Furious About Forwards

Forwards — is there anything quite as unpleasant and manipulative as these unwanted narrow-minded messages of guilt?

Now don't get me wrong, I love email. I love writing it, sending it, and reading it. But what I could definitely get along without are forwards. You know the ones I mean, don't you? They take on many forms, such as the letters of love, the "true" miraculous stories, Christian messages, and the list goes on.

It's not that I'm a cold hearted person who doesn't enjoy a good warm fuzzy feeling. Why, that is one of the best kinds of feelings. But what really gets my knickers in a knot is how the typical forward is signed off. . .
—If you don't send this on you will never find your true love.
—If you don't send at least ten copies of this within the next half hour, you will get SARS.
—If you delete this, you suck!
—Send this to 30 people or you will fall in love with your brother.
—If you don't send this you are a horrible, unchristian, cute-animal-hating, uncompassionate sack of slime.

So what's my point? If these are messages intended to uplift, encourage, strengthen, and embolden the reader, then why do the final two sentences in almost every forward serve only to blame, shame or guilt a person into sending a sappy, crappy, or annoying message to every single solitary soul they have ever come into contact with? To what end? And what does this say about the sender? It says point blank: I am merely sending this to you because I'm a shallow, superstitious, easily manipulated person and I believe that you are a pea brain and have no sense of your own, thus I'm sending this cockamamie crap in your general direction!

As for me I will send a message when I want to, how I want to, and most importantly why I want to. I have my sense of values, I know where I stand with God, I love and am loved and I certainly won't be coerced by some silly/foolish missive to do something that is merely attempting to push my buttons.