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* The setup…

A widely circulated e-mail over the past few weeks warns drivers that, beginning today, Illinois State Police are going to be using cameras in work zones to enforce work zone speed limits — and ticketing drivers for being as little as 1 mph over the limit. […]

But tickets are “obviously not given for 1 mph over,” Lt. Luis Gutierrez, state police public information officer, emphasized Tuesday.

State police offices in both Springfield and Chicago said they don’t how this old e-mail keeps getting passed around.

“It’s generated every time summer comes around,” said Gutierrez.

I don’t get many of those chain e-mails. Maybe I just know smart people. Maybe I’m just lucky. Maybe now that I’ve written this, I’ll get a kabillion of them.

Anyway, I’m curious. So…

* The Question: Do you ever get these things? And, if so, what do you do when you get obviously false chain e-mails from friends or family members? What was the weirdest one you received?

I’m not talking about those Nigerian spam letters, or some such. I mean chain letters forwarded to you by people you know who think they’re real.

posted by Rich Miller
Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 7:48 am

Comments

I find them to be the most annoying things in my email. If I had the courage, I would tell people to absolutely not send them to me, 7 years of bad luck be darned.

Comment by sporty41 Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 7:59 am
The weirdest chain email I’ve received is:

The letter said if you cough allot at night to put Vicks vapor rub on your feet and put socks on before going to bed. It will reduce your coughing completely.

I know someone who got this chain email and thought it was real - so she tried it.

I just delete these emails without reading them. Fortunately, my junk folder catches most of the chains and spam.

Comment by State Employee Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:05 am
I reply (but not reply all) with a link to snopes.com when warranted.

Comment by Greg Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:05 am
typical chain emails…that describe safety issues….relating to kidnapping…attack…rape..ECT. Weirdest email…pertained to some really poisionous spider from a foriegn country that now resides in the USA,,,and they lurk under toliet seats.

Comment by ouch.... Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:11 am
I reply to all that someone should fact check the stuff and include a link to the Snopes entry on the subject.

Comment by Bird Dog Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:16 am
My father, as he has retired has apparently decided to elect himself “Official Forwarder of Rumors”. He has settled down (or at least taken me off the list of recipients) after I would reply to “all” in the chain linking the Snopes page debunking whatever he had passed along.

I have infact gotten the email mentioned by Rich above…from my father.

Comment by How Ironic Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:17 am
I like the Bill Gates Giving away money one. THe free laptop one is also a good one.

I got the one about the cameras used by ISP, if any good does come out of that one is it will slow drivers down through construction zones.

Comment by He Makes Ryan Look Like a Saint Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:23 am
Yup. Get these way too many times from well meaning people. On the real scary ones, I do the research & forward the sender back some hoax busting websites to look at regarding the orignal forward. Life is scary enough without compounding it with false warnings. Unfortunately, they keep sending them without ever checking for themselves.

Comment by sal-says Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:23 am
Just had a HUGE argument with my girlfriend who received one of these from her Right-Winger brother. Basically, it talks about a bill in Congress that passed the House and was entering the Senate (that seems to be the M.O. for these emails) that would require you to get the OK from the federal government for home improvements. According to her, if we wanted to cut down a tree or add a bathroom it would have to “be approved by Washington D.C.” I am slowly losing her…..

Comment by Diamond Dog Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:31 am
Same as Greg

Comment by OneMan Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:33 am
I got that and in driving to Springfield the first day after reading it I looked for cameras and must admit I drove closer to 50 than 55 in a 45. But on way back kept it at 53 or so in work zones.

DD, find yourself a nice Democrat girlfriend. She’ll probably be volunteering for people with disabilities who are out of State services (temporarily).

Comment by Mongo Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:37 am
Weirdest e-mail I receievd was the one cliaming swifter was deadly to pets because the chemical was only one molecule away from antifreeze.

Since lead is only one molceule from gold, I will be more thne happy to sell lead bars to these folks at gold rates as invetsment vehicles.

I send them all to snopes.

Comment by Ghost Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:41 am
I get sevaral stupid and non-factual, hyperbolic email. Most of it is critical of Obama, Democrats, or progressive programs. I believe they originate from Karl Roves school of BS.

Comment by consulthammer Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:42 am
My parents forwarded me the work zone camera email, as well as every false warning their hysterical friends send them. I used to debunk them but now I simply delete, knowing I can’t change them and appreciating that they are alive to send them.

