You all know how much I HATE spam – especially on phones. This afternoon, I was forwarded another piece of crap (possibly by accident) that is a prime example of how stupid people are:

Keep an Eye on your license plate.
From a State Office:
Pass it on to those you know. Thanks

A woman said her son found his license plate missing so he called the police to file a report. They told him people were stealing the plates to get free gas. Given the rise in gas prices, people have taken to stealing license plates, putting them on their car, then getting gas and running. The gas station will have “your” license plate # and you could be in trouble for “pump and run.” Check your car periodically to be sure you still have a plate. If you should find it missing, file a report immediately!!! Keep an eye on your license plate! Make sure you always know it’s there! When the license plate is reported as the “drive off vehicle”, it’s YOU they contact! Be aware!!!! Be aware of your license plates, most of us never look to see if the plates are there or not.

Sounds almost reasonable, does it not? Guess what? It’s NOT true. I understand that people are stupid and love to be “in the know” about every little conspiracy, but this is not one.

However, while gas theft is on the rise and there have been instances of pump and runs by vehicles bearing stolen plates, the situation warned against in the e-mail is not epidemic. There has not been a sudden sharp upswing in the number of gasoline drive-offs where stolen tags were involved, and even among reported pump-and-run cases, thefts facilitated by stolen plates are still fairly few and far between.

Now, know that I say people are stupid, not a person. Generally speaking most of us are intelligent. Especially in a one on one setting. It’s when we’re together as a group or sending out these mass emails that we get dumb and believe stupidity.

For those of you who are not aware, there is a site that specializes in tracking these junk emails and proving them true/false/possible. They also take care of a great many ‘urban legends’ and such as well. The next time you get some of this garbage, please go to Snopes.com and see if you can find something about the subject. Normally they have at least one entry, and sometimes several that are in relation to whatever crap happens to be in your subject line.

Yes, I was ranting a little. Please show your intelligence and spread the word about this kind of garbage. Also, for the love of God, don’t forward it to anyone.