Tuesday, December 02, 2008

Hate Ignorant Mail

Maybe it's because I didn't get enough sleep last night, but an email I received this morning thoroughly pissed me off. It was sent by a religious acquaintance to a slew of her religious friends (how I got on the list I've no idea), telling everyone not to buy the USPS's Eid stamp.

It comes complete with a long list of atrocities committed by Muslims, and says in part, "How ironic is this? They don't even believe in Christ, and they're getting their own Christmas stamp . . . " How stupid is that? It's not a Christmas stamp, it's an Eid stamp, you dumbass.

Worse, I think, is this part: "To use this stamp would be a slap in the face to all those AMERICANS who died at the hands of those whom this stamp honors."

So . . . if you believe this email, the USPS has created a stamp to honor terrorists.

Any hope of laughing this off was extinguished by her next email, which arrived two minutes later. This one was a Power Point presentation on remembering the Holocaust. I have strong feelings about the Holocaust and absolutely want it to be remembered--but not by sending around emails containing very large, extremely graphic photographs of the piles of the dead, along with "patriotic" propaganda.

Accompanying the photos was an old lie. The slide show contains the "information" that the United Kingdom has banned teaching about the Holocaust in schools to avoid offending Muslims. That story's been around for years. I sent her a link to the Snopes.com article on the subject, and to her credit she passed along the correction to everyone on her list.

Speaking of lists, I took her off my Christmas card list. Yeah, she got credit for making that correction, but it wasn't enough to justify mailing her a card. Although I might have felt differently if I'd had an Eid stamp to put on it.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good post, Susan. I've got an aunt that sends those kinds of emails out -- although, she's quit sending the more political ones to me because I either respond with a snopes link or one line about how I disagree with the email. Now only I get graphic heavy emails about cats or menopause.

Helen said...

What does a graphic heavy email about cats contain Dona?

I find it scary that people still hold such views.I do like the idea though of sending her a card with that stamp on it...

Indigo Bunting said...

Maybe we should ALL send her cards with that stamp on it.

Susan, thanks for writing this. Some of the Pennsylvania relatives I married into think this way, and it just makes me want to bang my head against the wall. Before the election, I had to send a couple of them e-mails telling them to NOT send me anything political.

You did a great job with this.

Susan said...

Thanks, guys. During the election this same woman started out really disgusting anti-Obama emails. (How did I get on her list?? She must be trying to save me.) A couple of times I hit Reply All and sent back my responses, which consisted of links to articles I felt were worth reading. Of course, I realized they'd probably never be read, and eventually I asked her to stop sending me this crap.

She replied with a long email about how we should vote for the platform, not the person, and that God was on the side of McCain.

Given the results of the election, I wonder if she and her friends questioned their assumption of God's power.

Joya said...

Perhaps next time you should send her the photo from the New Yorker of Elsheba Khan mourning at the grave of her son, an Army corporal who died fighting in Iraq... an American who died fighting in Iraq... a Muslim who died fighting for America.

The photo is here: http://www.newyorker.com/online/2008/09/29/slideshow_080929_platon?slide=16#showHeader

crystal said...

People like that make it hard to be religious :)

Adam Byrn "Adamus" Tritt said...

OH, I want to send her a card too.

I have had those emails as well. I get them still, sometimes from my father, telling me a "respected" (nameless) professor at a "well-known" (nameless) university has proven any number of things against the Muslims such as, and this is my favorite, they are inferior as proven by the fact they never win Nobel prizes.

All sorts of obscene, arrogant, self-righteous, ignorant idiocy.

Here is the worst part. As I am Jewish, when I prove these wrong, I get told by other Jews I hate my own kind.

Mali said...

Great posts, and comments. So much for freedom ...

Susan said...

Yes, great comments, everyone. Joya, that photo is a true example of one picture saying 1,000 words.