Comment by Independent Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:46 am
Ditto on Snopes referrals but some are amazing in how an item can become an urban legend in mircoseconds across the Internet.
Yesterday’s mail had an item about “a freind of a fire captain from Lewiston” getting ripped off at a gas pump that printed reciepts that were high than the pump price”. Jeez that happens everyday in the grocery stores with barcode scans higher than shelf tag prices…. oops that was another e-mail….

Comment by one day at a time Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:52 am
About a decade ago, a very important police administrator, sent out the email warning everyone in the office to watch for gang members who flash their headlights on the high beams and if they get a response, attack the motorist.

I immediately sent him the Snopes link discrediting it, and he had to send out another email retracting it.

My wife works with a school district, so gets a lot of these nutty things via co-workers, along with a lot of security viruses.

A healthy dose of cynicism, and an ability to quickly check sources online, prevents these things from being passed on as fact. “A too good to be true” - usually is.

Comment by VanillaMan Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 8:59 am
The email you got wasn’t technically wrong because police CAN ticket you for going 1 mph over the speed limit, they just don’t/won’t.

Comment by Blue Ribbon Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:00 am
I really enjoyed the barrage of e-mails a few years back that warned of blinding your children by inadvertantly getting sunscreen in their eyes. That was almost as good as the older one that warned that flashing your headlights at a car driving at night with no lights on would lead to the car turning around and following you to your destination to murder you as part of a gang initiation ritual.

I try to “reply to all” with a link to Snopes whenever possible, as that provides some measure of embarassment to the sender.

Comment by BigDog Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:00 am
This thing popped up in Southern Illinois on June 17th and had links to a pair of IDOT press releases issued during the Blagojevich administration (2005, I think). The links are no longer active.

Comment by Jak Tichenor Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:00 am
I get the political hysteria ones about how Obama is going to eat your first-born child. I send the snopes link to reply-all.

Comment by Thomas Westgard Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:05 am
Ironic:

Any chance that your father is also my father-in-law? Kudos to Independent who came to recognize that we’re never going to change them. Thank God for spam filters.

Comment by ilrino Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:10 am
I just delete them. I did get the one Rich mentioned. As I drive a lot for work, I checked it out and the link had a date of 2005.

Comment by wizard Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:14 am
I also reply to the sender with a link to Snopes. The emails that especially drive me crazy are the ones from a “relative” of a very sick child with a rare disease, and some doctor in Europe has offered to treat the child for free, if only we all forward the e-mail to 500 of our closest friends. I always ask the naive sender to really think about it: What kind of doctor would make his treatment of a patient dependent upon you forwarding e-mails to your friends? They usually feel pretty stupid after I tell them that (and they also usually remove me from their bulk e-mail list, which is a bonus).

Comment by Tired of hoaxes Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:17 am
I would be more interested in knowing what is the lowest speed over the limit someone has got one of these tickets?? :>

Comment by Tommy Boy Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:18 am
Im with Greg. I send back the snopes link and almost never hear from the original sender with an admission that they were duped, and never see a retraction email.

Comment by Downstate weed chewing hick Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:24 am
I have a relative who forwards waaay too many emails. Mostly the “bad/good luck” type…..love the one where the guy didn’t forward the email and went out for lunch and got hit by a truck!

I have responded to the off the wall ones about how members of Congress have outrageous health care benefits. I sent back the facts.

I’ve also busted a few folks for the ones about the rights given to immigrants. I reminded them that none of our family came over on the Mayflower and we were all immigrants at one point.

Comment by Hair today....gone Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:28 am
First I laugh, then if it is from family or close friend who seems to believe, I point them to snopes or debunk it myself.

The latest one I received contained two photographs being sold as being taken by a passenger on Air France 447. Laughably simple to debunk and on Snopes as well.

Comment by Plutocrat03 Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:35 am
Snopes is absolutely the best defense, and I reply to all.

Comment by Anon Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:37 am
I wish I had a dime for every chain email that I received about Barack Obama’s citizenship (or lack thereof).

Comment by Stones Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:38 am
My dad forwarded me the e-mail in the post. A quick check of the link found it to be from 2005. I knew it was wrong without reading the date due to the presence of the word “Blagojevich”…

Comment by Ben S. Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:39 am
–…what do you do when you get obviously false chain e-mails from friends or family members?–

Withering sarcasm seems to cut down the worst ones.

