Sunday, October 29, 2006
Don't believe anything you hear....
And only half of what you see. A phrase that's been around forever and is just as applicable in "our modern world" than years and years ago. Yet, my master's degree-having Mother believes anything you send her in an email. The more it appeals to a conservative bent, the more stridently she believes it. I've sent her the About.com Urban Legends link numerous times. No help there. I think I could put together an email that says "France is paying illegal aliens from Mexico to come to the US, create huge organic farms that will feed a new generation of super-strong gay children who will take over the world, kill Santa, start sacrificing Christians and destroy the US military" and she'd believe it. Sigh.
And the things she believes are so easy to research--even to the barely computer literate. Today I got an email about how Target is a French-owned company that hates our military. A quick trip to target.com reveals that Target, is in fact, based in Minneapolis, MN. I suppose the fact that some people pronounce it "tar-zghaay" automatically makes it a French company. One would think that since we now know there were no WMD's in Iraq, we'd apologize to France for their lack of support in invading. They were right, we were horribly, tragically, fatally (for half a million Iraqi's and 2000 American soldiers) wrong.
But my dear mother, who is so convinced that her religiousness is better than mine, would rather take 15 seconds (she has dial up) to send out a hurtful untrue email than spend 3 minutes finding out the truth. I like to think that Jesus would have us think before we say unkind things. Even about "big faceless corporations". That we should consider our words and their impact than blindingly repeat falsehoods.
I responded politely with some helpful links. Maybe she'll read them. I'm sure she'll insist that "she didn't know" the email was full of lies. My point, not that she'll get it, is that she CAN FIND OUT.
And the things she believes are so easy to research--even to the barely computer literate. Today I got an email about how Target is a French-owned company that hates our military. A quick trip to target.com reveals that Target, is in fact, based in Minneapolis, MN. I suppose the fact that some people pronounce it "tar-zghaay" automatically makes it a French company. One would think that since we now know there were no WMD's in Iraq, we'd apologize to France for their lack of support in invading. They were right, we were horribly, tragically, fatally (for half a million Iraqi's and 2000 American soldiers) wrong.
But my dear mother, who is so convinced that her religiousness is better than mine, would rather take 15 seconds (she has dial up) to send out a hurtful untrue email than spend 3 minutes finding out the truth. I like to think that Jesus would have us think before we say unkind things. Even about "big faceless corporations". That we should consider our words and their impact than blindingly repeat falsehoods.
I responded politely with some helpful links. Maybe she'll read them. I'm sure she'll insist that "she didn't know" the email was full of lies. My point, not that she'll get it, is that she CAN FIND OUT.
