Email Nastiness–and one very eloquent response

13 Comments

On the news and the blogs for the last few days has been a very impressive response to a nasty email in my home state of Wisconsin.  (See Huff Post story here that has both the original segment from Tuesday and the Today Show segment from Wednesday. )   Many of us teaching negotiation talk about email communication, the dangers of anonymity, the risks of untrustworthy behavior, and the importance of taking time to respond rather than responding in kind to a flaming email.  But I’ve never seen such an eloquent and well-thought out response to a flaming email as the one presented Tuesday by Wisconsin TV anchor Jessica Livingston.  Upon receiving an email last Friday that basically told her she was too fat to be on the air, she took the time to reflect and marshal her very impressive communication skills.  Her tv segment (linked here also with some commentary from Vibe) is not only a cautionary tail on emails, but a heartfelt plea against bullying and for civility instead.  Let me also note my dismay that the man who sent her email happens to be a lawyer, a successful law student who was editor-in-chief of his law review (according to the firm’s page), and likely a successful practicing attorney as well.  What possessed this gentleman to take time from his otherwise busy day to watch tv and then type out his judgmental missive is a mystery.  But there are a few lessons here–first, in case you didn’t already know, anything you put in an email could appear on the Today Show and NBC Nightly News. as this email already has.  Think before you type.  Second, I imagine that within the local LaCrosse community, there may well be ramifications for this lawyer’s reputation and future clientele.  Maybe clients will hire him because of his, now national, reputation for bullying.  More likely, a client could well wonder about this lawyer’s tact and people skills.  And finally, as Ms. Livingston reminds us, we are all better than this.  Civility should be the mainstay of how we lawyers communicate–in person and in email.

13 thoughts on “Email Nastiness–and one very eloquent response”

  1. Professor Schneider,

    Thank you for this post. For some, this can be a very uncomfortable subject, but I believe that it is an important issue in today’s society. I remember watching this story a few months ago, and after watching Ms. Livingston’s response once more, I still believe she exudes tremendous class and dignity.

    Ms. Livingston took a “moral high road” in her response. I know that some would use her media access to degrade and belittle an emailer who personally attacked them. She responded eloquently and tried to address the main issue of weight gain in the United States.

    I do have to agree with a few of my fellow classmates. While extremely powerful, Ms. Livingston’s response should have addressed and encouraged young viewers to watch their weight and remain active. I applaud her courageous response regarding a very uncomfortable issue.

  2. I recall watching this news segment in disgust, but at that time had not known that the author of the email was an attorney! I’m not sure I would want to enlist the use of his best judgment for two hundred dollars an hour when he clearly has no sense of his own. This does not even seem to be a situation where he has put his foot in his mouth in error; that would be a bit more understandable. The fact that this man went out of his way to right some random newswoman a physically insulting email is despicable. I think the fact that Livingston decided to make a point of the email publicly as opposed to tuck it away in embarrassment shows great courage. It worked out especially well to coincide with anti-bullying month. It is quite admirable that she was able to receive an email such as this and confront her linguistic assailant on the air. Between her and the attorney who authored the email, I think its clear that Ms. Livingston has a better way with words. I would be interested to learn whether the attorney has felt any backlash from Livingston’s supporters and how her response has effected the way he perceives his thought process in sending such a ridiculously insulting and unnecessary email.

  3. Professor Schneider,

    Thank you for the post. I admire Ms. Livingston’s public response to the email and thought she was extremely classy and honest. I am also surprised that the lawyer wrote the email in the first place, given the fact that he rarely watches Ms. Livingston’s program and his seemingly busy lifestyle.

    However, I thought Ms. Livingston’s response could have been more effective if she actually addressed the issue in the email. The lawyer was trying to raise the problem of obesity in society and the fact that Ms. Livingston’s ability to be a role model for woman should warrant a more health conscious lifestyle. I thought she should have addressed the issue of obesity first, by stating that she has taken plenty of measures to improve her physical condition (her husband, on the today show, said she trained for triathlons). It would have further strengthened her position that attacks by bullies do not deserve any consideration.

    If Ms. Livingston were negotiating, I think her response, while professional and tactful, did not address the real concern of the opposing party. She had an opportunity to address the other parties main concern, while demonstrating how unsubstantiated his assertion actually was.

  4. I appreciate that Ms. Livingston had the courage to publicly expose this attorney’s comments rather than privately respond to him or even ignore him.

