10 Things You Should Never Write an Email About

As an avid e-mail, Facebook and computer guru, do I have a story to tell! Well maybe I shouldn’t tell it since my subject is what not to write in an e-mail. Coming up with 10 things may be more difficult than not telling personal stories of people who failed to check their anger before writing an email to “get them straightened out!”

I hate “FWD” e-mail. I really do, and when my inbox is filled with 30 new messages, I could get excited that I am about to receive a note from someone who cares, except it is ¾’s forwarded messages from an unknown source. That said…
E-mail has taken priority over a hand/written, computer generated form of correspondence. It is inevitable that the person reading an e-mail will read it in a tone different than how it was written. Proper wording of an e-mail can make or break a friendship. Unlike face to face meetings, or even phone calls, the person reading your e-mail does not have the benefit of hearing the tone of voice your message brings.
E-mails should never be used to criticize another. Families have been shredded because of e-mails that were meant to mend, but only further broke apart the relationship.
Never, but never reply in anger to an e-mail. Some e-mails were never meant to be answered.
Unless you intend to reply to everyone on the “to, or cc or bcc” list, hitting the “reply to al”l is not the best thing to do.
Then again, should you forward something to someone else, please do everyone the courtesy of removing all the addresses that came with the e-mail you are forwarding. Computer hackers know how to gain access to the addresses to send spam e-mails.
Regardless of your message, it is considered screaming if you use ALL CAPS to write your e-mail. Some of your recipients may not be aware of this, but you should be acquainted with your address book enough to know who would take offence to an ALL CAPS message.
Re-read your e-mail before sending it. Be sure to “check spelling” before clicking the send button.
Often sending attachments carries a virus (if indeed your computer has one) to the recipient. If you do not have virus protection, it is better not to send attachments. I have friends who refuse under any circumstances to open an attachment to an e-mail. They have that right.
I confess, during the much heated election a few years ago, I made the mistake of forwarding a political statement that mean much truth to me, to everyone in my e-mail list. Knowing there were a few on the other side of the issues from myself, I thought “So? They need to see this!” so I click send and off it went. Out of all the 100+ people in my address book, only one responded. And respond she did. She tore me apart, chewed me up and spit me out, over how wrong I was about her candidate for president. I then send another e-mail trying to apologize for sending anything that would offend her. She was closed minded and after a second attempt to explain there are two sides to everything, I gave up and never pursued the subject again. Therefore now there is a broken relationship today because I didn’t think twice.

I hope this helps. We should know the people in our address list well enough to never send anything offensive. Then there are some we don’t need on our list anyway.