What are YOU doing to squash ULs?

[Patty O'Furniture]

This isn't pretty, but I need to show you all something:

http://www.geocities.com/attrayant_1/cookie2.jpg

You might think that working for a fortune-50 company would remove you from these persistent buggers. Hardly. There is a coin-slot type box in the break room for your pull tabs (help Ron's kids, don't ya know), the Neiman Marcus cookie recipe makes its rounds every few months or so, and just last week several of my coworkers were urging me to take part in the great gas-out this weekend because of an email from their sister in law.

I wanna give up.

Try to educate people and they look at you like you're nuts. Toss the pull-tab box in the garbage and you're hurting Ron's kids. If you politely refuse a copy of the cookie recipe then you must be insensitive to the misfortune of somebody's poor old mother who got stuck with a $350 bill for the recipe. Tell them that the gas-out is utter nonsense and all of a sudden you're on the side of the oil tycoons.

Soooo... what are you guys doing to put out the fire? How many of you with a web page display a prominent link to Snopes (http://www.snopes.com)?

Anybody ever felt like they successfully turned a chain email junkie away from the dark side of the force?

[Lucretia]

It depends on the mood I am in...sometimes I get all fired up with that reformers zeal and send notes back (polite, gentle, friendly notes...most of these people are my friends/family), basically saying that it's all a crock, and suggesting they research future forwards on snopes at least.

And then other times I get convinced that there is just no point, that for some people, especially people new to the 'net, that if it comes in e-mail that makes it credible, period, and damn common sense.

[Patty O'Furniture]

Oh, and I forgot to mention- that is a scan of a paper recipe I was given many years ago (I was in my mid-teens, so it's been about 20 years) when 99.9% of the general public didn't have computers or email. I wish you could appreciate the sheer age of this document- it looks like it should be under glass in the National Archives building. Amazing that hardly a word has changed in all that time, but I see that the going rate for the recipe has at least kept up with inflation.

[KSO]

Last week, I received the tired e-mail about the gang who has its newest members lurk at gas stations so they can climb into your backseat, then kidnap you and take you to the "gang headquarters" where you will be gangraped by the gang. I was so annoyed, I looked it up on Snopes and then responded to everyone on the e-mail that this stupid UL has been circulating since 1967 and there is no need to now be paranoid at the gas station. It came off as really bitchy so I had to send a follow-up apologizing for the bitchiness. But that's another story.

[Chief Crunch]

For the most part, it's useless. I could not convince my aunt that the -gry riddle was altered and the answer was intended to be "language" as in "there are only three words in the English language." Most people react with some bizarre, vehement form of defense with lines like, "No, no, this REALLY happened to a friend of mine." My friend knows a girl who actually CLAIMS to have had a spider lay eggs under her skin and watched them hatch with hundreds of spiders crawling out. Why the hell would you lie about something like that? It's not a goddamn religion, it's an urban legend! What do you say to these people? I did successfully set one of friends straight in regard to "the hanging munchkin" in the Wizard of Oz, but the victories are far and few between.

[Yue Han]

I fight the fight. Pissing people off in the process sometimes, but dammit, the fight against ignorance is a life style. Sometimes I mass reply to everyone who got it. Then I go back and send it to the people one step back in the forwarding process. Always link to the answers, and always givbbe a synopsis for those who won't read the link.


And never give up.

At first, I was despised. Now my friends send me their forwards first to ask if there's any validity. Keep the faith.

--John

------------------
'Twis brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

[SouthernXYL]

The gang-member-gas-station UL was told to me many years ago, by someone who had it happen to her husband's coworker's friend's mother. I had never heard of it before but I kind of figured out it was in the same league as the Donohue show where it was proven that P&G was owned by satanists - my friend's boyfriend's sister's friend's cousin watched that show, you know.

Here's the scary thing. You know the one about gang members driving w/o headlights after dark, shooting people who flash their headlights at them. Well, the cops here were telling that one, and the city council tried to pin them down about it, asking exactly when and to whom it had happened. Cops had to admit, well, er actually, it hadn't. Yet. But a bunch went off to the state capitol for some sort of gang summit and told the same story as fact. Reporters from here had gone there and said - wait a minute, hadn't we established that that was fiction? Oh - oh - yeah.

Personally, I think all the gang initiation crap is highly overrated. Every time there's juvenile crime around here it's assumed to be gang-related, and almost all the time it turns out it's not.

[Joe_Cool]

I have successfully debunked the "black people will lose the right to vote in 2007" rumor and am actively fighting the KFC rumor both to my roommate (who is black and was ready to riot over his right to vote).

I've also (finally) convinced one of my co-workers that cockroaches from Taco Bell don't lay eggs in your gums/cheeks/brain/whatever.

But I'm ready to give up and accept that the human population is hopelessly ignorant and hopelessly gullible. The ignorance is spreading faster than Captain Trips from The Stand, and it sometimes seems there's no stopping it. *sigh*

What can ya do?

