How do you deal with email forwards that are based on false information?

Question

I receive HUNDREDS of e-mails from people about a variety of topics - most religious or political in nature, that are forwarded by people who don't bother to check the facts before sending them on.

I do not send forwards. I believe there is a much better use for the computer and e-mail than to use it to promote hatred, prejudice, etc. Especially when it is based on false information.

I sometimes check out the information, and reply to everyone on the list with the truth. This has stopped some people from sending me forwards, but I know they still send them to other people.

I am not promoting taking anyone's freedom away, but if we are in the "information age," shouldn't we at least try to make sure the information we are promoting is accurate?

Answer 1

I have a filter set to file all forwarded email in their own folder. I only go through it about once a week, and rarely read any of them. It keeps them from clogging up my inbox.

Answer 2

First of all you need to inform everyone who sends you forwards that you are severely allergic and will break out in a case of homicidal rage if you get one more forward regarding ANYTHING up to and including:

1.) Bush's war in Iraq
2.) missing children
3.) poems from dead kids who died as a result of:

*drunk driving accidents
*child abuse situations
*accidents involving household appliances, pets and or motor vehicles

4.) myths and/or urban legends involving:

*weird deaths
*weird celebrities
*weird things people have had removed from rectums
*weird things people will do to rob, kidnap, rape or steal organs from other wholly innocent and unsuspecting people.

and finally:

5.) the newest latest and greatest computer uber virus, that will not only infect the computer, but the toaster oven, the television and possibly the garage door opener (but oddly enough not the garage door)

Secondly, you might want to casually mention www.snopes.com, which is a handy little web site full of exposed myths and odd true stories. It's not hard to use, and people might learn a thing or two!

Thirdly, you should accept that the scandal-filled, horror-inspiring, tear-jerking e-mails are the ones we remember...the fact that we're in the "information age" does not mean that people will stop spreading rumors! It's much more fun to send the e-mails about how much semen was pumped from Lindsey Lohan's stomach (I heard it was like 3 quarts!)

Answer 3

Yahoo! isn't a lottery, it does no longer run a lottery, neither is Yahoo! interior the habit of giving out money to human beings at random, for no glaring reason. rather at the same time as that human being hasn't ever entered into the type of lottery or contest interior the first position. when you're unfamiliar, right here's how a *real* lottery works. You pay 2$ for a cost ticket. 1000's of human beings pay $2. The proprietor skims XX% of the gross sales, and pays something else to three value ticket holder at random. in case you do not pay the $2 to enter, you do not win(, and also you may properly be particularly advantageous that you gained't win even if in case you probably did enter......) interior the ridiculously unlikely probability that you do win, typically they are going to deliver you a examine interior the mail, once you produce a prevailing value ticket. they gained't cost you "taxes," "criminal expenditures," or "processing expenditures," &c., or in the experience that they do, it is going to immediately be deducted from the prize income the previous. Use a touch straight forward experience, or at the same time as unclear, contact the authorities. ~W.O.M.B.A.T.

Answer 4

not much you can do. a lot of those e-mails have been floating around for years.

Good effort though. But we as people in general tend to twist the truth in many fashions... I hope you find a way to correct the email battle. then maybe you can start in on the global media.

Answer 5

I think thats very considerate of you. Absolutely!

Answer 6

Don't pass them on.