Asserting yourself over email can be difficult, especially if you’ve been socialized to fear coming across as unfriendly, demanding, or overly firm. Of course, these are fears that never once crossed the radar of the God of the Old Testament who took no prisoners and did not give a single shit how he was perceived. So throw out your “best”s and your “warmly”s in exchange for these email signoffs that will make you sound less like a pathetic weakling and more like the punitive and wrathful Lord God of the Bible, part 1.
Sincerely,
While still polite, “sincerely” is a step in the right direction for those used to littering their emails with smiley faces and exclamation points. Plus, “sincere” sounds like “severe”, which is how some might describe God’s decree that people with bad skin not enter his churches. It’s not an outright attack, but it will have your recipient wondering, “Are they mad at me?” and that’s good.
Do as I will you, or I will kill your kid,
Threatening to kill someone’s kid might strike you as “a little intense” or “cause for termination”, but as long as the rest of the email is pretty balanced, the recipient should understand this simply indicates you mean business. Besides, back in the day God was never not killing kids, threatening to kill kids, or telling people to kill their kids. It was virtually his whole thing, and people really respected him for that! If you say this, just make sure you’re really willing to kill their kid should they not complete the project you delegated to them. No one would have taken the vengeful and petty God of the OT seriously if he didn’t have follow through!
Fuck you,
Singing off a perfectly amiable email with an unambiguous yet unprovoked “fuck you” has huge Old Testament God energy. Remember when God ran into Moses and randomly decided to kill him but then Moses’ wife circumcised their son and put the foreskin on Moses’ feet and God was like, “Whoa, what? Okay, I’m not gonna kill you right now” (Exodus 4:24-26)? Well chances are your coworker is no Moses’ wife when it comes to innovative and insane quick thinking, so they’ll just be stunned by your unprovoked ire and make a mental note to stay on your good side.
Email etiquette can feel like a real minefield, but minefields aren’t something the OG God would give a fuck about. He would probably just throw an Egyptian baby into it to see what happened, so channel this energy and you’ll definitely get a promotion or institutionalized — depends who your dad is!