------------------
If you say it, mean it. If you mean it, do it.
If you do it, live it. If you live it, say it.
-----
Joe Cool

[labradorian]

I think I have (temporarily) killed Craig Shergold around my office-place; after my sixth "NO, NO, NO" email about 16 months ago I haven't seen it circulate since. I also waged a campaign against the Canadian version of the "Bill 602P" hoax about a year ago. Can't make much headway against the pull tab thing though. Tried the "gas-out"-out fight, but with mixed results. Saw the LSD-tatoo thing in the old hometown paper a few months back but said to hell with it.

------------------
Dee da dee da dee dee do do / Dee ba ditty doh / Deedle dooby doo ba dee um bee ooby / Be doodle oodle doodle dee doh http://members.xoom.com/labradorian/

[ubermensch]

depending on if i know the person that sent me the chain letter/UL...i send this out...
sorry about the formatting, if it's messed out..i copied and pasted it from an email...

...


Hello, my name is Basmati Kasaar. I am suffering from rare and deadly diseases, poor scores on final exams, extreme virginity, fear of being kidnapped and
executed by anal electrocution, and guilt for not forwarding out 50 billion fucking chain letters sent to me by people who actually believe that if you send them on, then that poor 6 year old girl in Arkansas
with a breast on her forehead will be able to raise enough money to have it removed before her redneck parents sell her off to the travelling freak show.
Do you honestly believe that Bill Gates is going to give you and everyone you send "his" email to $1000? How stupid are you? Ooooh, lookyhere! If I scroll down this page and make a wish, I'll get laid by
every Playboy model in the magazine! What a bunch of bullshit.
So basically, this message is a big FUCK YOU to all the people out there who have nothing better to do than to send me stupid chain mail forwards.
Maybe the evil chain letter leprechauns will come into my apartment and sodomize me in my sleep for not continuing the chain which was started by Jesus in 5 A.D. and was brought to this country by midget pilgrims on the Mayflower and if it makes it to the
year 2000, it'll be in the Guinness Book of World Records for longest continuous streak of blatant stupidity.
Fuck them.
If you're going to forward something, at least send me something mildly amusing. I've seen all the "send this to 50 of your closest friends, and this poor, wretched excuse for a human being will somehow receive a nickel from some omniscient being" forwards about 90 times. I don't fucking care.
Show a little intelligence and think about what you're actually contributing to by sending out forwards. Chances are it's your own unpopularity.
THE FOUR BASIC TYPES OF CHAIN LETTERS:
Chain Letter Type 1:
(scroll down)
Make a wish!!!
No, really, go on and make one!!!
Oh please, they'll never go out with you!!! Wish something else!!!
Not that, you pervert!!
Is your finger getting tired yet?
STOP!!!!
Wasn't that fun? :)
Hope you made a great wish :)
Now, to make you feel guilty, here's what I'll do.
First of all, if you don't send this to 5096 people in the next 5 seconds, you will be raped by a mad goat and thrown off a high building into a pile of manure.
It's true!
Because, THIS letter isn't like all of those fake ones, THIS one is TRUE!! Really!!!
Here's how it goes:
*Send this to 1 person: One person will be pissed off at you for sending them a stupid chain letter.
*Send this to 2-5 people: 2-5 people will be pissed off at you for sending them a stupid chain letter.
*Send this to 5-10 people: 5-10 people will be pissed off at you for sending them a stupid chain letter, and may form a plot on your life.
*Send this to 10-20 people: 10-20 people will be pissed off at you for sending them a stupid chain letter and will firebomb your house.
Thanks!!!! Good Luck!!!
---------------------------------------------
Chain Letter Type 2
Hello, and thank you for reading this letter. You see, there is a starving
little boy in Baklaliviatatlaglooshen who has no arms, no legs, no parents, and no goats. This little boy's life could be saved, because for every time you pass this on, a dollar will be donated to the Little Starving Legless Armless Goatless Boy from Baklaliviatatlaglooshen Fund. Oh, and remember, we have absolutley no way of counting the emails sent and this is all a
complete load of bullshit. So go on, reach out. Send this to 5 people in the next 47
seconds.
Oh, and a reminder - if you accidentally send this to 4 or 6 people, you will die
instantly. Thanks again!!
--------------------------------------------- Chain Letter Type 3
Hi there!! This chain letter has been in existence since 1897. This is absolutely incredible because there was no email then and probably not as many sad pricks with nothing better to do. So this is how it
works:
Pass this on to 15,067 people in the next 7 minutes or something horrible will happen to you like:
*Bizarre Horror Story #1
Miranda Pinsley was walking home from school on Saturday. She had recently recieved this letter and ignored it. She then tripped in a crack in the sidewalk, fell into the sewer, was gushed down a
drainpipe in a flood of poopie, and went flying out over a waterfall. Not only did she smell nasty, she died. This Could Happen To You!!!
*Bizarre Horror Story #2
Dexter Bip, a 13 year old boy, got a chain letter in his mail and ignored it. Later that day, he was hit by a car and so was his boyfriend (hey, some people swing that way). They both died and went to hell
and were cursed to eat adorable kittens every day for eternity. This Could Happen To You Too!!!
Remember, you could end up just like Pinsley and Bip. Just send this letter to all of your loser friends, and everything will be okay.
---------------------------------------------
Chain Letter Type 4:
As if you care, here is a poem that I wrote. Send it to every one of your friends.
Friends
A friend is someone who is always at your side,
A friend is someone who likes you even though you stink of shit, and your breath smells like you've been eating catfood,
A friend is someone who likes you
even though you're as ugly as a hat full of assholes,
A friend is someone who cleans up for you after you've soiled yourself,
A friend is someone who stays with you all night while you cry about your sad, sad life,
A friend is someone who pretends they like
you when they really think you should be raped by mad chimpanzees, then thrown to vicious dogs,
A friend is someone who scrubs your toilet, vacuums and then gets the check and leaves and doesn't speak much English...* no, sorry that's the cleaning lady, A friend is not someone who sends you chain letters because he wants his wish of being rich to come true.
Now pass this on! If you don't, you'll never have sex ever again.

