I just had an intriguing experience upon opening my email box.  I had 75 emails within, 70 of which were from one source.  I have been looking into some more edumacation and one institution added me to a list-serv.

Upon getting this initial email I wasn’t too shocked – I just deleted it and moved on.  But then I got a second – from a person saying they didn’t want the information and that they should be deleted from the list.

Well, clearly, writing back to a mass email from a list-serv does nothing but send it to everyone else.  Several people followed the lead of the first though, and soon I had several “Please take me off the list, thanks” emails.

That was the first wave, the group I will call the “polite but dim-witted” crew.  They should notice when they get emails sent back that this process doesn’t work.  Or perhaps they could just read the end of the email where it tells them how to get off the list.

But no – now we get the second wave.  This was the crew of people known as “trying to help but just making it worse.”  They sent a few emails explaining how to fix the problem; unfortunately (if necessarily), they sent the emails to everyone.  Problem exacerbated.

Now came wave 3 – the assholes.  This round of emails, which was quite large and interspersed with late-coming wave 1 types, consisted of verbal assaults, mocking statements, and general nastiness.  Of course, the ironic part is that these emails WERE ALSO SENT TO EVERYONE.  So we all got to see how pissed these people were at getting more emails from strangers – by getting more emails from strangers.

So this was inevitably followed by the fourth wave – the “jaded observers.”  This crew poked fun at the process, by sending around recipes and tips for grooming pets in a synical and sardonic attempt to satirize the whole situation.  And yet, I still have to go through their email.

Finally we hit wave 5 – the “desperate.”  There were impassioned pleas to “stop the madness” or cries of “I can only hold 15 emails in my inbox and this is filling it all up.”  I’m sure the people who now only had 14 spots left thanks to that email were excited.

I haven’t deleted them all yet – I might have to collect and print them so that psychologists and sociologists everywhere can study the horrors and humor of a bunch of overachievers whose balance has been upset by a some computer-illiterate undergrad.

(On a side note, the auto-signatures of some of these people were hilarious – long lists of the activities they sponsor followed with a supposed-to-be humorous “Stress Case!!!!!!” closing.  I was amused.)