# You'd think everyone would know about
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [August 7, 2025, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800 "2025-08-07T06:44:03Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 4
### Author:  [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/61 "2025-08-07T18:21:52Z")
> [@Spiderman](#):
>
> I know about WBC but I would be clueless with your reference to “the Phelpses”.
Well, I did try to clarify… Westboro Baptist Church, “God Hates Fags” signs, picketing the funerals of service members, etc. Nope, nothing rang a bell. I realize I’m probably more familiar with them because they’re “local” but I know they were making the national news quite a bit when ol’ Fred was still alive.
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### Author:  [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/62 "2025-08-07T18:23:33Z")
> [@doreen](#):
>
> I was alive and sentient during the ’80s - and as far as I remember, music already sort of divided people into groups.
My husband and I are far apart in age, but we both lived in Florida most of our lives. It seemed to me that Billy Joel music was inescapable.
Husband seems to have missed most culture and news during the 80s, but I understand. For him it was a decade of personal upheaval and young offspring. I missed most of the 90s for the same reason!
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### Author:  [@sunacres](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sunacres)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/63 "2025-08-07T18:23:50Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#):
>
> I’m generally really not very good at identifying plants and trees, but oaks also have such characteristic leaves that I can identify them immediately.
I was always confused about oak identification. Growing up in California, when I saw the “oak leaf cluster” military awards the leaves looked nothing like the oaks I grew up with. Eventually I learned that oaks have very varied varieties.
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### Author:  [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/64 "2025-08-07T18:27:17Z")
> [@purplehorseshoe](#):
>
> Who TF can’t point to a rose, and say, “That’s a rose!”?
I know someone. I’ve shared the story before, but I’ll share it again, as she is/was the single most ignorant person I’ve ever encountered. And this happened about 38 years ago!
I was having a conversation with a co-worker. She was venting about how much trouble she was having to get a social security number for her son because he was born in England. She and her husband were on a military base when the birth occurred and both American citizens.
Another co-worker who overheard our conversation chimed in: “Oh, I know just what you mean! I’m having the same problems. My son was born in Hawaii!”
Ummm.
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### Author:  [@Calder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Calder)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/65 "2025-08-07T18:32:38Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#):
>
> > [@chela](#):
> >
> > OJ or the Phelps clan? Nah.
>
> FWIW my wife read my post above and agrees with you, in theory.
>
> But I can’t agree about OJ. Depending on how old you are, he was famous in five different areas:
>
> Football, outstanding at USC and the NFL
>
> Hertz commercials 🙂 (this is where I first saw him, since he never played for the Packers)
>
> Acting (Naked Gun films. Roots. Capricorn One; I was surprised to see he was an actor _while_ he played at USC!)
>
> Football analyst/broadcaster including Monday Night Football
>
> and, double homicide and subsequent slow speed chase and the “trial of the century”, acquittal, “If I Did it”, and the related Law and Order ripped from the headlines episode.
>
> I don’t know how an adult at the times could miss _all_ of those
Does wishing I could have missed all of that count? I do remember getting pissed that the NBA finals got preempted to show an announcer saying breaking news OJ simpson is running away in his Ford Bronco with a gun to his head….. Did we mention that OJ has a gun to his head… This just in, OJ Simpson has a gun to his head while driving… For over an hour.
I did everything I could to avoid the whole thing from that point on, as I was sick of hearing about it.
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### Author:  [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/66 "2025-08-07T18:48:38Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#):
>
> Understood. Amazing that she hadn’t heard of that
Not if you had ever met her.
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### Author:  [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/67 "2025-08-07T18:56:49Z")
You also mean “The Ancient Aliens Channel”?
I once worked with a fellow pharmacist who didn’t know that lesbians menstruate.
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### Author:  [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/68 "2025-08-07T18:57:36Z")
> [@SCAdian](#):
>
> To me, those are “groups”, not “bands”. Bands play music in parades, parks and halftime shows.
😄 That’s funny. What century do you think this is? Do you think JFK has a chance to beat Nixon?
Oh, right, you’re Society for Creative Anachronism. _Oh we won’t give in, let’s go living in the past_. In that case, carry on. (I’m not sure if having LBJ on the ticket helps or hurts.)
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### Author:  [@ricepad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ricepad)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/69 "2025-08-07T18:58:02Z")
I recall reading in one of Herb Caen’s columns (SF Chonicle) around 1980 or so that he supposedly overheard a young teen in the Tower Records store on Columbus in San Francisco yell to her friends as she was sorting through the album racks, “Hey! Paul McCartney was in a band before Wings!” No idea how much of the story was true, but that was Herb Caen.
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### Author:  [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/70 "2025-08-07T18:59:02Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#):
>
> My oldest nephew was 20 in 2019, and I’m 100% sure he doesn’t know any of those bands. Why should he? He’s a member of the first native digital generation and has very different channels for information, including music, than the generation of his parents.