[Revtim]

I alway reply to ULs with a reference to Snopes.

You may think I'm a force for good but.....

I have to admit I started a couple brand-new ULs last week, to see if they spread.

Sorry.

[Sassy]

I fight the good fight... and I have had some success. I work with a non-profit group that supports people with a little-known disease (www.pemphigus.org) One of the services is an on-line support group. Since many of these people are older, and got the computer mostly to collect info that can help them, they are particularly vulnerable.

For a while it was urban legends heaven. I checked each and every one, sending the link to the exact location at Snopes or other urban legends sites. I was a nag and people were upset: "I don't know... but what if it was true?" Others were pleased, and in the end we have reduced the UL reporting significantly. And yes, we have links to Snopes on the website.

1. When my sister sent me one, I told her politely that it was deeply silly, and she now makes a point of telling me that she enjoys collecting Urban Legends. So I sent her a whole list of UL websites, including Snopes.

2. When a well-intentioned member of my peer group at church kept faithfully forwarding all sorts of junk e-mail to me (Bill Gates is the Anti-Christ, etc.) I tactfully asked her to take me off her forwarding list, but didn't tell her exactly why. No sense hurting her feelings.

3. The touchingly young and naive Youth Pastor at our church recently started sending out the same sort of thing as Number 2 (above), by using our church chat loop, which I resented. First he sent us the Great Gas-Out, then it was "Madalyn Murray O'Hair is trying to shut down Christian broadcasters" (again! I remember it from back in the 70's when the petitions were paper, not electronic.) (And I thought she was dead, anyway, or officially missing or something. If she's dead or missing, how can she be leading the fight to get "Touched By An Angel" off the air?)

So I forwarded the About.com Urban Legends page with the M.M. O'Hair UL on it to him, with a brief sarcastic note from me. I sincerely hope he took the point.

Fortunately, all the other people who send me e-mail seem to understand instinctively about ULs.

Other than that, I think you just have to get used to it. It's going to be a fact of life on the 21st century Internet, the way roadside litter became a fact of life with the 20th century automobile.

[Shayna]

Sometimes there's nothing you can do but just throw your hands up in disgust. Some things you shouldn't even have to direct someone to scopes to debunk -- it should be obvious to anyone with the brain God gave a turnip.

This is an actual email exchange I had with, what I would have otherwise considered, a reasonably intelligent friend...

From: changed_name@school.edu (yes, my friend works in the educational system here in the good ol' USofA)
To: Shayna@myemailaddy.here
Subj: Fw: New Wheels! Please forward...

(My friend's words): Yall all know I need new wheels..the Beamer is getting on up there. Wonder what it would be like to drive a Honda? Call me crazy or call me lucky?

--------------------

(853,726 email addresses removed to protect the chronically stupid)

Jo: Read this and forward it to lots of people. You never know what might happen.

ml

Hi, Friends! I got this e-mail forwarded to me and thought you would enjoy the competitive spirit behind it. :) Forward it and we'll see if it works. We all love Hondas, right?

First off, I just want everyone to know that this is the real thing. I forwarded this message to everyone I know about 6 months ago and last week a Honda employee showed up at my house with my brand new 1999 Civic EX!!! It is so funny because I never believed these things worked and actually I sent this one as a joke to all my friends. But they forwarded the message too and now I have received a new car!!!

Bob Stanley, Denver Colorado

Friends,

Look I know this sounds too good to be true, and that's what I thought too. But I called Honda's headquarters in Japan and spoke to an American representative myself and it really is true! They assured me that this the real thing! I still wasn't convinced but I called three weeks later and my Honda account balance has reached the unbelievable sum of $12,500!!! So even if you don't believe this, forward it anyway so my account will continue to grow until I get my brand new Prelude!!!

Steve Kelly, Minneapolis Minnessota

Dear valued potential customers:

Here at Honda we have been well known for over 20 years for providing the best in reliabillity, comfort, and style. Over the years we have risen to be one of the top auto industries here in Japan. But that isn't enough. We want to be number one in the US.

[Everyone knows how this stupid email goes, so I've deleted the majority of the body.]

I thank you for your time and business.

Sincerely,
Kageyama Hironobu
Senior Honda Marketing Advisor

---------------------------
From: Shayna@myemailaddy.here
To: changed_name@school.edu
Subj: Re: Fw: New Wheels! Please forward...

Please tell me you don't really believe this is true! LOL

---------------------------
From: changed_name@school.edu
To: Shayna@myemailaddy.here

Of course I don't believe it is true, but hot dang, what if it is and I get a new car!

