Should you correct email sender on factual errors?

When, if ever, should you correct someone who spreads factually incorrect information to you and others on email?

Last month, The Right Thing marked its 25th anniversary of running as a column. A reader we’re calling Harris has been reading and responding to the column for more than a decade, after first discovering it when it ran in a North Carolina newspaper. Harris is an attentive reader, offering both praise and correctives when they are called for.

A few weeks ago, Harris wrote to tell me about an email-only connection he had developed with a man in his area several years ago based on their “common political outlook and interest in the news.” The man regularly forwards a lot of political cartoons and commentary to Harris.

But recently, after Harris started fact-checking some of the man’s missives, Harris found some claims in the emails to be false.

“I politely asked him not to send things to me that he hasn’t verified,” wrote Harris.

Late last month, Harris and several others on an email chain received a video from the man with a video with the sarcastic comments “Thank you, Democrats” and “Sad but true” preceding the video link.

“Regrettably, I found multiple sources that said the video wasn’t true,” wrote Harris. “Normally, I would have just ignored it, but then I received a 'reply-all' email from one of the other recipients saying, 'well, damn this is scary as hell.'”

Harris finds it unfortunate that the man shows the email addresses of all the recipients, none of whom Harris knows.

Harris asks if he should email the responder to “ease her pain,” email all the recipients and the man to set the record straight, email only the man to suggest he send a correction, or just mind his own business.

“I’m inclined towards the latter,” wrote Harris, in part because after he learned the man’s wife had died recently, he had called him for the first time to offer his condolences and suggest they might meet for lunch “when he gets his life back in order.”

“I believe in ‘truth, justice, and the American way,’” wrote Harris, “but it gets complicated when feelings are involved.”

While Harris is showing grace by not wanting to criticize the man for spreading an error-filled email, that alone should not be enough to stop him from emailing him to let him know the facts in his recent email were wrong.

Harris had already asked the man not to share un-fact-checked forwards with him. And while the man was grieving, that grief did not stop him from sending the email. If Harris believes it’s important to let him know the facts in the email were wrong, the right thing is to email him to let him know.

Were it me, I would email the man directly and let him decide whether to send a corrective to the entire list. Harris might also take that moment to ask the man if he could blind copy his recipients rather than have all their email addresses visible on the emails he spreads.

He could also remind him he’d prefer to be taken off the list of emails that aren’t fact-checked.

If he’s still up for an in-person lunch, he can lead with that – all the more reason to email him alone and not all those on the email string unless he’s looking for a bigger crowd at the lunch table.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues.

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. 

Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2023 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

What should I do with misdelivered mail?

A reader we’re calling Cliff wrote that every time his regular U.S. mail carrier goes on vacation, he ends up getting mail meant for his neighbors that is misdelivered to his house.

“I can always tell when there’s a substitute on duty,” Cliff wrote, noting that often it’s only the mail from his next-door neighbor, but sometimes it’s mail meant for four or five different houses along his street.

If Cliff happens to be on his front porch when the substitute mail carrier arrives, he checks the mail and will hand back any misdelivered pieces. But most often, Cliff only discovers the errors long after the mail carrier is gone.

Cliff wants to know what the best thing to do is. Put the mail back in his own box with a note to the mail carrier? Drop the mail meant for others into a postal box up the street from his house? Call the local post office? Or simply put his neighbor’s mail in their mailboxes? Cliff also wants to know if it’s OK to simply toss anything that looks like it’s junk mail with a neighbor’s name on it.

I am not an expert in federal laws regarding U.S. mail, but Cliff should not destroy any mail addressed to someone else even if he deems it to be junk. That decision about junkiness should be left to the intended recipient.

Any of the options Cliff asked about seem reasonable, though it’s not likely that calling the local post office will help a great deal if the substitute mail carrier changes every time the regular carrier is on vacation.

If Cliff knows his regular mail carrier well enough, he might want to take the time to let her know about the recurring misdeliveries when she is on vacation. The regular mail carrier might have advice on how best to proceed.

She might advise Cliff that calling the local post office might actually have some positive affect. Or she might be willing to let others at the post office know about the recurring issues.

My experience with local postal carriers in the city where I live has been largely positive. I once wrote about my former mail carrier (now retired) who spent months tracking down three boxes of books meant to be delivered to me that somehow ended up on someone’s porch several blocks away.

While Cliff putting the misdelivered mail back in his box or dropping it in the mailbox up the street might get the mail to its intended recipient at some point, the most expedient thing might be for Cliff to walk next door or up two or three doors to give the intended recipient his mail.

Granted, Cliff has no obligation to do the mail carrier’s job for him. But the simplest and most direct solution seems to be to just give the right person their mail.

Again, I’m no expert in federal U.S. mail laws, but taking a few moments to get something that belongs to someone else strikes me as a neighborly and right thing to do.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues.

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. 

Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2023 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

When an earthquake hits, how best to give

Shortly after 11 p.m. local time on Friday, Sept. 8, an earthquake struck Morocco, southwest of Marrakesh, devastating villages at the base of the High Atlas mountains. More than 2,900 people were reported killed and more than 5,500 injured.

I had taught at Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P) in Rabat for a week in mid-July. While Rabat is roughly 200 miles north of Marrakesh, UM6P has a Marrakesh campus, and the students and staff with whom I worked were from various parts of Morocco. A handful of students I had taught at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) are also from Morocco, and each happened to be there when the earthquake struck.

Soon I was receiving texts from family, friends and colleagues to ask if everyone I knew there was accounted for. Several asked for advice on the best way to donate to help with the relief. Initially, I did not know the answer to their questions.

I texted the people at UM6P who I worked with to see if everyone was accounted for and was relieved they were. Almost immediately, students and staff at UM6P assembled packages of supplies to get to those affected by the earthquake.

I also checked in on my former graduate students from HKS who were in Morocco when the earthquake struck. They too were accounted for.

The question loomed, however, of how best to donate, given the shared desire to donate to efforts that had the best chance of directly helping those affected. In such situations, I always try to do enough research to make sure efforts are legitimate and help the people who most need help.

One of my go-to organizations of late has been World Central Kitchen (https://wck.org), the nonprofit run by chef José Andrés. Whether it’s in Puerto Rico, Texas or Ukraine, World Central Kitchen seems to have been able to rapidly set up operations to get food to those affected by disaster. Within days, World Central Kitchen was set up in Morocco.

I also asked my former HKS students who were back in Morocco for advice. Several of them along with other Boston-area students with Morocco ties set up a GoFundMe account (https://www.gofundme.com/f/boston-moroccan-students-unite-for-morocco) that would funnel funds collected to organizations they had carefully vetted for their effectiveness.

I usually rely on sites like CharityNavigator (www.CharityNavigator.org) to assess the reputation and effectiveness of any charity. World Central Kitchen has a top rating. My students’ GoFundMe effort is not a registered nonprofit, so they have no CharityNavigator rating. Nevertheless, I persist in believing they applied the same rigor to the work they did as graduate students to the vetting of charities that could best help their families and neighbors.

There is no obligation for anyone to give anything to any causes they don’t care to. It’s impossible for most people to donate to help support those affected by all of the many disasters and crises that hit the world.

But for those who want to help the victims of the Morocco earthquake, the right thing is to try to do so in whatever way they believe might most help those in need.

For me, it might be donating to World Central Kitchen or my former students’ GoFundMe effort. There are, however, plenty of other ways to help. I trust you to find yours.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues.

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. 

Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2023 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.