Guns, Politics and Social Media

Tonight, we are going to work our way back to last Friday in this edition of M3’s Friday Follies. As is customary, M3 covered some speculative, questionable subjects: Internet knowledge, humor, fiction and the environment. What are people saying?

Googleless

A late addition to this week’s Friday Follies comes from sunny California. Now, one would think in such a forward thinking, albeit very guilty, state, this would be a common issue. Alas, my interest in caring for the oceans and marine life was completely lost on Marci. She believes I am dreaming.

Only in your twisted imagination could these things exist. Plastic is a liquid. And what a stupid name you gave it. Nurdles. There is no such thing.”

Thank you for the vote on my creativity. Maybe, plastic would be more effective if we could find a way to make it a solid. There might even be commercial applications. I need to research patents…

But I am not just a dreamer…I am an animal abuser with a penchant for theatrical photography and necrophilia.

How could you just cut open a fish like that? Why would you stuff a dead bird with trash? You are not supposed to play with dead things. They have diseases”

I did not do it.

Since she missed the links from the photographs and the copyright credits, for the record: I did not take the photographs.

I sent her a copy of the latest Oceana newsletter with this little note:

Although I personally eat seafood, I have always believed in humane treatment of food stock. As to the nurdles, I do not create the news. I merely report it.

In case you were unaware, the Internet has introduced a new feature called the “search engine”. I would recommend one personally to you, but I feel certain it would only serve to reinforce your belief that I am populating the Internet with my own content in an attempt to pollute the information pool, which means I would attempt to skew search results in my favor.

Surely, if you have never heard of it, it cannot possibly exist.”

It is a political activism site.

In what is quickly becoming the most popular post on M3, I touched on the heartache and anxiety caused many by changes to social media platforms. Most of the M3 readers happily shared the post with their Facebook, Google+ and Twitter followings. Julie, however, did not.

social media icon thought bubble

I think she needs a FaceSpace.

It appears from her hatemail Julie is a current employee of the social media world. While her position is not apparent in her email signature, one can only guess with a handle of socialforummoderator. (Who creates email addresses that long any more?)

In pertinent part, she was dismayed I would portray the social media giant in such a negative light. Her firm belief is social media is the path to political diplomacy and grassroots empowerment. She questioned my grasp on current events.

Don’t you know social media is the only reason there is no war in Africa? Not one single person had to die and it was all done on cell phones.”

Just to flex my political and diplomatic skills, I responded to her query:

Wow! I really need to subscribe to your news service! Mine must have it all wrong. They were talking about such trivial things as the death of a dictator, economic boycott pressures and the volatility of oil futures. Maybe, they are operating on old feeds. They are still talking about diamond wars, hunger and ethnic cleansing.

It is truly amazing there is such good cell coverage there. Maybe, the US companies could go over there and study their techniques. Thank you for spreading the good news! I never would have guessed Africa would be free of death, what with all the starvation. Or do you think all of those racial, hunger and AIDS foundations are fake, too?”

Wicked Evil Violence Monger

As you all know, it is my secret goal to convince all the M3 Readers to buy illegal handguns and commit acts of meaningless violence as a method of entertainment. Oh, you did not know that? All of the posts in Story Time, and most especially Secrets and Surprises, are really just a veiled attempt to further my evil agenda. Let me give you the newsflash hatemailed to me from Al in Saskatchewan.

Just what are you trying to do here? All the talk of suicide and violence. People like you should be prisoned. If it weren’t for guns there wouldn’t be any crime. I bet you own one of those assault rifles. Are you selling them?”

First of all, the only reference on all of M3 about suicide came from a hatemailer. Secondly, never have I considered being “prisoned”. Thirdly, I was unaware there were no thefts, illegal drug sales, batteries or white collar crimes in Canada. Before I contacted my travel agent for a real estate prospecting tour of my northern neighbor, I could not pass up the opportunity to give Al a jolt, so here is the response he got:

I try not to advertise my position on guns on the blog because the ATF in America is trolling the Internet looking for keywords which suggest illicit arms sales. I would hate for them to pull my guns license which allows me to sell assault rifles at gun shows. They are very popular with the deer hunting crowd, although I doubt the deer are so enthusiastic.

If you are interested in purchasing a gun, let me know. I happen to know someone in your area who sells them. Will you be needing clips to go with that?”

The Sixth Bullet

Revolver Shell

A gun enthusiast and NRA member from Minnesota hatemailed me about Russian Roulette: An Introduction. His chief complaint was I used the wrong photographs to illustrate my post. You see, as he (in)correctly points out, I was not using revolver ammunition.

After 300 (non-capitalized) words about bullets, he proceeded to prove the five people featured were wrong in their assumptions. At this juncture, I am unsure as to what his point in not making a comment on the post was.  James would then reveal the true point of his hatemail.

  • No one “could possible be that stupid about the interent“.
  • I am “wasting my time bloging when I [sic] should be doing interent classes”.
  • “if you was a real writter you would’nt be writting about stupid people.”