Hugs,
K

---------------------------
From: Shayna@myemailaddy.here
To: changed_name@school.edu

LMAO at you girlfriend! Answer this for me. IF it was true that you'd get a new car from Honda just for forwarding an email to a bunch of people - HOW are they going to find you? HOW are they going to know who the heck changed_name@school.edu is? HOW will they get your address to just miraculously show up at your door with the keys to a shiny new car that's sitting in your parking lot? You slay me. This is NOT true - not even by the wildest stretch of the imagination. LOL

---------------------------
From: changed_name@school.edu
To: Shayna@myemailaddy.here

I am dying with laughter.....of course I won't get a new car in my driveway! But heck fire.....who knows!! Okay, tell me gulliable is not it the dictionary! LOL

---------------------------

(Well, it's not, but...) I give up!

------------------
"How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world." - Anne Frank

[Alphagene]

I find it oddly satisfyin when someone sends me a UL with a massive email distribution list. I debunk it and then reply to everyone on the list. In the debunking I suggest that the authore check out snopes before he or she is gullible enough to believe and then send an email to dozens of people.

I have turned several of my friends into UL watchdogs, and they get a sick pleasure out of shutting down the perpetrators.

------------------
Gypsy: Tom, I don't get you.
Tom Servo: Nobody does. I'm the wind, baby.

[Una Persson]

I don't bother anymore. Several times, I tried to debunk several e-mail chain letter UL's at work, and ended up insulting a senior partner who believed it was absolutely true. The latest "water-cooler" UL's at the office are the "JATO-powered-car-into-the-cliff-wall", and the "spider biting women in the bathroom" ones. When I tried to debunk the JATO one, I ended up insulting a couple people, who I did not realize had been telling others they personally saw on TV the man drive into the cliff. Still, I was able to give a hefty dose of skepticism to my cow-orkers, who now send many e-mail chain letters to me for verification.

Once, after trying to kill an e-mail chain letter (Bill Gates & Disney) I was even reprimanded by an e-mail admin who accused me of spreading the chain.

Just not worth it.

------------------
The Prince: "Did you kill Jahamaraj Jah?"
Lady: "Yes."
The Prince: "My Gods! Why?"
Lady: "His existence offended me."

[ThufferinThuccotash]

Our local paper has a column called "Around Town", written by a woman who keeps track of local events and personalities. She recently asked if anybody knew where she could redeem thousands of aluminum can pop tops to help dialysis patients. A letter with a link to snopes is on my list of things to do.

------------------
TT

"It is better to know some of the questions than all of the answers."
--James Thurber

[SingleDad]

I spent about two days recently on the Great Gas Out legend...

Back when I was in High School, me and my friends convinced our especially gullible friend that Abraham Lincoln was a conehead (which is why he wore the stovepipe hat).

By the way, this purports to be the true story of the Rocket Car (http://cardhouse.com/rocketcar/). It might not be true, but it's a hell of a story!

------------------
If Cecil Adams did not exist, we would be obliged to create Him.

[thirdwarning]

I usually just kill them off when they come in, but I got the AOL-Intel merger thing two or three times in a week and finally hit the "reply to all" button and sent a message back saying that this is CLASSIC URBAN LEGEND and that it clutters up the airwaves.
I got a message back saying that everybody knows it's a UL but that people like to feel connected. And when I answered that I prefer to feel connected to people I actually know, the response was that I should just go right on protecting "my" airwaves.
How do you keep these things from proliferating when people KNOW they're not true and send them anyway?!?

[tomndebb]

Will it help fight the bad old UL if I buy all my electric devices from Europe?

[Northern Piper]

A friend sent me this one, which I've been passing along:
I was on my way to the post office to pick up my case of free M&M's (sent to me because I forwarded their e-mail to five other people, celebrating the fact that the year 2000 is 'MM' in Roman numerals) when I ran into a friend whose neighbor, a young man, was home recovering from having been served a rat in his bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken - which is predictable, since as everyone knows, there's no actual chicken in Kentucky Fried Chicken, which is why the government made them change their name to KFC. Anyway, one day this guy went to sleep, and when he awoke he was in his bathtub, and it was full of ice, and he was sore all over. When he got out of the tub he realized that HIS KIDNEYS HAD BEEN STOLEN!! He saw a note on his mirror that said 'Call 911!' but he was afraid to use his phone because it was connected to his computer, and there was a virus on his computer that would destroy his hard drive if he opened an e-mail entitled 'Join the crew!' He knew it wasn't a hoax because he himself was a computer programmer who was working on software to prevent a global disaster in which all the computers get together and distribute the $250.00 Neiman-Marcus cookie recipe under the leadership of Bill Gates. (It's true - I read it all last week in a mass e-mail from BILL GATES HIMSELF, who was also promising me a free Disney World vacation and $5,000 if I would forward the e-mail to everyone I know.) The poor man then tried to call 911 from a pay phone to report his missing kidneys, but a voice on the line first asked him to press #90, which unwittingly gave the bandit full access to the phone line at the guy's expense. Then reaching into the coin-return slot, he got jabbed with an HIV-infected needle around which was wrapped around a note that said, 'Welcome to the world of AIDS.' Luckily he was only a few blocks from the hospital - the one where that little boy who is dying of cancer is, the one whose last wish is for everyone in the world to send him an e-mail, and the American Cancer Society has agreed to pay him a nickel for every e-mail he receives. I sent him two e-mails. One of them was a bunch of x's and o's in the shape of an angel (if you get it and forward it to more than 10 people, you will have good luck, but for 10 people you will only have OK luck, and if you send it to fewer than 10 people you will have BAD LUCK FOR SEVEN YEARS). So anyway the poor guy tried to drive himself to the hospital, but on the way he noticed another car driving without its lights on. To be helpful, he flashed his lights at him, and was promptly shot as part of a gang initiation. Send THIS to all the friends who send you their junk mail and you will receive 4 green m&ms. If you don't, the owner of Proctor and Gamble will report you to his Satanist friends and you will have more bad luck: you will get cancer from the Sodium Laureth Sulfate in your shampoo, your mother will develop breast cancer from using the antiperspirant which clogs the pores under your arms, and the U.S. government will put a tax on your e-mails forever. I know this is all true 'cause I read it on the Internet.


