F*cking stupid scammers, why do they bother?

As for the desperation / sadness of the situation in some parts of Africa (as mentioned by tynan) yes it is terrible but is it my problem? No. Anyone anywhere has choices and although this may sound like Nazi middle-England speaking I don't believe unless you've lived in those circumstances you have much of a better idea than I do of what those choices might be. And scamming seems to be a fairly shit choice.

It's also true that some parts of Africa increasingly look to the west for handouts because we're mug enough to weave musli and have the spare cash and middle-class sensibilities to 'care'. What's this doing to those parts of Africa apart from turning them into bigger victims than they already are? And isn't scamming just a crafty way of milking a little more from the 'affluent' west? I doubt these phishing scams are being sent to Mexico or Uganda.

No it's not nice but neither is some twat coming up to you on the interwebz and saying 'oh hello, I'm the Pope and my dad is God but he's dead now in heaven and wants to give you $100 mirrion dorra in Q-tip bonds, please help or my beautiful daughter's head will fall off'.

The thing that personally offends me about it the most is the insult to my intelligence and the thing that amuses me about it the most is how some idiots can be stupid enough to get drawn in by it.

What's the answer? I don't know, but a lobotomy for all westerners who fall foul of it probably wouldn't hurt. And continued contempt and ridicule for the scammers who try it on won't hurt either. Learn to be a bloody carpenter (insert realistic vocation / trade of choice) or something instead of trying to get all the cash for a BMW in one hit so you can impress the laydeez.** If carpentry was good enough for Jesus it's good enough for you.** Good grief.

The bits in bold are daily mail bits.

Unfortunalty, due to a colonial past Africa is everyones problem. And being from western europe, we sit on the top step socially amd economically, which is why we understand we still need to do much more than we're doing.

It sounds a little trite comapring the problems of an African country to the time consuming task of clicking 'report spam' on gmail.

I think the real problem to be addressed isn't stupid westerners (apart from this case maybe) but the problems in Africa?

Jesus disn't exist. There is no god. Good grief indeed.

Did you vote Tory? Big Society?