How do I ask co-workers to stop emailing me religious junk mail?

March 2, 2005 10:44 AM

How do I ask co-workers to stop emailing me religious junk mail?

I've accepted most annoying forwarded junk emails as a fact of online life, and I'm able to ignore the religious ones from acquainatances. But I'm quite bothered by the religious chain letters that some co-workers send to me daily. Any forwarded junk is a waste of my time and company resources, but I find the religious stuff highly inappropriate at work.

posted by raedyn to work & money (28 comments total)

So why don't you just ask them to stop sending the e-mails, saying that you have a lot of email traffic to deal with? You don't need to explicitly mention that its the religious content that annoys you.

Although it's really fun to make fun of religious people as well.
posted by xmutex at 10:47 AM on March 2, 2005

Reply with "please don't send me e-mails of a religious nature." If you're uncomfortable with stating the real reason reply with "please don't send me chain letters." If they insist on continuing in either case, take it up with your HR department (assuming these aren't coming from someone in HR).
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 10:48 AM on March 2, 2005

Does your employer have an acceptable use policy for the corporate network? If so, I would expect it to cover such mailings. Don't threaten them or anything, just let them know that your company considers such use improper.
posted by tommasz at 10:50 AM on March 2, 2005

I've had 100% effectiveness in just plain asking. Some I've asked to not send me any junk/chain email. One friend I've asked to only send me email at my home address. In general, people seem to be receptive/respectful.

On preview, before taking it up with HR, I'd talk to the offender in-person.
posted by ObscureReferenceMan at 10:52 AM on March 2, 2005

On preview, before taking it up with HR, I'd talk to the offender in-person.

Yeah, I should have put face-to-face in there before going to HR.

( BTW, ORM I really like that your nick is itself an obscure reference.)
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 10:58 AM on March 2, 2005

I've had 0% effectiveness in just asking, eventually I resorted to a procmail filter that keyed on a bunch of phrases. Depending on where you are getting HR involved may be a joke. Where I am HR is one of the offenders :P
posted by substrate at 11:00 AM on March 2, 2005

Yeah, I guess you could set up a filter that automatically routed all email containing the word "jesus" or whatever to the junk folder. Of course, then you'd risk losing important emails from jesus in accounting.
posted by BigPicnic at 11:08 AM on March 2, 2005

I have a friend who used to be pain-in-the-arse forwarder of jokes and assorted trivia. I, of course, had to deal with hundreds of messages in a day.

One day, I got pissed off at having to download all the junk (some of them were big files - cartoons and the like). So I wrote her a mail saying, "Hi [friend]. It's nice of you to send those jokes, but I have too much mail to deal with already. Could you please take me off your CC list from next time?"

That did it.

(If you want to be evil, find out something your co-worker doesn't like and send him that. Maybe he'll get the message.)
posted by madman at 11:30 AM on March 2, 2005

"I try to keep my personal and work life separate could you please not send any non-work related email to this address? I'm already pretty busy. Thanks."

If they follow up with "Well what's your home email then?" you can either explain your preferences, or just drop the ball. I also find religious chain mail obnoxious [and have some family members who persist in this] but I've found that keeping the "OMFG it is so not cool of you to send that to me!!" tone out of my email voice is part of actually getting the emails to stop coming. Something about your resistance makes them think you need those emails more.
posted by jessamyn at 11:33 AM on March 2, 2005

Send all messages with fw in the subject line to /dev/null.
posted by adampsyche at 11:56 AM on March 2, 2005

I had that same problem and because I am a Federal employee I was able to site a specific policy so I hit reply to all and said remove me from this type of email because it is a violation of etc. etc.
Needless to say I was considered a bitch by some but I didn't care and I stopped receiving them.
posted by govtdrone at 12:24 PM on March 2, 2005

these are all great ideas, now I wish I could get family to stop forwarding the stuff. ugh.
posted by whatnot at 12:34 PM on March 2, 2005

The world is full of people who'd steal your wallet as soon as they'd look at you, no real need to make a point of shutting up someone who wants to save your soul. Just filter into junk mail, and avoid the confrontation.

Anyway, charitability aside, this could well be the discretion which is the better part of valor -- the kind of workplace where religious emails are regularly sent around sounds like the kind of workplace where making a point of being the office free thinker might not be career enhancing.

You might also count your blessings (secularly, of course). If you were living in the rural South, your neighbors might well walk right up to your door on Sunday morning to ask you to church -- and not theoretically either, but proposing why don't you just run to your bedroom, put on suit, and hop on in the mini-van.
posted by MattD at 12:44 PM on March 2, 2005

Spammers do use these long-forwarded chains of emails for address harvesting. Maybe you could frame your request with an eye to that (but don't let them find out about bcc!)
posted by sonofsamiam at 1:28 PM on March 2, 2005

The world is full of people who'd steal your wallet as soon as they'd look at you, no real need to make a point of shutting up someone who wants to save your soul. Just filter into junk mail, and avoid the confrontation.

The thing is, I don't try and convince you that your entire belief system is lame and wrong. Why is it ok for Christians to do it?

It's not work appropriate, unless maybe you work in a church, and even then I'd avoid it.
posted by bshort at 2:10 PM on March 2, 2005

MattD - what stikes me as weird is that this is a municipal government office in Canada. This sort of thing is explicitly forbidden. Most of my co-workers are very professional but it's a big workplace, so there's always one or two who feel obligated. I suppose they think they're doing me a favour.
posted by raedyn at 2:27 PM on March 2, 2005

no real need to make a point of shutting up someone who wants to save your soul.

