Spam invades our email inboxes every day. If we’re lucky, our antivirus programs deflect the most egregious. After that, how do we decide whether to click or move on?
One answer: We can arm ourselves with a knowledge of grammar. It appears that spam artists generally didn’t excel in their English classes.
Scrolling recently through my spam-studded personal inbox, I can immediately skim off the worst offenders. They are spamming me in French. Seven years ago, I rented a car in Paris; I have since been bombarded with spam in the language of love. Grammatical or not, au revoir.
After the non-English spam is obliterated, I scan for the nonsensical. These messages tend to begin awkwardly. “Hello, my Dear fellow of an American,” one offers with a “Kindly” heart. I’m not surprised to discover that this spammer needs my help retrieving money from an overseas “Banque Acount.” Delete, my Kindly fellow.
Nonsensical scammers eliminated, we move to the third level of spam hell, where English-speaking cyber-goons steal your best friend’s email address, craft a subject line that catches your click – and then lock you in their clutches until you surrender some Bitcoin.
To foil these folks, study these Big Five grammar challenges (with examples of their correct usage):
• Your vs. you’re. You’re most likely to thwart a spammer if your grammar is impeccable.
• It’s vs. its. If an email reveals that it’s written without a knowledge of it’s vs. its, delete it or send it back to its sender for verification.
• Too vs. to. If you don’t know the difference between these two, it’s not too late.
• Commas. If there’s no comma after the introductory phrase in a sentence, mark the email as spam or send it back to the sender for review.
• Affect vs. effect. Scammers may affect our lives by attacking our inboxes, but if we stay vigilant – and grammar-aware – the nefarious efforts will have little effect.
Neil Chethik, aka the Grammar Gourmet, is executive director of the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning (www.carnegiecenterlex.org) and author of “FatherLoss” and “VoiceMale.” The Carnegie Center offers writing classes and seminars for businesses and individuals. Contact Chethik at neil@carnegiecenterlex.org or
859-254-4175.