------------------
and the stars o'erhead were dancing heel to toe

[Doug Bowe]

Another good place that I'm surprised hasn't shown up yet is:
http://urbanlegends.miningco.com/library/blhoax.htm?pid=2733&cob=home

My friends have simply stopped sending me "email tracking" stuff because they know they will get links and addresses back.
It's a lonely fight because things you thought had died will appear again years later.

[Rincewind]

I am proud to say that I have fought the good fight.

A few weeks ago, I was on a business trip to Omaha. I was with some coworkers and the discussion got around to where we couls go for lunch. Someone mentioned KFC. Another person then told everyone that she didn't eat at KFC anymore since she heard that they use genetically engineered animals that can no longer be called chickens. I jumped right in and told her it was false.
She said that she had gottten an e-mail telling her about it. I told her that not all e-mails are 100% accurate. I then told her to go to Snopes.com.
Then the discussion got around to various UL's concerning fast food places. I recognized most of them, and told people to go to Snopes.com to see prove that they are false.
Overall, most of the people were already skeptical of the stories and we managed to convince a couple of people that they were false.

------------------
"Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent" Isaac Asimov

[RM Mentock]

Originally posted by Chief Crunch:
For the most part, it's useless. I could not convince my aunt that the -gry riddle was altered and the answer was intended to be "language" as in "there are only three words in the English language." Most people react with some bizarre, vehement form of defense with lines like, "No, no, this REALLY happened to a friend of mine."

I think you've been sucked in. See section 2.2 of the rec.puzzles faq (http://xraysgi.ims.uconn.edu/). There is no documentation supporting your version of the gry puzzle that I know of.

------------------
rocks

[Chief Crunch]

There have been several -gry threads since I've been here and that is the version of the -gry riddle most people cite as the original. I tried a search, but it seems not to be working. I clicked on the link you provided and looked around, but there's no mention of a FAQ, so I did a Yahoo! search and came up with the following:

What are the three common English words that end in -GRY?

There are only two: angry and hungry. The rec.puzzles archive offers a
large collection of words that end in -GRY, but none of them could be
considered even remotely common.

There are many generally unsatisfying "trick" answers to the problem,
which depend on a specific wording of the question or that the question be
spoken instead of written. There seems to be no agreement among puzzle
historians about which form is the original, or even the age of the
problem. In any event, it is apparent that the frequent mutations of the
puzzle statement over the years have erased whatever answer was intended
by the original author.

The FAQ refers to a "trick" answer, which is the category "The English language" version would fall under. Every copy of the riddle I have ever seen contains a line akin to "And if you've listened/read carefully, I've already told you what the word is", which makes no sense if the "There are only three words in the English language. What is the third word?" part is left out.

[RM Mentock]

Oops, sorry, that link was to the rec.puzzles archive, not the faq. But you did quote the section of the faq that I was referring to. Do you have some original references? The writers of the faq would be very interested.

------------------
rocks

[Chief Crunch]

How can there be "original references" for a riddle that travels via word of mouth or the internet? It's like trying to find the single person that started any given urban legend or chain letter. Just because the "trick" answer is "unsatisfying" as the FAQ says, doesn't mean it isn't necessarily the original. In my experience, a great many riddles have stupid trick answers. Of course, there's no way of knowing for sure what the original wording of the riddle and answer were. The point I was trying to make is that my aunt still believes there are only three words that end in "-gry", and she also believes the third word is used everyday, but she's just overlooked it.

[Mr.Zambezi]

The "Three words ending in GRY showed up on the local talk show today. I called in and read him the original riddle and let him and the listeners on the joke.

People Still called in with words like Pgry and Aggry and Gry. Since he is a conservative talk show host and therefore intelligent ;) he told these people that they were wrong, that it is a stupid riddle and to just get over it.

Score one over ignorance!

[Beruang]

I take the annoying route. I reply to the entire list, and even everyone on any forwarded list. I include a politely phrased memo about the senders having "good intentions," then I include a link to about.com.

I've gotten a couple nasty letters from total strangers, which is fun. But I now also have a couple of friends who run all ULs by me before sending them on.

