If It Isn’t True, Why Do People Believe It?

(Conspiracy Theory Analysis)

Every generation has its urban legends, stories everyone believes. For my generation (Gen X), a commonly held urban legend is that Mikey, a character from a commercial for Life cereal, died from eating Pop Rocks mixed with soda.

This did not happen, though it’d be kind of awesome if it did. Not awesome for Mikey, obviously, or his loved ones, but just a great story, you know?

In recent years, I have heard students at two different universities tell me they’re certain the cafeteria staff puts laxatives in the food as a way to prevent food poisoning under the theory that the faster the food moves through one’s system the less likely one is to contract E. coli. For this to be true, we would have to believe cafeterias are deliberately poisoning students in order to keep from poisoning students.

We also have a related phenomenon called the Mandela Effect, in which large groups of people collectively remember something that never happened. It’s named after South African civil rights leader Nelson Mandela, who millions of people remember dying in jail during the apartheid era (1948–91) in that country, when in reality he lived to see the end of apartheid and become president of South Africa before dying at age ninety-five in 2013.

Other examples of the Mandela Effect include people believing the song “We Are the Champions” by Queen ends with the words “of the world” (it doesn’t), and that Chick-fil-A was once spelled Chic-fil-A or Chik-fil-A (it wasn’t). (If you search for the Mandela Effect on the Internet, you’ll see dozens of other examples.)

One theory explaining the Mandela Effect is that multiple universes run through time concurrently, and we occasionally “slip” between them, temporarily experiencing one of the other timelines before slipping back to our main timeline. It’s a cool idea, based in genuine theoretical physics, but honestly I find it a little disappointing. If I can slip into an alternate universe, I’d prefer one where I can jump like thirty feet in the air, rather than one where Chick-fil-A is spelled differently.

Anyway, if we set aside the parallel universe theory, there’s usually a rational explanation for why so many people have mistaken memories. In the case of Nelson Mandela’s death, I believe it’s likely people are conflating Mandela with Bantu Stephen Biko, another prominent South African civil rights activist, who tragically did die in jail in 1977, having been beaten by police. Biko’s story was prominent in the news at the time and further popularized by a movie, Cry Freedom (1987), starring Denzel Washington as Biko. Over time, as Mandela came to represent the fight against apartheid in so many people’s minds, I believe he became the avatar for the struggle. Anything that happened to a South African civil rights leader must have happened to Mandela.

When examined, any urban legend, including examples of the Mandela Effect, tells us something about the culture in which it thrives, as well as why people believe the legends.

EXPERIENCE

Using an urban legend as a jumping-off point, explore the legend and develop a theory as to why it is believed by so many people, while also convincingly debunking the legend.

AUDIENCE

You’re writing for someone who believes the urban legend to be true, with the purpose of convincing them it isn’t true and explaining what is actually true.

Consider how difficult this might be. It’s possible you will be slaughtering someone else’s sacred cow, or challenging something they’re certain they remember happening. This can be unsettling. No one likes to be told they’re wrong. There’s a reason so many of these legends persist. In many cases people want to believe them.

You’ll have to do a thorough analysis of the audience’s needs, attitudes, and knowledge in order to devise an approach to achieving your goal. You’ll probably have to revisit those thoughts throughout your process, to make sure you’re not unintentionally alienating them in ways that will prevent them from appreciating your message.

PROCESS

1. Choose an urban legend.

It can be fun to first try to think of something you believe to be true, but on second thought may be an urban legend. For a decade, I assumed that Mikey of Life cereal died from eating Pop Rocks, because I’d heard it somewhere and didn’t bother to question it.

The legend need not be something trivial or silly. That we’re supposed to drink eight glasses of water a day to stay healthy is not backed by any scientific evidence. In some cases it may be actively harmful by overtaxing the kidneys. Go ahead, look it up for yourself. There are hundreds of these sorts of things floating around. It can start to get a little spooky once you recognize how much you think you know is based in . . . not much.

2. Investigate.

Find out as much as you can about the urban legend you’ve chosen. Many of them will be debunked by a single website (such as Snopes.com), but don’t settle for one account. You’re looking to surround the problem, including by finding whatever evidence you can that indicates the urban legend might be true (or the origins of why so many people believe it may be true).

3. Figure out what you think you want to say.

Different writers will do different things in this step. Some like to do lots of brainstorming and/or outlining. Others like to arrange their research as they look for inspiration. Personally, I usually just start writing. I grab onto a single idea, write until I’ve exhausted it, and hope and pray another idea appears. I often don’t even know what I’m writing; I’m just trying to uncover the ideas. It’s my version of brainstorming.

4. Draft.

Keeping your purpose in mind, write a draft. Remember that it’s an argument with a particular purpose, to convince your audience that a particular urban legend is not true. Length? Whatever—it’s a draft. Write until you’ve exhausted what you have to say about your subject. We call this a “down draft,” where you get it all down.

5. Shape the writing.

Looking at all the material you’ve generated, and considering your audience’s needs, attitudes, and knowledge, shape what you’ve done into a coherent essay that fulfills the purpose of debunking the legend while also offering insight into why the legend is so persistent, and doing it in a way that will convince those who were previously inclined to believe the legend.

As for structure, think of your audience. Each step of the way, they will have needs you should seek to meet. You may shock them in the beginning in a way that will make them resist the rest of your message, which means you should then attend to that shock and reassure them they’ll be better off knowing the truth. A different approach may involve walking them through the evidence bit by bit to induce them to come to the conclusion you’re advocating for essentially on their own.

I can’t tell you the best structure, because it is highly dependent on your choice of legend and your audience. Tone is going to matter too. If you come across as a know-it-all, or seem dismissive of anyone who might’ve believed the legend, you’re fighting an uphill battle.

Length? Long enough, and not a sentence longer.

6. Get feedback.

This is a piece of writing that will probably benefit from getting feedback from other people. To help them, develop some questions you want them to answer about the piece. Without specific questions, readers may just tell you something is good or not good. What do you want your readers to consider about your writing?

7. Revise, edit, polish.

When you’re trying to be convincing, making the piece as polished as possible is usually a sound idea.

8. Title.

A title that invites the reader in, to explore what you’ve found, and opens them up to learning something new feels like the right move here. Good titles sometimes show up unbidden, but sometimes they take some coaxing.

REFLECT

Reflect on the feedback portion of this experience. How helpful was the feedback to improving your piece? What was helpful? What wasn’t helpful? In hindsight, would you have given your readers different questions to focus on?

Imagine yourself on the other side of the equation, reading someone else’s piece written with the same purpose in mind. What would you do to try to be helpful to them?