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No, I don't feel sorry for them, or for their equivalent who fall for get rich quick schemes. Both are fueled by greed and entitlement handicapped by zero critical thinking efforts.
I'd disagree. They usually prey on the vulnerable, those that know no better.
I wouldn't give money to a stranger. People do dumb things every day. There's been warnings for DECADES about not clicking links in an email. DECADES. Yet stupid people do it every day and wonder why their credit card or bank account has been maxed out or drained. You can't fix stupid.
That famous cartoon from the New Yorker - "On the internet, no one knows you're a dog". - came out in 1993. 1993
Some people have still not gotten the message.
There's intelligence and there's common sense. An elderly relative who worked for many years as an MD, fell for the grandparent scam. His wife did not even know at the time that he did it, just found out years later.
I don't feel sorry for them, as they are making a choice based on someone telling them what they want to hear, when they know it isn't true. Yes, they know it, but their ego gets in the way.
Seriously, I don't understand the "online" choice, and maybe that says something about the choices some make. Seriously, find groups with common interests (other than pumping up someone's ego), or go grocery shopping and hang out as it seems to me that the guys here, and some other cities seem to use that to find women. Common interest will get one further than just finding ego food online.
I don't feel sorry for anyone that makes their own bad choices, especially when the information is "out there"! Ego gets in the way. "Oh you are so pretty.", yeah, you know you are being fed a line if you don't ever get that normally.
Choices have consequences, and the majority of people used to understand that and heed the warning!
If you are talking about children, that is different as far as online, but we are talking about adults who do knonw better, but choose to ignore what they know.
I don't feel sorry for them, as they are making a choice based on someone telling them what they want to hear, when they know it isn't true. Yes, they know it, but their ego gets in the way.
Seriously, I don't understand the "online" choice, and maybe that says something about the choices some make. Seriously, find groups with common interests (other than pumping up someone's ego), or go grocery shopping and hang out as it seems to me that the guys here, and some other cities seem to use that to find women. Common interest will get one further than just finding ego food online.
I don't feel sorry for anyone that makes their own bad choices, especially when the information is "out there"! Ego gets in the way. "Oh you are so pretty.", yeah, you know you are being fed a line if you don't ever get that normally.
Choices have consequences, and the majority of people used to understand that and heed the warning!
If you are talking about children, that is different as far as online, but we are talking about adults who do knonw better, but choose to ignore what they know.
All true, perhaps, but one should remember that............
............................in these times, we have the situation of children raising children with all that implies.
I largely don't also, but the people who fall for the romantic scams are rarely entitled, but are pathetically lonely/needy. I do feel sorry for that state.
I have to agree with this, as there was a time when I could have easily become the victim of a romance scammer. Especially when I was in high school - I very much wanted to start dating, but I was socially awkward, didn't have much self confidence, and boys often seemed to overlook me. So, if I'd had access to the Internet then, I can see where I would have gotten into a lot of trouble online.
Now that I'm older and more experienced with using the Internet, I'm able to spot romance scammers for what they are.
I largely don't also, but the people who fall for the romantic scams are rarely entitled, but are pathetically lonely/needy. I do feel sorry for that state.
Even before the Internet, such scammers preyed on those people. I remember watching a show once about a man who cruised the antique jewelry world. He was knowledgeable about the subject and would find single women who had businesses and woo them and actually marry them. Then some months into the scam, he would takes some of their inventory or their money to go on a "buying" trip, and that would be the last they saw of him. Most of the time the women were too ashamed to report it.
However, one of these "wives" was determined to find him. She tracked down other women he had scammed and got them to join her in pressing charges. She got police in different states to track him down while she tracked him down, too. Eventually she found him at a shopping center in Florida, and he walked right passed her without even recognizing a woman he had once slept with and married. The cops arrested him, and he went to prison.
But it goes to show how vulnerable lonely people can be.
I do feel bad for people because I realize they a huge blind spot. A woman I know got scammed out $30k and I talked about it with a mutual friend a few times, and she couldn't believe anyone could fall for such a thing. Fast forward 8 years and that same mutual friend tells me about her own adventure in online dating. She didn't loose any money but got emotionally invested in someone who was CLEARLY setting her up so he could ask her for money. When she gave me the play by play I kept wondering why she missed all the red flags and justified staying involved with him for so long.
I'm not at risk for this particular scam but I can't say I'll never be taken in by something because I WANT IT TO BE TRUE. It's already happened.
Whenever kind-hearted well-meaning people are hurt by liars and thieves, of course I feel bad for them.
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