Oh, and our company now has a policy against mass-mailing e-mail to the entire staff, brought about in part by some UL mailings a few years back.



------------------
"The dawn of a new era is felt and not measured." Walter Lord

[RM Mentock]

Originally posted by Mr.Zambezi:
The "Three words ending in GRY showed up on the local talk show today. I called in and read him the original riddle and let him and the listeners on the joke.

Well, as Chief Crunch noticed, there is no original riddle. At least, to the best of our knowledge. To say that there is, is a form of UL itself.

It is well documented that there is no third common word ending in -gry, but that is a different story. Have you heard the version that turns on -gry being pronounced "g or y?"

------------------
rocks

[evilbeth]

Being the sadistic person that I am I still enjoy the fight. I got a warm-fuzzy feeling the other day when I opened an e-mail from a friend who is a notorious UL-forwarder with the subject line, "Hey, is this true or not?" Apparently, she has tried to check snopes but did not look close enough to know they had a search feature. (It was an UL, BTW.)

At work, everyone received an official e-mail from the powers-that-be telling them not to forward such things (along with chain letters) mostly because I sent a letter to the CEO telling him that a select few of his employees were taking up valuable time (on the clock) and space on corporate e-mail to spread lies.

Those of you who have given up the fight, feel free to forward any messages you get to me and I will reply to everyone on the lists under the name, "UL Buster Extraordinaire" and set them straight! (I have no life!)

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I always try to do things in chronological order.

[CurtC]

There's some pleasure to be derived by just sitting back and watch the beauty of a UL being propagated. However, since the elimination of ignorance is important, I usually modify my tack.

If it's an e-mailed version, I'll check with snopes and reply back (to the sender only) with the link to snopes. I also usually will quote a pertinent paragraph from the site, in case the person is too lazy to follow the link. I would never reply to the whole distribution list, because you're basically calling that person an I-D-ten-T (ID10T) publically. This is not a way to make friends.

In conversation, I'll refrain from jumping in and declaring it to be a known UL, unless someone asks its UL status. But I will ask a few hard questions to maybe pique the teller's (and listeners') skepticism. Questions like "Do you yourself know this person?" and "Did he tell you himself?". Also, "Don't they have to precisely match a kidney to its donor?" and "I thought Jay Leno collected old cars, not Harleys."

Actually, I hardley ever hear UL's by word-of-mouth anymore. I think the last one I heard was the Leno/Elvis/Harley one, and that was about five years ago. And after correcting the e-mail blasters a couple of times, I stop getting those. I'm not sure if they get wise and stop sending them, or they just take me off their distribution list.

[Gr8Kat]

I am on the verge of giving up. I have one friend who sends me every UL that comes down the pike. I send her references to snopes and the F-secure site (I get every virus warning from her, too), but she never takes the hint. I even say in all the messages "Bookmark these sites and check them first next time," but she never does.

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"I hope life isn't a big joke, because I don't get it," Jack Handy

The Kat House (http://members.aol.com/gr8kat1/KatGen/home.htm)
Join the FSH Muscular Dystrophy Webring (http://members.aol.com/gr8kat1/KatGen/fshwebring.htm)

[docandjean]

I'm in the "reply to all" camp. And I tend to add snitty comments about people not checking their facts before forwarding mass mailings. The worst ones are from folks on AOL, with forwards buried inside of forwards. I did have one person email back to me after I responed thanking me for setting him straight.
And I have a link to both the Straight Dope homepage and the snopes homepage on my website.
Fighting ignorance is an uphill battle.

[Patricinus Scriblerus]

Remember what your Mommy told you "If it sounds too good to be true it probably is".

Good advice! Mothers are always so smart!

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There are only two things that are infinite...the Universe and Man's stupidity...I'm not sure about the Universe though.

[Sassy]

Originally posted by opus:
Some people are impervious to arithmetic.


this is today's brilliant statement... I may get it tattooed somewhere :) :) :)



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I am a redhead, you see, and I do not tempt. I insist. -Cristi

[Whammo]

What are you kidding? I'm busy thinking em up, and forwarding them to everyone on my list! :D

*runs and hides*

[Whammo]

oh great... THAT had to be my 300th post....

[RavingMad]

Quite a few people have referenced Snopes as the be-all and end-all authority on a tale's veracity. WHY?

Why is one Barbara "Debunker Extraordinaire" Mikkelson given such deference as a flawless authority? She provides plenty of cites for her answers, sure, but has anyone actually checked them out? independently verified her conclusions? conducted their own research?

I imagine the answer is 'no.' (Though please let me know if you have.)

So isn't blindly following her debunking of ULs (almost) as bad as blindly believing the UL in the first place? (Now, I'll fully admit that to a skeptic such as myself, nearly every one of the legends she debunks is, prima facie, untrue, but then why not appeal to simple common sense instead of to an unknown and unaccredited authority?)

As long as we're on that topic, why believe Cecil? Ms. Mikkelson at least has the good graces to provide cites for her answers, whereas our gracious host here (usually) doesn't even give us that much. Many people here blindly follow his every dictum as words from on high, despite any supporting evidence of his claims.

