One more forward will kill me

I’m so irritated with getting nonsensical forwards that I’ve started to write angry emails in return, in a hope to wake people up from their zombie-obedience. An email ends with: “Send this to everyone”, and people just blindly obey.

The worst kinds of forwards are those where the forwarder actually thinks he or she is doing the forwardee a service. For instance the recent forward I received warning me: BIG VIRUS COMING!!! PLEASE READ & FORWARD!!

The email claims that there’s a devilish virus on the way with the ability to burn your hard drive, and it was said by CNN to be the worst virus ever. The virus-warning even claims that Snopes.Com vouches its authenticity.

Well, Snopes.Com did say that it is a real virus, but it is not a BIG VIRUS COMING. It’s been around for a long time. Which means that any half-decent anti-virus program will render it harmless.

Why not double check with CNN, before forwarding your benevolent email. It’s easy. Go to CNN.Com and type in “worst virus ever” in the search field. And lo and behold – there is no listing of CNN making any such claim. Instead you find other people, like myself, voicing their irritation.

It’s always good to check on Snopes.Com – but don’t do as millions of others have done and actually believe someone else because they had supposedly checked on Snopes.Com. Stop being lazy and do it yourself.

Probably what irritates me the most is that people do not take a moment to think about the claims of these emails. They just believe it without a moments thought. For instance, the virus will burn your hard drive… How can a piece of program code, a series of 0s and 1s, make fire to your hardware? Program code is not magic. It’s like thinking that the words on this blog has the ability to steal your car. It doesn’t make sense. Are people really that gullible? It doesn't take an Einstein... And people think I’m paranoid?!

So please, I beg of you, stop killing me with your forwards. (As if that made sense, but I’m sure you get the idea.)