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Christine
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| Posted: July 24 2006 at 3:11pm | IP Logged
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When you send an e-mail to a friend, do you expect it to stay between you and that person (unless otherwise stated)?
Recently, I sent an e-mail to someone and was shocked when she forwarded it to everyone in our homeschool group. It was a positive e-mail, but I did not expect it to be shared and had I known it would be shared I would not have sent it. Are my expectations wrong? I am hesitant to e-mail her because I don't know what she will forward to others. I would appreciate any insight.
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Christine
Mommy to 4 girls, 5 boys, & 2 in God's care
Memories of a Catholic Wife and Mother
Pretty Lilla Rose
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mumofsix
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| Posted: July 24 2006 at 3:27pm | IP Logged
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Christine, strictly speaking, your friend should not have forwarded your email, sent privately to her by you, to third parties without your consent. I would consider that tactless and discourteous.
However, the reality is that this is very, very common. Something about the ease of pressing that button, maybe? My husband, who has been using email since it first existed (the internet was invented at the international laboratory he works at) always says that you should, realistically, regard any email as potentially public property, and never commit anything to email you would not want others to read. Even if your recipient is totally trustworthy and would never betray your confidence, it is so easy to misdirect an email accidentally. Most of us have done this at least once: I know I have.
Really private communication should be reserved for snail mail, telephone or best of all face to face.
Jane.
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Bookswithtea
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I think it happens all the time. Likewise, posts on public forums can easily be copied and sent privately. If you mention geography in your email or post, it can be way too easy for your home location to end up public, too.
When I was on the SL Cath. moderating team, one of the comoderators was trying to stress to the other moms on our loop the necessity of maintaining your privacy on boards/yahoo groups. She took one post and an email address (which she rightly assumed included a last name) and within about 2 minutes had the full name, address, and phone number of this mom, and from the email she had all her children's names, too.  If a hs mom can do it, so can predators. 
If it were me, I think I'd say something to the mom who forwarded the info. to the group...maybe in the future she could ask first??? But as far as email/posts go, its best to assume that its more public than you think it is.
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Blessings,
~Books
mothering ds'93 dd'97 dd'99 dd'02 ds'05 ds'07 and  due 9/10
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KellyJ
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| Posted: July 24 2006 at 7:40pm | IP Logged
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I have a friend who seems to do this to everyone in our homeschool circle. I've asked her to not send along my emails through the loop (without permission obviously). I don't think she realized that others might not want their emails freely sent along OR that many of those emails are irrelevant to those to whom she has forwarded them.
KellyJ
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Christine
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| Posted: July 25 2006 at 7:16am | IP Logged
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Thank you for the advice. I appreciate it.
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Christine
Mommy to 4 girls, 5 boys, & 2 in God's care
Memories of a Catholic Wife and Mother
Pretty Lilla Rose
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momwats8
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I would most certainly say something. Just kindly tell her that you meant that to be between her and yourself or else you would have sent it along to the whole group from the start. Then ask her if she could please refrain from forwarding any other e-mails without asking you first. Another way is that some of my firends use is to include a little side note at the beginning or end of the e-mail that tells them to please not reply all or forward the e-mail but to keep this private.
In Christ - Mary
Wife to Mike and Mom to Austin, Mikey, R.J., Ben, Kolbe, Nate, Christian and Maggie
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mary
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| Posted: July 25 2006 at 12:21pm | IP Logged
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I would not have expected email to be shared without the person asking. however, i am grateful to my mother for teaching me that one should never write something that you wouldn't want published in the town paper. 
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JennGM
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| Posted: July 25 2006 at 2:27pm | IP Logged
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momwats8 wrote:
| I would most certainly say something. Just kindly tell her that you meant that to be between her and yourself or else you would have sent it along to the whole group from the start. Then ask her if she could please refrain from forwarding any other e-mails without asking you first. Another way is that some of my firends use is to include a little side note at the beginning or end of the e-mail that tells them to please not reply all or forward the e-mail but to keep this private. |
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Mary has a great point. You could put that note at the bottom of your emails, or perhaps gently prod this person when she send YOU an email, ask permission to quote or forward her email to someone.
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Jennifer G. Miller
Wife to  & ds1  '03 & ds2  '07
Family in Feast and Feria
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4Real Forums : Tea and Conversation
Topic: E-mail Privacy