So why do y'all, self-proclaimed skeptics throughout, elevate Unca Cece to the demigod of truth?


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~ Complacency is far more dangerous than outrage ~

[Patty O'Furniture]

Seeking out anybody's advice implies that we assume the luminary in question has the most valid answer within [reasonably] easy reach. These folks have acquired question authority, and they will continue to rest upon pillars until such time as they prove themselves unworthy or unable.

Those who are willing to check their own work, make corrections to past errors, and accept the laws of science and fact no matter how uncomfortable or unpopular they may be prove themselves to be worthy of the challenges we bring.

More, these sources have a fairly solid history of successfully supplying satisfying answers. We seek out the truth using the brightest light at our disposal. I would love to be able to take several days off work every now & then and lose myself in a dark & scary corner of the Library of Congress doing some of my own fact finding, but this just isn't feasible for most.

The human race is (as far as we know) the only species to have formed a collective intelligence, there are a few of us deemed more capable of dipping into it for the benefit of the rest of us.

You're welcome.

[SoMoMom]

Originally posted by opus:
This isn't pretty, but I need to show you all something:

http://www.geocities.com/attrayant_1/cookie2.jpg

There is a coin-slot type box in the break room for your pull tabs (help Ron's kids, don't ya know), I wanna give up.

Anybody ever felt like they successfully turned a chain email junkie away from the dark side of the force?

Excuse me, but our local McDonald's has a pull tab recepticle. Are you trying to say that people shouldn't contribute to it?

Yes, I have at least stopped my sister from forwarding the e-mail and whenever I get one from someone else I send back a link to the same story on Urban Legends. (I don't know whether it does any good though). Only one person has thanked me for the address. I printed a hard copy of a letter that I finally sent to one friend that was not getting the message and took it to my neighbor that just got her first computer. I said, "I had to send this to a friend of mine. Before you start trying to save dying children 5 cents at a time by forwarding e-mails, read this." Ok, so that's 3. Three people that don't forward urban legends because of my efforts.

[tomndebb]

If you think Unca Cece gets uncritical acceptance, you ought to spend more time over in Comments on Cecil's Columns.

There are two things at work, here. First, much of the genuflecting at the shrine of Cecil is mildly tongue in cheek. Second, if you go through his books (increasingly available on the archives) you'll notice that while he does, indeed, admit when people catch out errors in his columns, the percentage of people who catch him in an error is tiny compared to the number of people who yell "Aha!" only to have him demonstrate that his research was better than theirs.

Some of us are more credulous than others, but I think we uphold a certain level of skepticism pretty well.

(A couple of months ago, Libertarian started a thread in Great Debates challenging the quality of Snopes. It was a pretty merry brouhaha for a while although I don't remember the Topic's title.)

(Cecil caused the Encyclopædia Britannica to modify one of their articles; I haven't.)

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Tom~

[SoMoMom]

Hey how'd that recipe get on the post. I deleted it! Well, I thought I did. :)

[BoBettie]

I have to say, I got the KFC one last week from a former co-worker. (she still works with my husband) I actually wrote back and said not only was it untrue, it was so fucking ridiculous that I was worried about her for believing it. She told my husband that she was embarrassed, and always had admired my ability to "tell it like it is". Needless to say, no more forwards.

I'm also fighting the good fight with my aunt, who USED to send along all that shit. Now she doesn't bother. She meant well, though.
Zette

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"If I had to live your life, I'd be begging to have someone pop out both my eyes. Just in case I came across a mirror." - android209 (in the Pit)
Zettecity (http://www.angelfire.com/ny3/zettecity/index.html)
Voted "Most Empathetic"- can you believe that?

[Patty O'Furniture]

Spreading that recipe around, eh mom?

Excuse me, but our local McDonald's has a pull tab recepticle. Are you trying to say that people shouldn't contribute to it?

I'm not saying that they don't have value, just that they don't have much value. It almost seems an act of cruelty to toss the can in the trash and say to those kids in the R.McD house: "You can't have this aluminum can, but you can have this little pull tab!" It's like throwing a four course dinner in the trash but saving the crumbs left on the place mat for the hungry & homeless.

Snopes sez:

Seeing as how people were bound and determined to collect pull-tabs for charity, in 1987 McDonald's found it a good idea to get into the act. Their "Collect a Billion" campaign is a response to pull-tab mania.
Tabs dropped off at various McDonald's are taken to a local recycling company and the money made from recycling them is given to the local Ronald McDonald House to help defray operating costs.

And...


It needs be stressed yet again that pull-tabs are far from "found money" -- even Ronald McDonald House gets only 40 cents a pound for them ($474 per million tabs, according to their web page). You'd still do far more good organizing a local soda can recycling program and donating the proceeds to the same Ronald McDonald House (or indeed any other charity). Next time someone asks you to donate a few pull-tabs for a good cause, donate a few facts instead. You'll be doing everyone a favor.

The point is, people are missing the point. Collect a million tabs and the R.McD house gets a measly $474. Expend the same effort and collect a million pennies, and they get ten thousand dollars. Walk through your office and ask people to reach into their pocket & donate either (a) an aluminum pull tab, or (b) a penny. Which do you think you'll get more of?

