Everyone needs a hero, and I've found mine: The scam baiters, a cadre of funny reverse scam artists who intellectually flail the Nigerian 419 scam artists. This is a must read. Unfortunately, I don't know if you need a subscription. Generous excerpts:
Scam-baiters have set out to turn the tables on the scammers. The legions of scam-baiters seek to con the con artists, often with remarkable artistry of their own. They tease the scammers with promises of payments that don't arrive, with wired funds from banks that don't exist, with Western Union money transfers that go awry. They lead the scammers on wild-goose chases to pick up checks from couriers who don't materialize, insist the scammers perform ridiculous stunts, and ask them to pose with demeaning signs to prove their commitment to the transaction. Blinded by the same greed that blinds their marks, the scammers take the scam- baiters' bait and, often as not, end up as heads on the virtual wall in the scam-baiting Web sites' “trophy rooms.” . . .
“Safaris” are the trips scam-baiters lure scammers into making to remote banks to collect their advance fees, which, of course, don't exist. Insults, the bitter imprecations hurled at the scam-baiter once the scammer realizes he's been scammed, are prized as tokens of the baiter's success in “owning” the scammer–driving him around the bend and provoking him to the spluttering rage of capital-letter curses: “YOU ARE GOING STUPID, ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND? YOU FOOLISH WHITE MONKEY AND YELLOW PIG” was the response of one “barrister” when finally copping to his humiliation. But the most valuable “trophies” are photos of scammers holding ridiculously worded signs–such as King of Retards or I am a sheep shagger–whose significance they apparently don't recognize.
To be honest, as I scrolled through the trophy room, I started feeling a little bad for the duped scammers, but I came around quickly, remembering the many lives they've ruined and my inboxes they've filled with their junk. The author of the Atlantic Monthly piece said scam baiting might border on racism. He couldn't be more wrong. If it's a race thing, it's because the scammers are all from Nigeria, not because the scam baiters only want to deal with the Nigerians. If these scammers were flooding out of, say, Belgium, I have no doubt the scam baiters would love to have them holding up signs that say "Mi Eric Shun."
Granted, there is something sad about the Nigerians and an economic plight that prompts them to fall for such tricks, but, at least compared with other African nations, Nigeria is not a poor country (plenty of their citizens apparently have email). A disproportionate number of Nigerians, I'm told, spend all their time trying to cheat people instead of concentrating on developing wealth legitimately (Nigeria has a lot of natural resources). The reasons for this misplaced energy, I'm not qualified to speculate. But I do know this: cheating and stealing are violations of the fundamental moral law that is written on the heart of every human being. The Nigerian scam artists know better, they know it's wrong. It's even in violation of Nigerian law (section 419).
But they don't get punished. These scam baiters are doing basic justice. If a person thinks the scam baiters are improperly having fun with people that should be pitied not punished, that person is the real racist: he thinks black Nigerians can't rise to the most basic levels of decency.
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"Mom, I got an 'F' on my report card, and it ain't because I'm stupid (though that might be part of it)."
New Jersey's health department is escalating the battle against the bulge by starting an Office of Nutrition and Fitness to better coordinate programs aimed at preventing obesity. . . . Fred M. Jacobs, commissioner of the state Department of Health and Senior Services . . . is mulling the idea of having schools notify parents, via report cards, of children with weight problems.
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Great list: 100 Scariest Movie Scenes of All Time. The shower scene in Psycho is number one, the Carrie arm is two. Don't look at number six (yikes).
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WSJ reviews a Waugh's book about the House of Waugh. Pretty good stuff. Great paragraph:
The Australian émigré critic Clive James recently awarded Evelyn the accolade of "the supreme writer of English prose in the 20th century," a judgment Evelyn would have endorsed if it did not mean agreeing with a pleb from the colonies. But Evelyn was so much more than a stylist or someone who could make us laugh out loud. He was mocked for his brooding sense that the barbarians were not at the gate but inside the citadel, indulged by the apostles of moral equivalence in the name of a vapid tolerance. His foreboding has been all too cruelly vindicated.
