutely detests chain letters that pretend to be religious and inspirational and dupe far too many Christians, conservatives, or both into passing them along. I’m also sick to the back teeth of seeing most people speaking out against forwards turning out to be anti-Christian or left-wing or both, while so many moderates and Christians don’t mind chain letters, and they sure as heck should mind. It’s all mass manipulation and forwards will use any angle and emotional trick in the book and then some to yank the heart-strings or funnybone to get people passing them along. Then there are the people who get all touchy when their chain letter wasn’t received with rave reviews and big pats on the back for being such a “caring friend” and sending it on. “I’ll never send you another fwd again!” Uh, that’s not the point, pal, the point is to get you to think about what you’re getting cyber-manhandled into spreading, whether it’s to me or anyone else – and just stop it! Why people let chain letters boss lead them around by the nose while they have no problems ignoring and refusing things that come personally from their friends/family I’ll never know. And what’s with people who think that after a couple of really nice personal notes back and forth, that it means I want to get forwards and e-cards? I don’t, that’s not communication, it’s a very poor substitute. And the “friendship” ones really gall me. Because you know they aren’t personal at all. They’ve been sent all over the place to and from millions of people I don’t know, and my friends just got suckered yet again. And most often, they are so sickly sweet, and very preachy, as if I need lectures on what a friend is and how a friend must always be there etc, because they or I could die tomorrow and yet, the only time these people can even be bothered to send me anything at all, it’s always that crap, where are they when I really need a friend to talk to? Too busy passing on friendship forwards! When friends abandon you and continue sending chain letters to others who are either too afraid to say anything unfavorable about the forwards, or because they love this stuff just as much, that can and has lead to some pretty hard feelings.

By: The History Enthusiast

The History Enthusiast — Sat, 02 May 2009 18:26:18 +0000

On the flip side, I’m conservative and I used to get forwards from liberal friends who were part of anti-Iraq War listservs and they wanted me to join, or articles with lies about Palin, etc…. Just know that it goes both ways.

By: Yonah

Yonah — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 14:59:23 +0000

I don’t get forwards either. My friends have long since learned that if they keep sending me forwards, they quickly cease to be my friends.

By: Liz

Liz — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 01:21:24 +0000

Due to my determination not to discuss politics at work during the presidential election, one of my VERY conservative co-workers assumed this meant I was actually conservative (which is the complete opposite of what I am). She promptly put me on her mailing list and I would get e-mail after e-mail with things like, “ORDER YOUR NO-BAMA STICKER TODAY!”. I didn’t bother correcting her because I thought it was funny to read the super conservative political propaganda.

By: Village Idiot

Village Idiot — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 22:33:33 +0000

I love the forwards I get that have passed through about 50 inboxes first and so I have to scroll waaaaaay down past all the old headers to see the content. I never bother looking at the content because I’m too busy harvesting and selling all those ripe, valid email addresses to spammers.

OK, I’ll admit I don’t really do that myself, but that’s what happens
(and probably why there are so many of the damned things going around).

By: a westie

a westie — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 21:26:08 +0000

I think a lot of people forward these things before they even think through the implications. The political ones often have a sense of urgency or an argument based on religious faith inspiring a quick forward. As for the jokes, people don’t take them as seriously, so they don’t devote as much thought.

Still, that’s not a good excuse for misogyny. My point is more that people should think before they send their emails, as a forward reflects poorly on them when the email is in bad taste.

By: hypatia

hypatia — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 18:51:17 +0000

I find most of the e-mail forwards I receive are from my much older relatives who aren’t “hip” to websites like FaceBook yet and that they mostly consist of cute pictures, inspirational/cute anecdotes, and crude humour.

I just tend to delete them and leave it at that.

By: Ali

Ali — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 15:35:21 +0000

Most of the forwards I get and/or send involve nerdy stuff that me and my fellow engineer coworkers find interesting so no complaints there. I do get some of those stupid “this is how you will die this week!” emails, almost always from the company safety committee so I can’t really opt out of those.

Other than that I’ve only received spam forwards twice at work (I get the occasional religious forward from my parents but other than that my personal emails stays blisfully forward free). With the political forward I replied all with links that explained/refuted every point in the email and told the sender they should base their vote on more than just unsubstantiated email forwards. With the offensive racist/sexist/homophobic/xenophobic “joke” email, I told the sender to never include me on forwards like that again or I would send it along to HR and the only reason I hadn’t with thta email is because at the time I did consider that person a friend.

By: waxghost

waxghost — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 05:49:51 +0000

Holly, I have gotten one or two of those also.

But most of the forwards I get are from, as others have said, conservative family members who send some really dumb, offensive stuff. I just write back something along the lines of, “I would much rather have a real email from you about what’s going on in your life than something that someone else wrote. Please don’t send me any more of these; if you do, I will just delete them anyway.” So far, no one has persisted and I really don’t get forwarded emails very often at all.

By: Shel

Shel — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 04:00:46 +0000

I agree with Megan.. email forwards are viewed with the same level of derision as spam, but even sadder as most are incredibly old.

By: Holly

Holly — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 03:44:05 +0000

The only ones I seem to get anymore are the “please be more careful, because you’re a delicate woman” emails. When something horrible has happened (or most likely didn’t happen) to a woman I get an email from a concerned aunt or friend detailing the situation, outlining how to avoid that situation like I couldn’t figure it out (I’m not only a delicate woman, I’m a stupid woman as well), and telling me to forward the email to any woman I care about. I do not forward the email. I must be a horrible woman who doesn’t care about others.

By: Sabriel

Sabriel — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 03:37:51 +0000

I don’t get any forwards because I have asked people not to send them to me. I think the fact that I am not in email communication with my extended family does help.