Since James comes to Friday Follies via an email link, I can only stick pins into the voodoo doll which wears the name tag “internet rubbernecker” and think evil thoughts about whomever emailed this person a link to M3. I penned the following response.

Dear James,

After more than two decades of writing for publications and the Internet, I refer you to the links below for headlines in newspapers and Yahoo! News which I have written. Perhaps, before viewing them you should take a few moments to peruse the various topics on M3 which have nothing to do with stupid people.

I think I shall take your suggestion of creating Internet classes to educate those who do not have the Web prowess I possess. Would you like to sign up for my first class? The subject: How to write an email using basic English grammar and spell check.

Sincerely,
Red.

PS You may want to avoid the M3 tag “Friday Follies”, as it will certainly cause you more angst.”

Here’s hoping he cannot resist seeing his name in lights!

I hope your week has been free of hatemail, nurdles, grammar mistakes and stupid email. Until next week’s Friday Follies from the stupidest inbox in the blogosphere, Happy Valentine’s Day!


© Red Dwyer 2012
Reblogging of this or any other post on The M3 Blog is expressly forbidden.
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31 Comments

  1. First, let me apologize for what I am about to say since I’m sure you don’t enjoy getting these emails.

    I sure do enjoy hearing about the emails you get and how you deal with them! The emails and the responses need to be collected in a book. They–the emailers—just need to get a life!

    Reply
    • LOL! No apology needed! After I stop shaking my head, or my brain stops hemorrhaging, I laugh myself silly while I write the replies. I may just put them in a book. That is a wonderful idea.

      Reply
  2. authormjlogan

     /  February 10, 2012

    Well at least they didn’t accuse you of running a porn site…

    Reply
  3. socialforummoderator@jackass.com did make one good point though – from news reports I read, an awful lot of the Arab Spring was co-ordinated and rallied using social media.
    As for the rest, yeah, you’re too patient. I doubt they have the intelligence to appreciate your replies.
    I love em though.

    Reply
    • I know, but her unintended use of hyperbole made me want to vomit. When I stop seeing red, I have to shake my head and laugh. My question remains: What keeps their skulls from caving in?

      Reply
  4. If there were no guns there would be no crime. Oh, that’s a rational position! Yikes.. I suppose talking about suicide makes people want to do it, as if they had never thought of it before. I

    Reply
    • You have nooooooooooo idea how many people believe that nonsense. I still do not understand where they associate anything here with suicide. I get at least one suicide email a week.

      Reply
  5. Hahahahahaha! Let ‘Emma have it Ann Marie!

    Reply
  6. I find your quick wit, and sarcastic comments to be simply hysterical! I laughed all throughout this blog entry! I was simply in awe as to how small minded these people are who take their time to spam your inbox with such stupidity. More power to you for taking the time to read, and reply to them! Thank you for sharing with us! This made my night!

    Oh, and I think I laughed the most at this: “if you was a real writter you would’nt be writting about stupid people.” Grammar skills like his are to be envied. haha

    Reply
    • LOL! Thank you, Becky. I have some I have to edit to get them as good as his! Truly a sad testament to the state of education. El Guapo is right, most of them completely miss the sarcasm…but it makes me feel better!

      Thanks for stopping by tonight!
      Red.

      Reply
  7. Oh well: What worries me is that they are free to breed… 🙂

    God Bless!

    Prenin.

    Reply
  8. And yet I am still waiting for my first hate mail! i am so jealous!

    Reply
  9. Red, just for the record, the bullet shown in the photo IS actually a typical bullet shape ie. a 9mm for an automatic pistol, not for a revolver. type handgun. The difference between the two is a flange of greater diameter that sticks OUT on revolver ammunition as opposed to the “grooved equal diameter” rim on the auto ammo which allows it to ‘stack ‘ evenly and feed smoothly in semi-auto or automatic weapons.
    I hope he at least pointed out the physical difference, most people are not aware of any difference.
    The rest of your funny emails seem to be written by total lunatics with uninformed axes to grind . The gentleman from Saskatchewan who insists there would not be any crime if there were no guns is either dreaming or out at Timmie’s eating donuts.
    Canada is NOW scrapping the Billion-dollar long-gun registry because not ONE criminal or murderous sot has registered his deer-hunting rifle. The latest shooting incident out west involved RCMP officers searching for a handgun. WE assume naturally that the criminal types involved had their weapons dutifully registered.
    Your email banana-types really do need a whack, and you seem to hand’em out beautifully!
    That must create immense satisfaction, having so much hilarious material to work with. “:))))

    Reply
    • You may be surprised what I know about ammunition. The bullets in the original piece were .357 rounds and were revolver rounds, unlike the 9mm round in the pic here.

      I am a packing Momma…with a sharpshooting medal. *grins*
      Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

      Reply
  10. ok what did I learn today? Plastic is a liquid so there is no way, it is available as packaging for water and soda. Having learned to check a safety, load and fire a gun makes me evil……..might as well go all the way and give in to get my permit to carry concealed..

    The people in your inbox give me a headache. I’m gonna go hope I have something to take for it.

    Reply

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