lib/PublicInbox/View.pm | 2 +-

diff --git a/lib/PublicInbox/View.pm b/lib/PublicInbox/View.pm
index 5aab609ddb2a3258b9111c73bb6a2d9c78421550..b3545a4a9c3496220fe47d38aee20fa3e8c5cb9b 100644
--- a/lib/PublicInbox/View.pm
+++ b/lib/PublicInbox/View.pm
@@ -197,7 +197,7 @@ 	return $rv if $part->subparts; # walk_parts already recurses
 	my $ct = $part->content_type;
 
 	# account for filter bugs...
-	return if defined $ct && $ct =~ m!\btext/[xh]+tml\b!i;
+	return '' if defined $ct && $ct =~ m!\btext/[xh]+tml\b!i;
 
 	my $enc = enc_for($ct, $enc_msg);