CBCF Christians Breaking Chain Forwards

Christians who break all chain letters - yes, we really do exist.

CBCF: A place to smash chain letters without the Christophobia so commonly expressed by internet chain-breakers elsewhere.

Latest Activity

Capri added 7 discussions
44 minutes ago
Capri added 2 discussions
yesterday
Megan FitzGeraald added a blog post
I recently received a copy of the Jones letter and had the reaction I always have when reading material that expresses the views of the far Right: Where has the Christian spirit gone? What happened to the tenet that we are our brothers' keeper? How…
on Sunday
Megan FitzGeraald is now a member of CBCF Christians Breaking Chain Forwards
on Sunday

Guidelines

Smash chain letters, don't bash God. Fault the forwards, not the faith.

Vexed with virals?Are friends, acquaintances and strangers getting you down because of their forwarding/recruiting/retweeting the same stuff as everybody else? Do you feel they have cut the genuine communication line in favor of these virals?

This could be the place for you. Come in here and have a smashing good time debunking/ranting about chain letters, chit-chatting about anything else within reason, turning the tables on the hoaxters, vexation into laughter, and hopefully making new friends along the way.!<

Christian Chain Breakers call to action:

They just keep coming, however nicely we try to discourage their spread. Virals AKA chain letters.

Let's stop suffering in silence and obligatory niceness. That doesn't mean we should be vulgar and trollish. It means taking a stand against viral manipulation. Let's do our part to cut through the bull and take the power away from the hoaxters.

It's time to start turning the tide, breaking chain letters, and doing our best to quash that negative stereotype which says religious people are always the ones who forward chain letters and debunking is always done by the non-religious or especially non-Christians. As this article on hoax-identification and forwarding says, don't be a link in the chain, be a shepherd, not a sheep.

If you happen to see a smash of a forward you remember sending in the past, please don't take it the wrong way, we're not bashing you, and you're not the only one who fell for some chain letter. When I was new to the net, I got taken in by the Neiman Marcus cookie recipe chain because I thought it was a first-hand account from a cousin's friend!

DUH!

But how else will you learn but by experience and observation, and from sites like this one?

I've learned my lesson and now thoroughly smash any chain letters I may have started out as a starry-eyed newbie over. It's good to laugh and learn from one's mistakes too.

You are more than welcome to join this network! You may reply to, follow, and create discussions on the forums, which are always getting new activity, create blogs and groups, and much more.

God bless.

Further reading, hoax-busting, chain-breaking resources: Hoax Slayer and Hoax-slayer Social About Urban legends Truth Or Fiction Break The Chain Snopes Chain letters and why they should never be forwarded. fw Fw Fw Hoax Tell-tale Signs Of A Hoax what makes hoaxes seem believable. Toxic Excuses The High Cost Of Hoaxes Combination Hoaxes
Hoax Encyclopedia
Chain Of Fools is absolutely spot on in describing the mindset of a chain-originating hoaxter, and how she manages to manipulate the masses into relinquishing their own will to her control.Chain emails, STOP them!

They Are Scams!

MLMs, Magical Thinking, and Parasites Phishing Scams (These are the emails that tell you your account on some site is compromised and claim you have to correct the problem by clicking a link in the email and submiting sensitive info, such as your login and password. These emails and phony sites look like the real deal, but they are not, and clicking their links and submitting your info will certainly compromise your account on whatever service the Phishing scammer is targeting. Fraud/Scam Awareness, What To Watch Out For Exposing Junk Science

Other networks: Oh Shut Up! You've probably said or thought it at some time in your life. Animal Ownership If you own or would like to own certain animals and it should be your right to do so.

Bible Gateway Bible Gateway Passage Lookup

Groups

 

Solona is dedicated to helping you when visual captchas shut you out of web sites.

Talking Communities Free Public Voice Chat Rooms Sky FM Playlist.com

Photos

Events

Notes

Note

We do not endorse all those annoying sponsored diet etc. ads that appear on the network.

Created by Capri Oct 27, 2009 at 2:38pm. Last updated by Capri Oct. 30, 2009.

Forum

Capri

A Soldier Died Today - a Poem

It is one of those poems about honoring fallen soldiers that goes around in forwards, often with no attribution and sometimes with modifications from the original. The poem was written by A. Lawrence…

Started by Capri in Who Really Said or Wrote That? 44 minutes ago.

Capri

Addaneye Aiekin Adolfo Whatever!

Who do these spambots think they're kidding? They joined two of my networks, using the same name for two different email addresses, and the same email address for two different names, and they joined…

Started by Capri in Hall of Suspended Idiots 14 hours ago.

Capri

Kids On What Love Means

Gosh, looking back at my "FunChat" group, which has long since been deleted because of all the chain letters, once I woke up to the realization that's what they all were, and to think I helped perpet…

Started by Capri in Confessions 16 hours ago.

Capri

Becky And Ralph Wolf Story Chain

Date: Tue, 2 May 2000 12:33:54 -0700 Newb Me: Wow, this one is touching. It brought tears to my eyes and that's not easy to do. Present-time me: *Gah, seriously? Was I REALLY this soft? That viral…

Started by Capri in Confessions 16 hours ago.

Capri

I Was Guilty Of Forwarding the Email Commandments Chain

Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 18:40:45 -0600 (MDT) Newb Me: Lol This is cute. present-time me: This is STALE! Chain: > > E-MAIL COMMANDMENTS Me: *Rolling eyes* Chain: > > Thou shalt inclu…

Started by Capri in Confessions 19 hours ago.

