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Urban legends can be scary, dangerous, embarrassing, or harmless, and certainly misleading. Many of us can be duped. No wonder. The stories may sound like something between a joke and an urban legend, between a horror movie and a myth. If it's too real and too important, and we are the good souls, it is likely that we will re-tell, sending the ! message to at least 50 people on our e-mail list to warn them. Then, the story will be retold in many different ways.
You might have heard the story about the little old lady from the church. On a
hot, summer day, on her way from the church, she stopped by to pick up the groceries, got into her car, and headed back home. As she entered her street, she noticed young vandals on the street corner. She quietly closed her window although it was 90 degrees and she had no air-conditioning. While she was still driving, she heard a loud explosion and something hit the back of her head. She touched this "something" which was wet and gooey, so she thought that she was touching a part of her brain. Believing that she had been shot, the lady turned her car around and rushed to the nearest hospital's emergency room. The doctors found a slowly leaking mass that the woman pointed out. After examination, they found that the leaking substance was a biscuit dough that exploded from the heat in the car.
This folktale has been retold for the last 4 years by the "little lady's" uncle, paramedics, Usenet posting, "Too Good To Be True" book, and as an e-mail message. Every posting had its own version, with a different ending. The uncle has been disseminating the story as it happened to "someone" from the church. If this story is not true, it could have happened.
This story and the others made me think and feel gullible because:
The story sounds true
It was told by someone about someone else, no reference or the reference is unclear
It has been retold
It has been changing while being re-told
All of the above can be characteristics of a true story. Be aware!
At snoopes.com and at ask.com you may find one that would match the one you are skeptical about. Ask.com will offer quizzes to test your myth IQs.
If you are duped and wanted to know if bald men are more viral, if artificial light is hazardous to your health, if chicken soup is good for a cold, if identical twins have identical fingerprints, AND if you want to lose weight and not sure if "celery has negative calories", you might be interested to read Anahad O'Connor's "Never Shower in a Thunderstorm". He is a New York Times columnist and he brings experts for answers. Then, you will sleep without fear. At least, until the new legends are invented!!!
Many legends are demonstrated to be false. Many of them can be based on a tiny piece of fact, however slight.
The gullibility can be frightening. I had a call from an extremely tearful client who heard from her colleague about the 2012 Nostradamus prediction. She called me and she must have called at least 10 other people. She also told me that she had to take an increased dosage of her anxiety meds.
I don't fear Nostradamus predictions or the radiation from the microwave, but I do fear computer viruses, poisonous Halloween candy, and I fear that I might be tricked to pay at Neiman Marcus "The $250 cookie recipe" because these sound probable, too close to our everyday lives.
The myth creators are having fun. And, they count on the fear factor. The readers are distributing the stories because they either want to share the fun with the ones they love or to warn them. Urban legends are perpetuated by the gullible. And we all are gullible sometimes.
Urban legends can be scary, dangerous, embarrassing, or harmless, and certainly misleading. Many of us can be duped. No wonder. The stories may sound like something between a joke and an urban legend, between a horror movie and a myth. If it's too real and too important, and we are the good souls, it is likely that we will re-tell, sending the ! message to at least 50 people on our e-mail list to warn them. Then, the story will be retold in many different ways.
You might have heard the story about the little old lady from the church. On a
hot, summer day, on her way from the church, she stopped by to pick up the groceries, got into her car, and headed back home. As she entered her street, she noticed young vandals on the street corner. She quietly closed her window although it was 90 degrees and she had no air-conditioning. While she was still driving, she heard a loud explosion and something hit the back of her head. She touched this "something" which was wet and gooey, so she thought that she was touching a part of her brain. Believing that she had been shot, the lady turned her car around and rushed to the nearest hospital's emergency room. The doctors found a slowly leaking mass that the woman pointed out. After examination, they found that the leaking substance was a biscuit dough that exploded from the heat in the car.This folktale has been retold for the last 4 years by the "little lady's" uncle, paramedics, Usenet posting, "Too Good To Be True" book, and as an e-mail message. Every posting had its own version, with a different ending. The uncle has been disseminating the story as it happened to "someone" from the church. If this story is not true, it could have happened.
This story and the others made me think and feel gullible because:
The story sounds true
It was told by someone about someone else, no reference or the reference is unclear 
It has been retold
It has been changing while being re-toldAll of the above can be characteristics of a true story. Be aware!
At snoopes.com and at ask.com you may find one that would match the one you are skeptical about. Ask.com will offer quizzes to test your myth IQs.
If you are duped and wanted to know if bald men are more viral, if artificial light is hazardous to your health, if chicken soup is good for a cold, if identical twins have identical fingerprints, AND if you want to lose weight and not sure if "celery has negative calories", you might be interested to read Anahad O'Connor's "Never Shower in a Thunderstorm". He is a New York Times columnist and he brings experts for answers. Then, you will sleep without fear. At least, until the new legends are invented!!!
Many legends are demonstrated to be false. Many of them can be based on a tiny piece of fact, however slight.
The gullibility can be frightening. I had a call from an extremely tearful client who heard from her colleague about the 2012 Nostradamus prediction. She called me and she must have called at least 10 other people. She also told me that she had to take an increased dosage of her anxiety meds.
I don't fear Nostradamus predictions or the radiation from the microwave, but I do fear computer viruses, poisonous Halloween candy, and I fear that I might be tricked to pay at Neiman Marcus "The $250 cookie recipe" because these sound probable, too close to our everyday lives.
The myth creators are having fun. And, they count on the fear factor. The readers are distributing the stories because they either want to share the fun with the ones they love or to warn them. Urban legends are perpetuated by the gullible. And we all are gullible sometimes.
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