# Fighting ignorance at work: I give up (urban legend emails) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 7, 2004, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186 "2004-06-07T22:41:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2004, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/41 "2004-06-10T17:36:15Z")
> [@tdn](#): > > M: He isn’t! He never even appeared on Oprah! > DAF: Oh yeah? Well, just because he never appeared on Oprah doesn’t mean he’s not a Satanist! > M: But it’s all made up! There’s never been a shred of evidence otherwise! > DAF: Yeah, but he’s lying. Satanists do that! I’m going to stop buying P&G products. Praise the Lord! It wasn’t Oprah he didn’t appear on, it was Phil Donahue he didn’t appear on 😃 Seriously, that story short-circuited a potential resurgence of interest in Christian faith at my college in 1982, and then re-emerged twice over the next decade at my church, fortunately both times being refuted by the pastor (if the pastor had promoted this crap, I’d have gotten a new church). ---
**Author:** ![Punoqllads](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d2c977/32.png) [@Punoqllads](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Punoqllads)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2004, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/42 "2004-06-10T19:05:55Z")
> [@chula](#): > > It was the old “Why did they change the name of the Chevy Nova in Mexico?” one. It hardly seemed worth mentioning since it’s such an obvious one for any Straight Dope and Snopes reader. Oh, no, the Chevy Nova sold just fine in Mexico. It was Canada where the problem erupted, because “nova” in Canadian means “exploding star”, and no one wanted to drive a car that sounded like it was going to explode. Hope this helps, Craig Shergold ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2004, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/43 "2004-06-10T19:33:44Z")
> [@Jeff Olsen](#): > > > [@AerynSun](#): > > > > While I understand your initial suspicion, two-year-old Canadian Aquafresh is just the kind of thing I’d expect to find at a Dollar Store > > True, but the main point was the unhealthy (compared to US brands) amounts of flouride, which sounded like the usual UL scaremongering to me. I’m not sure the email even mentioned the potential of buying an oudated import. I just checked and the email had no mention of outdated toothpaste, just the high flouride content. ---
**Author:** ![swampbear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/swampbear/32/467_2.png) [@swampbear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/swampbear)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2004, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/44 "2004-06-10T20:13:59Z")
> [@Missy2U](#): > > Hey, **Futile Gesture** , I thought Bill Gates was going to send me a **recipe** for a cookie - for like $200 or something. Or was that a trip to Walt Disney World? I get so confused… > > I have the same problem with three of the women I work with - if I get one more “send this to all the women you love” emails containing dire warnings regarding mall parking lots, flat tires, and all manner of impending dangers from “someone who cares”, I’m going to show them what a hostile work environment REALLY looks like. Oh great! :rolleyes: **Missy’s** going all postal and in a couple years we’ll be getting emails containing dire warnings regarding co-workers who go berzerk and run around offices ripping out hard drives and shoving them up other co-workers asses because she kept getting email glurge. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Bruce\_Daddy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/85f322/32.png) [@Bruce\_Daddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bruce_Daddy)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2004, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/45 "2004-06-10T20:30:29Z")
> [@CanvasShoes](#): > > But who can blame a parent or older relative for trying to bring sunshine to their young pups?? I appreciate the sentiment, of course, but my mother is out of hand. I spent 4 hours the other week removing the Sasser worm, AVG found 273 infected files and Spybot and Ad-Aware had a field day. This is a woman on a dial up connection who logs on, checks email and maybe eBay. I give up though, she’s hopeless. ---
**Author:** ![Unauthorized\_Cinnamon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/bc8723/32.png) [@Unauthorized\_Cinnamon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unauthorized_Cinnamon)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2004, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/46 "2004-06-11T01:02:55Z")
> [@Punoqllads](#): > > . . . Craig Shergold _Snickersnort_ ---
**Author:** ![snermy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@snermy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snermy)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2004, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/47 "2004-06-11T03:06:37Z")
What I hate are the random female coworkers who forward “cute” powerpoint slideshows of puppies and kittens and Anne Geddes babies and friendship poems and other such crap. Cause that kitten hangin’ in there just never stops being cute, does it? ---
**Author:** ![elmwood](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmwood/32/3060_2.png) [@elmwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elmwood)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2004, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/48 "2004-06-11T15:01:31Z")
Dear sweet little baby Virgin Mary, thank you for blessing me twith intelligent administrative staff. Since the first day of working here, I have not received one urban legend, friendship poem, glurge, anti-liberal stories, or any other e-mail messages along the same lines. In fact, the admin staff have complained to me when they get messages forwarded to them by the glurgey kountry kitschy women working in other departments. They know about Snopes. I love my job. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2004, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186/49 "2004-06-11T20:35:01Z")
> [@BiblioCat](#): > > They should arrive the same day as your money from the Nigerian businessman. 😉 Man, those Nigerian businessmen can be bitchy. I got my second scam letter (diamonds or something) less than a week after my first one (gold or something). So, I replied to the second one telling him that I’d already put all my money into the gold supergoodhappyinvestmentdeal from the first letter. I got a really bitchy response saying that I shouldn’t be making fun of his predicament and all that. It was kind of funny. -Joe, mean guy [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fighting-ignorance-at-work-i-give-up-urban-legend-emails/249186.md?page=2)