[chique]

For what it's worth I'm also a "reply all" type. I REALLY hate those stupid chain mails. Here's my version:

The message sent to you earlier was a hoax, one of many floating around the internet. As much as I'd like to say "Thanks for the spam, thank you, goodbye!!" you are a friend (or a friend of a friend) so I'm just passing this on so you know :)

While it's nice to get "stuff" from friends, it would be nicer if that "stuff" was pleasant, friendly messages wishing someone a good day rather than another useless warning cluttering up inboxes around the world. Please check one of the following website for information concerning chain e-mail, urban legends, and hoaxes - email and otherwise. Some of these links are dry, some entertaining, some educating, and other just pretty damn funny.

Thanks much, and have a GREAT DAY!!!!!
http://urbanlegends.miningco.com/culture/urbanlegends/library/blhoax.htm
http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/hoax.html
http://www.kumite.com/myths/
http://www.snopes.com/
http://www.urbanlegends.com/
http://korova.com/virus/hoax.htm
http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/CIACChainLetters.html

I haven't gotten any nasty responses; most of them are along the lines of "Who are you?" To them I send the one about the boy with a bag of sawdust for a body :)

[Patty O'Furniture]

Pull Tab Hoax Update:

The lady here who spearheads the pull tab drive showed me a letter from some organization called Family Campers & RVers.

It said thanx so much for the recent contribution of 73 pounds of tabs (according to the letter it takes over 1300 tabs to make a pound). I did some quick math and infomed her that using those numbers and based on the amount of cash the letter claims to have received from the recycling center, a single pull tab must therefore have a cash value of about 10¢! That just doesn't make any sense when you consider that it takes about 33 whole cans to make a pound, and recycling centers will give anywhere from 10¢-28¢ per pound (equal to .6¢ average per can).

Some people are impervious to arithmetic.

[SoMoMom]

Aw, now I see. I don't drink soda because I'm severely allergic to it and I don't drink enough beer in cans to be worth the 3 minute drive to McDonald's. Actually, I was hoping you'd tell me something that I could take to the McDonald's to have them get rid of that big annoying recepticle that takes up so much of that valuable waiting in line space. ;) And I'm proud to say that we donate our whole aluminum cans to our local volunteer recycling group. I give pennies to Ronald for his houses.

[Chronos]

Many of you seem to be losing hope in this noble batle against ignorance. There's at least a half-dozen posts here asking, "does it do any good to try to enlighten people?" Of course it does! After all, most of the people on this board, I'll wager, once did believe UL's, and were probably told by a friend to be more skeptical.
For what it's worth, I always reply all to dangerous (i.e., "Don't use sunscreen!")or pointless (money in various forms for forwarding comes to mind) hoaxes or panicmongers (virus warnings, gang initiations), making sure to include a reference or two and the strongest of the logical arguments. On the other hand, some of the stories, although false, are nonetheless funny enough to have merit in their own right (most alleged Darwin Awards fall into this category).
The thing to remember is that yes, misinformation spreads quickly on the Internet, but the truth has the potential to spread just as fast.

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"There are only two things that are infinite: The Universe, and human stupidity-- and I'm not sure about the Universe"
--A. Einstein

[RM Mentock]

Originally posted by STARK:
Quite a few people have referenced Snopes as the be-all and end-all authority on a tale's veracity. WHY?

...

So why do y'all, self-proclaimed skeptics throughout, elevate Unca Cece to the demigod of truth?

The demigod part is a joke. He's not really a demigod. His columns have had plenty of vetting.

Barbara Mikkelson, Snopes, are long time regulars at the usenet group AFU (alt.folklore.urban). Their website contains a digest of the collective knowledge of AFU. They regularly update the legends at the website, and send out mailings inviting interested others to peruse and criticize them. AFU frequently entertains discussions of the snopes pages. It's not that Barbara is mostly right, it's that her website is.

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rocks

[RM Mentock]

Originally posted by RM Mentock:
The demigod part is a joke.

That's a joke, of course.

[labradorian]

It's great your local McDeath has a pull-tab donation bin. But you're better off pitching pennies into it than pull tabs.

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Dee da dee da dee dee do do / Dee ba ditty doh / Deedle dooby doo ba dee um bee ooby / Be doodle oodle doodle dee doh http://members.xoom.com/labradorian/

[manhattan]

::test::

[Missy2U]

http://boards.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum7/HTML/001009.html

That's the thread Libertarian started regarding Snopes.

[redtail23]

The first time or few, I generally reply politely to the sender with links to the various UL sites. If repeat offenses continue, I'll move up to the reply-all technique and send nastier replies, still including links. Since (1) writing civil-yet-evil replies is one of my favorite hobbies :D, and (2) I work in MIS and am therefore obviously an expert on anything even remotely technology-related :rolleyes:, that usually fixes the problem. Or at least they take *me* off of their distribution list. (We do have a policy against email to ALL staff, so I don't reply-all on those; I wait for the email gods to strike down the offender.)

One of my favorites - I replied to an UL email with a link to a debunk site; the UL site mentioned the fact that *another* email was in progress warning that the first email was a virus and stating CLEARLY that the virus threat was a hoax...I got a plaintive reply asking me for help with the virus that was now on their computer. !!!