One of my pet peeves is forwarded emails that are intended to scare or anger people or give them something for free. You know what I’m talking about: emails about the latest serial killer techniques, a politician’s religious beliefs or recent meeting with troops overseas, fake printable coupons to Blockbuster, computer virus warnings, etc. People receive something inflammatory or scary from a friend (who got it from a friend at work, who got it from their aunt in Muskogee) and blindly send it out without doing any kind of research or even using any common sense. I just found a great article on factcheck.org on this phenomenon and how it relates to political email forwards.

If you receive a forward, you can investigate it through several websites that do the legwork for you. My favorite is snopes.com. If you send me a bogus forward, there’s a good chance I’ll write back with the appropriate Snopes link. I might even copy all the other people you included. Other options include breakthechain.org, factcheck.org, and urbanlegends.about.com. Before you forward something, PLEASE do your homework and try to ensure that it’s true. The chain won’t stop unless you stop it. Do the right thing, people!