–And, if so, what do you do when you get obviously false chain e-mails from friends or family members? What was the weirdest one you received?–

Truly moronic stuff about the CIA and DOD blowing up the Twin Towers in New York. The “smoking gun” was the “fact” that the impact of the crashes and the burning jet fuel couldn’t have brought down the buildings because “steel doesn’t melt.”

Brilliant stuff.

What was the weirdest one you received?

Comment by wordslinger Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:43 am
A couple friends - and my mom - send me this stuff fairly regularly. I always send back the Snopes link and cut-and-paste the text in the hopes that they get it.

Comment by Stuck with Sen. CPA Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 9:50 am
I got an email claiming that our state legislators were totally out of touch with reality. I could find nothing on Snopes to refute it, but I won’t pass it along, anyway.

Comment by Captain Flume Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:02 am
I get these kinds of emails all the time. But my favorite was one about how women should not go to WalMart on a particular night because gangs will be shooting females as part of initiation. What I couldn’t believe was how many of my fellow female friends totally believed it and were definitely going to stay away from WalMart that night.

Comment by Anon Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:08 am
my 85 yo mother in law loves to forward them … its the curse that comes with teaching her about email. but you know there is a … BIG VIRUS COMING! her email saved me … whew

Comment by The Horse Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:10 am
www.snopes.com

Comment by trafficmatt Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:11 am
I got one proporting to be a camera found from the Air France crash.

the pictures were from the TV show “Lost”

Comment by Pat collins Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:16 am
Get these all the time from friends and family. Usually reply using Snopes.
Am more irritated by people sending stuff to forward to 5 or 10000 friends. These usually have “feel-good” religious or patriotic themes; am not religious and don’t feel that I need to forward something to be patriotic.
Incidentally, someone above scoffed at Vicks on feet for coughs. My wife did it and it worked for her; she swears by the treatment.

Comment by Downstate Commissioner Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:35 am
I did get this particular email on the tickets for 1 mile over in construction zones, a few times. I wonder if my friends and family think I drive too fast?

I did not think the police would waste their time on this, due to speedometer calibrations, both on the individuals automobile, and the monitoring device I would think they would have to account for at least 2-3 miles per hour on the calibrations of both before they would waste the printing, paper, staff time, appeals, and mailing.

Comment by Third Generation Chicago Native Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:36 am
I did however enjoy the new commercials they have about cars speeding at 65 miles per hour through peoples offices, and the message was “Would you like this going on in your place of work? Neither do they? (refering to the road construction crews)
Cute commercial, and just in time for a high travel weekend during the height of the construction season.

Comment by Third Generation Chicago Native Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:39 am
Depending on the subject, either circular file or send the link to Snopes. One person was particularly bad in that no matter how many Snopes links I got from them, they continued to forward similar scares.

I think I eventually laid it down to her that she needed to check snopes.com before forwarding stuff. E-mail I received from her started to taper off, and occasionally I’d get a “hey, can you check to see if this is true?” message from her, which I just ended up pointing her back to snopes.

I think she finally bookmarked the site herself as I haven’t gotten any forwarded e-mails from her for quite some time. Either that, or she took me off her e-mail list…

Comment by Anon in BB Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 10:59 am
To the question, I’m in Greg’s group. Kill it with Snopes. I get my dose of stupid email from one relative and one friend. My friend gets a lot of his nonsense email from a pal in Texas retired from..ENRON. Go figure.

The goofiest one AA has received recently was accompanied by a YouTube video and was called “F-35 SCARE” or something like that. It purportedly showed the USN/USMC’s latest fighter jet in terrible distress while attempting a “helicopter-like” takeoff from a carrier-only luck or pilot skill avoided a catastrophic event.

After one look, it was clearly done with Microsoft Flight Simulator.

Comment by Arthur Andersen Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 11:04 am
I also got the construction zone email. These emails usually contain some truth to them so as to give legitimacy to the rest of the false claim.

I also have gotten the headlight email many times and just laugh because I remember years ago sitting in High School worried that gang member were killing people because of this. That is until my plain spoken father said, “Son, don’t you think that if this were going on it would be on the front page of the newspaper everyday.” To his credit I still read the newspaper everyday and have yet to hear of a gang initiation slaying involving a Good Samaritan driver!!!