    In an era where women are already working so hard to overcome society’s implicit pressure to be skinny, such explicit pressure from a local professional must have felt very threatening and hurtful, and it would have been tempting to ignore it or to respond with equally inflammatory comments.

    Her tactful, public response fostered so much positive discussion about the issues of bullying and the inequities women face in the daily pressures to be skinny that it was worth it for her to publicly discuss her very personal conflict. Not only did her response expose the stupidity of such comments, it served as a warning to others to think twice before criticizing someone about their appearance.

    With all of the subsequent publicity Ms. Livingston received on The Today Show and other national spotlights, the message to women about accepting and loving who you are and not caring about what others think about you resounded. It is so important for young girls to hear this message over and over. What a pleasant result from such an unpleasant situation.

    Ms. Livingston’s public response makes her a positive role model for all women to stand up for who they are, not a negative role model as the attorney’s comments suggested.

  5. Professor Schneider,

    I think technology overall has exposed people’s imprudence, the inability to assess the potential consequences of their actions and to show restraint. While we younger users like to say that applies to older users only that didn’t grow up using today’s technology, I think an age/gaffe research study would be surprising.

    While we on this blog praise Ms. Livingston and would enjoy an expresso shot of Schadenfreude in seeing the email author’s law practice suffer irreparably, the truth is that others in the LaCrosse area are silently applauding him. He may even gain a big client or two for his “guts.”

    Nonetheless, being a good person in any size community matters. In the end, however, this episode reinforces negative stereotypes of rural America by implying that not even its “smart” people can handle something as simple as email.

    During the winter break of my first year in law school, I met a lawyer for coffee (at first of now two indie coffee shops) in the small Wisconsin town in which I grew up. His firm of three lawyers uses cell phones and text messaging frequently, as the nearest outside jurisdictional courts are 26, 35, and 39 miles away. He has personal and firm Facebook pages, and the firm has a website.

    He, as a 1970 graduate of Marquette Law School, was very excited to share his experiences with me and I was flattered that he was willing. The topic of communication came up and he leaned in, lowered his voice, and said, “When you’re going to send a nasty-gram, certified mail is your best friend. You have to write it, print it, go to the post office, fill out a form, and pay for it. Four out of five times you won’t send it. The fifth time you’ll go back to your office and tone the message down.”

  6. @Myriem

    Some great points there. The whole “negotiating” landscape is changing before our very eyes with the internet. How it will evolve? That’s anyone’s guess…

  7. Professor Schneider,

    Thank you for your post. After reading it as well as the comments, my first thought was that this gentleman might have been seeking some attention he is lacking in his life.

    On a different not, this post invited me to think about communication via email/internet in general. I don’t know if this gentleman took sufficient time to reflect on what he wanted to convey before hitting the “send” button because, clearly, email-based communication shows to be far less inhibited than a face-to-face interaction. I doubt—I might be very wrong—that this gentleman considered the adverse consequences of his negative cyberspace “interaction” because of the lack of social cues (visual and verbal)—from which he could have benefitted—when emailing.

    That being said, the greater contentiousness that flows from online communication might become even more problematic as the legal profession continues to embrace technological advances. For instance, online negotiations are likely cheaper and faster than face-to-face meetings, but they would not lead to effective and successful results unless negotiators/lawyers adjust their behavior and tactics to fit the isolated environment of cyberspace.

  8. I am sure the attorney thought nothing would come of this email and Livington would just ignore the email or not show anyone out of shame. Clearly that is not the case. She was a much stronger person than he ever imagined. His reputation is most likely ruined in his county or local area, as it should be. It is hard to imagine why someone would hire a attorney who clearly “can’t play well with others.”

    I once sat in on a divorce hearing where it was evident the attorneys did not like each other. After the Commissioner made her ruling, and the attorneys left, she made the remark to me that the role of attorneys is to solve problems. In this case the attorneys clearly were ready to fight over even the most minor issues. Attorneys need to work with each other and their clients to solve problems. The attorney who wrote the email to Livington has yet to master this, and most likely was not taught this tactic in law school.

  10. I have seen multiple shows’ segments on Jessica Livingston’s response to this flaming email. Livingston and her husband appeared on Good Morning America where she was the picture of civility. Livingston appeared as an advocate against bullying while her husband promoted her aggressive long-standing attempts to lose weight, including competing in triathlons.

    Livington’s response goes to show that the consequences of sending a flaming email can often be positive for the recipient if handled correctly, while extremely detrimental to the sender.

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