On the Dangers of the Internet

On my school listserve email distribution list for my program we get all sorts of messages. They're mostly about school events and goings-on, notices from our student government, and ocassionally they are personal messags trying to espouse a particular point of view (we got lots of them urging us to kick out our university president when he was found to be misusing school funds for personal events, such as a 13 course birthday dinner for his daughter, paid for by the school).

Last week, we got an impassioned letter telling us about a new "reality TV show" (somewhere in Europe, if I recall correctly) that was supposedly going to follow the training of suicide bombers, eventually culminating in their supposed death. Only what was really going to happen is that the TV show was going to convince them they were dead and in heaven, making a mockery of their "sacrifice".

Needless to say, my school is highly public service-oriented, and this student was wanting to orchestrate a boycott, get the show canceled, etc. And I don't disagree in principle -- this sounds like a disgusting TV show.

Keep in mind this email goes out to thousands of students and alumni.

So imagine my surprise when we get a follow-up email several hours later. Evidently, the sources were checked and the story originated from The Onion, the humor newspaper.

Oops!

Moral: Look before you leap, especially when it involves mass emails.