Comment by Anon14 Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 11:09 am
When I get them I pick up the phone and call my editors to tell them to stop forwarding me rumors and falsehoods and that, no, I’m not going to have a story explaining that the rumors and falsehoods are in fact rumors and falsehoods.

Comment by Frank Booth Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 11:32 am
I notice that some of the “rumor” e-mails that have been going around for years sometimes come from our newer computer users who have now retired and have a lot of time to spend sending/receiving e-mails. They seems to be pretty gullible and will forward just about anything they get and believe it to be the gospel. I must admit though that I have had an occasional knee-jerk reaction to something, fail to check it out, and forward it only to get it back from someone telling me it is false. I have learned now to check everything through Snopes.com and will simply forward the link back to the sender. And of course there are the usual ones that come along every major holiday and I simply delete them. Jeeze, you would think with the millions of computer users, people could be a little creative and come up with some new rumors for us to read, other than some new way to sucker us out of our money, credit cards, bank account numbers, etc.

Comment by Little Egypt Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 11:50 am
I agree with the snopes response. However….the never ending religious emails…indicating that if you do not forward to 10 people… you have turned against God….or you will be cursed.
Its not so much the messages about God I mind…It’s the forwarding stipulation. I respond to the sender…and request to be removed from their list. Okay…. if I am struck by lightening today….you know why…LOL

Comment by Heaven or Hell? Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 11:51 am
http://www.thanksno.com/

Comment by Cheswick Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 12:52 pm
I received a forward from my sister-in-law telling everyone that Pepsi is coming out with a 4th of July can that has the Pledge of Allegiance on it, except the Pepsi whacko liberals left out the “under God” part. According to the forward, I was supposed to boycott Pepsi because of this shocking omission. It was kind of insulting since I only drink Pepsi. It’s not like I buy it for the can’s appearance!

I love the ones that say, “if you forward this to 7 people, an amazing video/message will pop up on your screen.” Seriously, that never happens!

I would really like to know who originates this stuff, because they could have serious power over the masses. Oh wait, I bet it’s Obama! LOL

Comment by just ducky Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 12:52 pm
Health nuts know that whatever you place on your feet absorbs directly into the body. If you rub fresh garlic on your feet, you will be able to taste it within minutes. I didn’t get that from an e-mail. It doesn’t really do anything, except prove that the skin absorbs whatever you place on it. It won’t hurt you, but you will smell like an italian restaurant for days.

My Mom is retired and sends me every weird warning under the sun. It matters not how many times I tell her about snopes.com. She freaks out and send every one to me and everyone in her address book. She never checks SNOPES. One she sent said that in an emergencey, you should dial to dial a certain two digit number from your cell phone, and help will arrive within minutes. Huh?

One that I got caught in many years ago was to have everyone send cards to a liitle boy who was dying, and his last wish was to break a world record for the amount of cards he received. I found out too late that the boy survived and by this time was a college student. I really had to eat crow on that one. Thats when I learned to ALWAYS check snopes.

Mom also sent this new illinois law e-mail to everyone. One would think she would check with me, knowing where I work, but no! She fired it off to the multitudes. Parents are a riot when they get older.

Comment by Say WHAT? Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 1:15 pm
Another good source for checking out chain e-mails, rumors, etc. are the Jan Harold Brunvand urban legend books. He’s written at least three, titled “The Vanishing Hitchhiker,” “The Choking Doberman,” and “The Mexican Pet.”

A lot of “new” rumors and urban legends are actually old ones that keep coming back, such as Madalyn Murray O’Hair’s alleged attempt to ban all TV religious programming; rumors of attempted abductions, mutilations, etc. taking place at a local shopping center and allegedly being “hushed up” by the local media; and “redemption rumors” that claim a sick or needy child will be helped if enough people collect soda pop can tabs, send cards, forward e-mails, etc.

Comment by Secret Square Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 1:48 pm
Get them all the time out here in the hinterlands. I usually just delete them, unless it is coming from someone whose reputation would be harmed if s/he were found to be sending out erroneous info.

Don’t know the weirdest one. Probably the photo found in a camera in the rubble of the Twin Towers that shows a student on top of the World Trade Center observation deck with a jet close behind him. It was so obviously a fake, but a lot of people believed it.

Comment by Fan of the Game Wednesday, Jul 1, 09 @ 3:25 pm