Capri

Baby Steps Out Of The Fwd Haze

Date: Sat, 8 Apr 2000 00:06:57 -0600 (MDT) Chain: If you aren't ashamed to do this, please follow the directions. Jesus = >> said, " if you are ashamed of me," I will be ashamed of you before…

Started by Capri in Confessions 19 hours ago.

Capri

Oyoyoyoyoy! I Got Taken In By The "Funny How" Religious Whining Chain!

Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 21:40:30 -0700 (MST) Newb Me: The moderator of a way cool primate list sent this and I thought it was really good. :) Present-time me: *CRINGE!* First off, I ended up leaving…

Started by Capri in Confessions 20 hours ago.

Capri

Valeria Bella

Valeria Bella valeriaw1261@gmail.com Suspended because of questionable history on other Ning networks. She posted a couple of blog entries about entertainment news but really who's interested in that…

Started by Capri in Hall of Suspended Idiots Feb 7.

Capri

Postcard From Hallmark Virus Warning Hoax Causing Problems Again - This Time With False-attribution

It's that stupid old "Postcard From Hallmark" virus warning hoax again. This article is poorly titled Constable causes chain mail hell for colleagues. The story does not say This police woman started…

Started by Capri in What's Up? Feb 6.

Blog Posts

Megan FitzGeraald

Roger Starner Jones letter

I recently received a copy of the Jones letter and had the reaction I always have when reading material that expresses the views of the far Right: Where has the Christian spirit gone? What happened to the tenet that we are our brothers' keeper? How does the far Right reconcile its so-called Christian positions with this kind of thinking? I was raised a Catholic and everything I ever heard in church stressed the importance of taking care of those less fortunate than ourselves. Yet when our presid… Continue

Posted by Megan FitzGeraald on February 7, 2010 at 7:04am — 2 Comments

Capri

D-Day For Facebook App Developers! YES - About Time!

Woot woot woot Yes Yes Yes YES YESSSSS!!! Great news if it turns out to be what I'm hoping for - no more pesky stupid viral app notifications for me on Facebook!
D-Day For Facebook App Developers!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/28/AR2009102803243.html

*Happy dance happy dance happy dance!* Good riddance stupid Zynga viral "social games" like "Farmville" "Mafia Wars" e… Continue

Posted by Capri on October 29, 2009 at 11:00am — 1 Comment

Capri

Open Letter To All Out There - Stop Abandoning Me For Chain Letters!

Chain letter forwards - don't just stop sending them to "me," please please stop sending them to anyone, period! They're mostly bogus and unoriginal, and just keep going and going around and around, and they're lazy.

A lot of them are plain evil, the sick kid hoaxes and slander pieces about famous people.

others are just annoying and a lot of them you have to wonder "How the heck did my friend fall for this!?" Example: Send this on to 1 friend and your crush will call you, send it to 25 people… Continue

Posted by Capri on October 28, 2009 at 3:30pm

Music

Loading…
 
 

Badge

Loading…

More about chain letters:

Sometimes chain letters will appear to have a link to a hoax-busting site included in them - especially a Snopes link. This is a trick to make the chain letter appear valid so the reader will just forward without question, because after all, if the forward has a Snopes link, then it must absolutely be true! Right?

WRONG!

The link the chain contains could turn out to be a debunk of the very forward that included it, or worse, it could be a masked link that looks like Snopes but if you click on it, it could turn out to be a malware/Phishing site.

Don't forward the chain. Don't click on the link within this type of chain. Instead, open a browser and go to Snopes or other hoax-debunking site manually or via your "favorites" or "Bookmarks" and type in some search terms that were found in the chain letter. For example, if you get a virus warning that tells you not to open emails with the subject "Olympics" or "Merry Christmas" and that fwd claims Snopes says it's true, and gives a link to what appears to be Snopes, close the email, go to Snopes and type in the search box "Merry Christmas" or "Olympics" or even the word "virus" which should bring up articles dealing with all virus warning forwards. Then, open your email program and do a reply-all with the information that debunks the chain letter to help stem the spread. With any luck, maybe your friend and others on their recipiant list will get a little wiser. Maybe. At least you will have done your part by breaking the chain and trying to help others to as well.

"But it's real, I checked." "It isn't animation or photoshop." "It's a real person in that video."

That doesn't matter. It's still a chain letter because it's viral and it's circulating like wild fire. If you got it once, you'll probably get it again from someone else.

"But I don't really believe all the chain curse stuff, I just liked the joke/poem/sayings etc."

That is what's called the 'hook' and it is the big manipulation. Give you a tasty carrot so you'll pass it along with the stick as well. It's still a chain letter, it's still viral, and you won't be the first or last person who was impressed enough by the joke or poem or whatever to pass it along, with the curse crap still attached. Whether you believe the curse stuff or not, passing it along, posting it without thoroughly trashing it makes you appear to believe it, and you don't want to look like a gullible schmuck, so just don't promote/spread it anywhere.

"But I cut out all the chain letter crap and then make sure only to send the joke/poem/etc. to certain people."

That doesn't matter. If you got it from a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend etc. It's still a viral forward AKA chain letter. There's no way to make it a non-chain letter again once it has become one. The only thing to do then is to break it by not passing it on to anyone, no matter what the content or how much it moved you. There are plenty of other resources to look to for inspiration, humor etc. that are not viral net-cloggers trying to get mass-produced.

But I always put a personal note at the top so they know I'm talking to them.

That doesn't matter. You still forwarded a viral which is a chain letter. Adding a personal note - doesn't make it any less of a viral. Here's a suggestion, email a personal note without sending the forward, you don't need a chain letter to help you write your friends personally and stay in touch.

 

© 2010   Created by Capri on Ning.   Create a Ning Network!

Badges  |  Report an Issue  |  Privacy  |  Terms of Service

Sign in to chat!