Since I have had an e-mail address I've had my share of hate mail. I don't know what it is about some people but no matter what you do, they're not happy. Now, I wouldn't mind if the mail had some form of constructive criticism, but most of this hate mail is just plain abusive -- and stupid.
A lot of players write and challenge my opinion. I enjoy having a logical and friendly argument, it's good for the brain. I have many ongoing e-mails with players who didn't agree with my stand point on a given subject. They voice their arguments, I pose counter arguments and we usually end up agreeing to disagree. You know, even I don't always agree with what I've written. You have to understand that the purpose of an editorial is to get you to think about that particular subject.
There are a lot of wingnuts out there who feel the internet empowers them. They can hide behind an internet pseudonym like PoserBoy500, wyldeweezil91, gEekOid8 or something equally creative, and say anything they want to despite the fact that it usually doesn't make sense.
I wonder if they think they're hurting my feelings? They aren't, because I don't have any feelings. They're certainly not being very clever. I often times wish they'd had an english teacher read it first, it would save me from correcting their spelling and grammar before returning it.
Yes, that's right. If you're going to act like an idiot, I'm going to treat you like one. I like to respond to those inane messages like "you suck", or "you're a pussy". My favourite ones are the messages that are in all UPPER CASE or lower case with no punctuation. Dazzle me with your brilliance, Einstein.
I really don't care if some people (with nothing better to do than harass other people) think my articles suck. The bottom line is that it doesn't matter, I've already been paid and their opinion of my dubious literary talents are redundant by that point.
While I usually enjoy CONSTRUCTIVE criticism, if the message personifies bad taste and immaturity I used to ignore it. What I usually do now is send them a cut and paste message which is called a "PFO Message" (which stands for Please (Youknowhat) Off -- it's a Canadian infantry term).
If they were half the man they THOUGHT they were, they would have found a more eloquent way of stating their opinion.
I fail to see the reasoning behind these types of messages. Other paintball writers also get this kind of mail, on occasion. I get more of it because of this editorial column. Some say I'm just asking for it, by putting my e-mail address on the article. To this I say that I get a lot more positive comments and logical arguments than I get flame-mail.
Someone once told me to post the e-mail on a newsgroup and let other players e-mail the moron and have at them. Although I would appreciate the sentiment I like to fight my own battles. Besides, what if no one jumped to my defence?
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