Thanks for the Spam, Grandma!

Categorized | Nicholas Johnson, politics

Tags | barack obama, batman, email spam, grandma

Thanks for the Spam, Grandma!

Posted on 18 July 2008 by Nicholas Johnson

Grandma spams It's not often that I have the time to give my grandmother a shout-out, but here it is. I want to give big props to my g-ma for her helping me to reach my quest of 'World's Strongest Man in the Email-Deleting Finger Catagory'. Thanks to her, I have added millimeters of girth and amazing definition to my email-deleting finger.

On any given Monday, I could spend minutes a day deleting all of the unread emails that she has forwarded me. I don't mean any disrespect to my grandmother, but I pretty much got the 'Obama = terrorist' message in your first email. You know I am a well informed, educated man. I graduated from an accredited university (UNT '07); you were there. I'm not amongst the undereducated masses that not only thought finishing high school was unnecessary, but also make up the majority of stereotypical Texans. I just don't fall into that group of people that is swayed by propaganda whether it is political, racist, or fear based.

I get it. Barack Obama is a Muslim name. And to a God-fearing Christian, anything Muslim is going to come off as Satanic and inspire all sorts of fear based responses. This is easy to do when your main source for Muslim related information comes from a small-town church pastor and the 700 Club. I'd be willing to bet that if I were to follow the email trail on one of the emails that begins: FWD(:FWD:FWD:FWD:FWD:…………..FWD:Barack Obama is Muzlim for 'Kill Americans'), I'd probably find at least 20 addresses with @….church.org in them. I'd say that it amazes me that the people that are entrusted to deliver the 'words' of God and Jesus are usually the ones that are first to instruct people to reject, hate, or rally against other religions, but I know better.

Maybe I'm too naive. Maybe I should feel an overwhelming need to exercise my right to speak freely and arm myself properly. Maybe I should be skeptical of everyone with a foreign accent. 'Are you sure this is chicken in my kung pao chicken? I'm not sure. My red-blooded American pastor said to be cautious. And I know he is NEVER wrong.'

Honestly, I would rather live in a world that I die being wrong than live a fearful life being right. Because the truth is, hatred is a multi-headed monster. All the bullets and missiles in the world will only suppress it. Hatred is the herpes of humanity and wars are the Valtrex. Even with regular treatment, it is still possible to spread hatred.

It is possible to spread it via forwarded emails. And honestly, I'm just not interested in being a carrier. I'm not interested in perpetuating the slanted, narrow views that these emails express. I'm still going to dislike various aspects of the cultures of other races, but I'm more likely to dislike the same things within my own.

Grandma, through no effort of yours, I'll most likely excuse myself from participating in the election in November. In doing so, I'm not staging any form of protest. I just don't like feeling like I am throwing my vote into an abyss. I still live in the same state that almost unanimously voted for G. W. both in 2000 and 2004. I don't care how dynamic Mr. Obama might be, he's not winning Texas in 2008.

Obama may very well end up winning the election and I'm sure that scares a lot of people. And they should be. Change is scary, but it is also necessary. It wasn't so long ago that people were afraid of automobiles and televisions, but I think we can all agree that those have worked out pretty well for all of us. I look forward to the day when we stop caring about someone being the first woman to… or the first black person to….

Hopefully then, and only then will I stop burning hundreds of calories a day deleting those unread emails.

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2 Comments For This Post

Lisa Long Says:
July 18th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
I get the same emails from my grandma! She lives in a small town in south Texas. I’m not for any of the candidates that are in the running.. I was a Ron Paul fanatic hoping for real change, not some promised faux change.
LP Says:
July 18th, 2008 at 5:29 pm
I give yours kudos for even understanding email. I spent an hour this week trying to show my grandmother how to program names into her cell phone and how to redial numbers, and she is STILL dialing each number every time she calls someone. She is a wizard at the microwave and video poker, and that’s about it. But I guarantee, internet or not….fear and consumption is alive and well at Mamaw and Papaw’s. Great blog.