Are email breakups OK?

I'm not generally old-fashioned, but if you're seeing the person in the real world, you ought to break up with them in the real world. If you're having an internet relationship, then breaking up over the internet is probably OK. It is hard and messy to break up. So what?! Lots of things are difficult and awkward, but have to be done. Email break ups might be easier for the sender, but I can't imagine that they are easier for the receiver. Don't be a coward - do the right thing and break up with him or her in person. Deal with the emotion and then you can both move on.

I agree with TaliaHoffman - don't be a coward and break-up in person. If you can't be mature enough to do it in person, then you are not mature enough to even be in a relationship. The same goes for breaking up over the phone (this happened to me).

I think it's totally thoughtless with no regard to the other person's feelings.

I think breaking up in email is wrong. I feel it shows a lack of respect for what once was. If two people shared something and one or both come to the realization that it should end, it should be done in person. It should be done during a two-way conversation. Email can come across very differently than intentioned. We are all adults, and part of being a grown up is facing your issues, not emailing them.

Agree with Talia.. Don't be a coward. Do the right thing. Email does not replace responsibility of face to face communication

Remember the Sex and the City episode where the guy breaks up with Carrie with a post-it note?

I think there is a hierarchy: in person best, on phone next, email next, post it last. But they all beat the cowardly "stop calling and avoid her" method that some guys think is acceptable. I'm sorry if I'm gender generalizing. Am I wrong? Would a woman ever just disappear?

Having been "disappeared on" I'd answer, "highly unlikely." Women's innate need to communicate feelings would mandate at least a telephone conversation.

Both men and women ditch romantic interests and disappear online. I've seen this a lot. They change their usernames, hide their profiles, don't respond to emails or "block" someone from being able to contact them.

It's getting easier and easier to hide behind technology, which is almost always an emotional coward's way out. There is a big black hole on the Internet, where a lot of people are hiding out, rather than just communicating their lack of interest in someone.

That said, if someone feels dangerous, or unpredictable in a potentially dangerous way, then it's OK (at least in my book) to end things via email.

When bad things happen to people, things like getting dumped by a lover, the victims often say: It wasn't the break-up, it was the way he/she did it. Hence objections to e-mail break-ups, or phone calls, or letters (the "dear John" letters of World War II). For better or worse, a relationship takes two consenting individuals and it's held together ONLY by mutual consent. If one person decides to break up, that person has the right to do so. Of course the other person feels hurt, betrayed, devastated, whatever. One can argue that breaking up in any way other than in person is cowardly or cold or obnoxious, whatever. Unfortunately, there is no good way to hear the words: I don't love you anymore and no longer want to be with you. It hurts to hear those words in person. It hurts to hear them any other way.