I never understand why religious people of any sort make this point. "Intrusion and forceful, unwanted persuasion is bad normally--but if they have good intentions, i.e., saving your doomed soul, it's ok."

That's selfish and illogical.

I would suggest the same as everyone else. Next time you see them in person, maybe cusually mention it to them--an e-mail back might be a little too direct, whereas a passing thing in conversation might blow over easier. Who knows, though. If it gets severe, like other people have said, confront them or contact an administrator (although a hiugher up should be the LAST resort--i think everyone knows what it feels like to have hell rain down upon you for something that could have been fixed relatively easily).
posted by Lockeownzj00 at 2:37 PM on March 2, 2005

If you were living in the rural South, your neighbors might well walk right up to your door on Sunday morning to ask you to church -- and not theoretically either, but proposing why don't you just run to your bedroom, put on suit, and hop on in the mini-van.


Holy crap! Now I know why folks down there all have guns.
posted by electro at 3:50 PM on March 2, 2005

Every single time I've asked someone to stop sending me something they thought was a "good thing" to send me, I've had a bad experience.

I think lying and saying that you're not getting the message and there must be some sort of problem or filter knocking out the messages may cause them to give up...?

(A while ago I accepted that lying was a necessary part of getting on with some people at work. I don't like it, but used carefully and as little as possible, it can be highly effective.)

Oh, and MattD; There's nothing wrong with my soul and that's not just because it doesn't exist.
posted by krisjohn at 4:20 PM on March 2, 2005

Oh, and MattD; There's nothing wrong with my soul and that's not just because it doesn't exist.

word! took the words outta my mouth.

let's not get into the south again, there was a big rift a little while back. let's just say there is a resemblance of a 'bible belt' somewhere in the US.
posted by Lockeownzj00 at 4:41 PM on March 2, 2005

Ask them nicely but firmly to stop sending you "unprofessional" emails. Then, if they don't comply, take it to HR.

On the other hand, if you're feeling passive-aggressive, just sign up for all of those free iPod offers using their email address, post using it to usenet groups, use it to sign up for porn site emails, etc. Then, a month or so later, mention in an offhand manner how spammers often use chain emails fill up their spam lists. By that point, they'll probably have had enough of a spam spike that they'll take your words to heart. Not recommended if you do have worries about your immortal soul, but eminently satisfying otherwise. I would, of course, never do something like this myself.
posted by boaz at 5:07 PM on March 2, 2005

The key factor here is not that it's religious it's that they're wasting company resources, including your time, on behalf of a personal agenda. If they were forwarding the latest urban legends, their personal manifesto, or photos of the grandkids it would also be inappopropriate to litter the whole office's inboxes with that stuff. There should be a corporate systems use policy you can simply point to, without needing to invoke religious objections ('cuz that could make the truly evangelical even more determined to save your soul from eternal damnation).

If they don't respect a polite request to get off the list, a supervisor or HR really should become involved. Aside from preventing abuse of company resources, they have a vested interest in preventing religious harassment in the workplace. [PDF]

If all else fails and there's any commercial content to the chain letters, you could check whether you've got a spamming claim against the idiots. Mass mail, no proactive opt-in, no way to opt-out...
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 6:45 PM on March 2, 2005

This might be getting a little away from the point of this thread, but I'm kinda interested in what sorts of emails are getting sent around; are they mostly proselytizing, are they directed at uh "unsaved" and are there generally people in certain denominations that engage in this kinda stuff?
posted by stratastar at 8:07 PM on March 2, 2005

When I have the problem of junk forwards of any kind from people I'm not friends with yet don't want to alienate by just saying "cut it out," I do as jessamyn suggests and ask that it be sent to personal e-mail. I usually write something like "I tend to be so busy at work that I rarely read personal e-mail, so if you direct it here, I can read it when I have more time." Of course, I fail to mention that the address I then provide is my spam account, which I only check whenever I want to see how the latest penis enlargement technology is progressing.

It's passive and a bit cowardly, but hey, that's what little social white lies are all about.
posted by melissa may at 9:43 PM on March 2, 2005

Just give them [e-mail] as your personal email address. Visit the site to find out why. :)
posted by madman at 12:10 AM on March 3, 2005

I'm kinda interested in what sorts of emails are getting sent around

stratastar - Well hey, I think I found my solution. I will just auto-forward them all to you! (j/k).
posted by raedyn at 7:46 AM on March 3, 2005

"Hello. Wanted to let you know that I prefer not to receive religious e-mail. Thanks for respecting my wishes."
posted by ikkyu2 at 8:10 AM on March 3, 2005

I had this problem with both of my mother-in-laws (don't ask) and what I ended up doing was creating a template that stated something to the effect "Your email had been rejected as potential spam. For future reference, this email seems to meet one of the following criterea:
1) Contains multiple header information from unrecognized email accounts.
2) Contains one of a common set of phrases that are recognized as spam.
3) Contains multiple attachements of embedded images.
If your email has been rejected in error please notify us and attach your rejected email in a zip file.

Please help us to eliminate spam - by some accounts 80% of all email traffic is spam. "

I think that there was more to it but you get the gist. It took about a week of replying to all of their emails with that as my message text before they called my wife asking what was going on. She told them I installed a new spam filter and that they should stop trying to send us crap (but said nicely). Since then I have gotten nothing.
Granted, that only works on people who are not tech savvy.
posted by GrumpyMonkey at 11:48 AM on March 3, 2005