It’s true that digital natives have a totally different relationship to media, especially music, than we do. But at the same time, there’s a certain freedom that comes with that, an agnosticism about era. New music is new music, obviously, but everything else is this big amorphous blob of Stuff. One thing is just as good as another thing, regardless of where it came from or when it was made. All that matters is that you like it.
My older daughter is 14. She enjoys the Ramones and Bikini Kill as much as she likes The Warning or Dorothy or Måneskin. She ravenously searches through playlists and recommendation services, and as she finds things she likes, she adds them to her catalog. It’s literally all just music to her.
Naturally this leaves her with gaps, because she’s hunting randomly and just stumbling on stuff in an organic but haphazard fashion. Every now and then, I’ll notice she’s into something new, and I’ll ask her about something in the same vein. Recently, she started listening to Palaye Royale, so I asked if she knew My Chemical Romance. She’d never heard of them, but spun them up immediately, and pronounced them excellent.
My point is that, yes, she and others of her generation may lack certain knowledge, but the _shape_ of their ignorance is completely different, and often wildly surprising.
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### Author:  [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/71 "2025-08-07T18:59:27Z")
Some months later, Newsweek magazine mentioned that the sequestered jurors had their media censored to remove references to OJ, and someone wrote in asking where he could subscribe to that service.
I also remember a reporter who said that his preschooler recognized OJ on TV before they recognized Bill Clinton. I thought that was very sad.
Also, when the Oklahoma City bombing happened, my first thought was, “Okay, so how long will this dislodge OJ from the top of the news?” The answer? TWO DAYS.
I have always believed that the verdict was because the LA riots were a little too fresh in the jurors’ minds.
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### Author:  [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/72 "2025-08-07T19:02:11Z")
> [@Cervaise](#):
>
> Ramones and Bikini Kill … The Warning or Dorothy or Måneskin. …Palaye Royale… My Chemical Romance.
Of all of these I have only heard of The Ramones. But I don’t know their music.
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### Author:  [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/73 "2025-08-07T19:02:18Z")
The Phelps’? I was sure you meant the Olympic swimmer guy. I was briefly upset. Not long because Dopers informed really quickly.
See? It just happened to me.
I knew it was close to Hiroshima because PBS had a couple shows about it running. Not _Hiroshima Day._ Never heard that.
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### Author:  [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/74 "2025-08-07T19:03:00Z")
That urban legend has existed since long before 1980. I could, however, picture someone saying, “Wow, Paul McCartney was in a band AFTER the Beatles?”
Or, for that matter, Darius Rucker was in a pop band before he became a country singer, or that Dave Grohl was in a band before the Foo Fighters.
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### Author:  [@Dropo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dropo)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/75 "2025-08-07T19:03:44Z")
Some years ago, I had to call an operator to connect me to an operator in Finland. I added – pointlessly, I thought – that I needed someone who spoke English. The American operator asked me what language they speak in Finland. I almost ended the call right there trying to process the ignorance.
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### Author:  [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/76 "2025-08-07T19:10:43Z")
A while back, the library I volunteer at got some vintage children’s books, and one was a “Three Bears” book, published in the early 1950s, where Papa Bear is sitting in his armchair by the fireplace, reading “Kon-Tiki.” Shortly afterwards, I was at a meetup with some fairly well educated people, and mentioned that the artist would have had no idea that people would still read that phenomenal best-seller 60 years later. The other people there all looked at me: “What’s ‘Kon-Tiki’?” So, I had to do a little explaining.
> **[Kon-Tiki expedition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kon-Tiki_expedition)**
>
> The Kon-Tiki expedition was a 1947 journey by raft across the Pacific Ocean from South America to the Polynesian islands, led by Norwegian explorer and writer Thor Heyerdahl. The raft was named Kon-Tiki after the Inca god Viracocha, for whom "Kon-Tiki" was said to be an old name. Heyerdahl's book on the expedition was entitled The Kon-Tiki Expedition: By Raft Across the South Seas. A 1950 documentary film won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. A 2012 dramatized feature film was nomi...
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### Author:  [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/77 "2025-08-07T19:11:54Z")
Well, it happened, to me, again.
I don’t know what language they speak in Finland. I could make a guess. But a client may be more thorough and want their exact expectations met.
Yeah better to ask, if you’re not sure.
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### Author:  [@Frodo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frodo)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/78 "2025-08-07T19:12:32Z")
Finlandian!
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### Author:  [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/79 "2025-08-07T19:12:36Z")
Yeah, add me as another who has never heard of “Hiroshima Day” before. Obviously I know what Hiroshima is, but I’ve never heard it called that before. I would have been confused as well.
Is “Hiroshima Day” a thing in Australia?
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### Author:  [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2025, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youd-think-everyone-would-know-about/1021800/80 "2025-08-07T19:13:33Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#):
>
> I was at a meetup
A what? 😁
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