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Some stories sound too unrealistic to be true. That’s because quite often they aren’t. Whether it’s a myth, a conspiracy theory, or simply a lie someone blurted out, it might spread among people, making some of them actually believe it. And when they do, they are inclined to tell others about it.

Looking for some of the most unbelievable stories people consider to be true, redditors have repeatedly turned to the ‘Ask Reddit’ community with a question—what is the dumbest myth you have ever heard? The abundance of answers they received covered everything from dinosaur remains being planted by the government to people looking for gold for aliens. Scroll down to find more of their unbelievable answers.

#2

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Aside from everything in the bible itself, my mom told me that bibles could not burn because they contained the word of God so God protected them from being destroyed. She told me there were many instances of entire houses burning down but the bible(s) remaining intact and virtually unscathed. So I burned a bible when I was about 8 years old. Myth busted!

Jeditard , Aaron Burden Report

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Loverboy
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

lmfao I can only imagine the horror on her face when you burned a bible and I love it

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#4

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Your birthday decides who you are as a person

bauchwech , Nikhita Singhal Report

#5

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing The earth is only 6000 years old. Tell that to the Sumerians

rawbamatic , Michel wal Report

#6

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing My MIL got mad at me for reaching up high to grab something while pregnant because, "That'll wrap the umbilical cord around the baby's neck!"I told her that no part of my anatomy directly connects my arms to the inside of my placenta. She didn't believe me so I googled to show her it's an old wives tale. She got upset and cried. :/ Sweet lady but damn. Use some common sense

ComprehensiveScore4 , Anastasiia Chepinska Report

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#7

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing If you have "organ donor" on your driver's license then EMTs will let you die to take your organs

ajfirnfh , Yassine Khalfalli Report

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Loverboy
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

You don't need to call an ambulance to have your organs taken, I'll do it for free.

prahaladsai avatar
potatoe
Community Member
11 months ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Like in a few corrupt places it could be possible ig as organ trafficking is sadly a thing in the world

j23blondie avatar
Blondie23
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

that's cute... as if the EMTs would even stop to look at your license. I have never heard this one until today. crazy

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Ken Beattie
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I've heard it trotted out as an excuse not to tick the organ donor box on your license. Seems ridiculous to me. Considering just how many people are donors, there'd be thousands of deaths in ambulances a year.

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Jan Bowyer
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

On behalf of all first responders, I cry BS on this. NO ONE works more diligently to save lives.

emmuzka avatar
Emma London
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

This angers me. Just imagine how many viable potential donations are trashed yearly because of this belief.

mindykany avatar
Min
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I used to have a license plate that encouraged organ donation and one of my co-workers was really upset by it, constantly warning me that someone in need of an organ would intentionally crash into me.

nadine_salloum avatar
Nadine Saloum
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I hope you put your blood type on there to be extra helpful, I don't wanna scratch my car for nothing

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Queen Mab
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

This myth would require that EMTs are callous people that would refuse to help people. This idea is ridiculous. Do people really believe this nonsense?

denver888 avatar
pico diablo
Community Member
11 months ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Can we have your liver, then? . . . https://montypython.gifglobe.com/scene/?frame=MontyPythonsTheMeaningOfLife-sGjOluo4

jb_16 avatar
JB
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I have class 5 (motorbike in Canada) on my license. Apparently, we are commonly referred to as ‘organ donor’ by many emergency services. I’ll freely admit some riders (looking at you idiots who think wearing all the protective gear is weak/unnecessary) are riding in the oft proven wrong assumption they will never have an accident. Bottom line is it don’t matter how slow you are going, falling off hurts and is more likely to result in fatality than being enclosed by a metal frame. Wear all the protective gear and ride like everyone on the road is a homicidal maniac out to destroy you. Then you can hope to achieve my status: old and too fat to fit into my gear from 5 years ago.

hillidaa avatar
Josh
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I had a lady at the grocery store tell me once that the hospital killed her daughter. Specifically, that her daughter "died on the operating table, as they were harvesting her organs." I didn't know how to tell her that people rarely survive organ harvesting.

frcarter avatar
Pandapoo
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

They won’t let you die, they’ll put you on life support (if you make it to the hospital) and harvest them while you are “alive”.

sandrathomas_2 avatar
Just me, myself, and I
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

"In order to be an organ donor, you have to be in a hospital, on a ventilator, and have some type of neurologically devastating injury," said Heather Mekesa, the Chief Operations Officer of Lifebanc, Northeast Ohio's organ procurement organization.

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SZ
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Nah, they can't collect money from you if you're dead.

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ADJ
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

In my country you are organ donor by default, but you can opt out if for some reason you do not want to do the right thing.

hea_c avatar
StrangeOne
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

That's not fair to say. Some people cannot donate organs due to medical reasons that deem the organs untransferable. There's no need to shame people if they decide to opt out.

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mysterious(all pronouns)
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

You have to die IN the hospital, and all your organs have to be in condition, and they want you to live.

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Huddo's sister
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

People believe this?? They can't even use your organs if you actually die outside the hospital. Also can't use them without permission form your family (at least in Australia) regardless of you being on the donor list (unless they get the court involved).

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Tim B
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I have mine posted on an online auction in India.

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Ted Higgins
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Well as I Liver & Breathe you Kidney be up to those wee EMTs.

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Timbob
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Monty Python started taking organs before people died, years ago !

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Bill Walker
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Dirty Bumper Sticker: "I don't have to be dead to donate my organ"

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Jared Robinson
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Maybe not EMT's but doctors sure will push harder to take you off life support. And that is not a myth it is well documented.

hea_c avatar
StrangeOne
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I assume it's more about freeing up beds and devices. The maternity ward here is just like that, too. If a new mom is in labour for hours the docs get impatient and start forcing the labour to progress faster. One nurse told me outright I had to "hurry up" cos I was taking up a bed and a room. The bedside mannerisms in North America are getting pretty bad.

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Jan Bowyer
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

My god, are there really that many conspiracy wackos out there? Stupid, ignorant, gullible.

ivonash avatar
Ivona
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

They may not make as much of an effort to save the potential donor.

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Pablo Ramos
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Well... if an emergency triage surgeon that works nights has a fiancee in a transplant list and you arrive, young, healthy, and badly hurt...

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Israel Martinez
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

The other one is that if you abstain from being a donor, that they still won't take them ...

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#8

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing That dwarfs didn't exist before World War 2.

A friend tried to tell me that They were bred by the Australians to be able to hide in kangaroo pouches and 'sneak attack' if the country was ever invaded.

We're not friends anymore.

The_Master_of_LOLZ , Mark Galer Report

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#9

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing The world is flat, and it only looks round from space due to gravity distorting light.

Dr_Graves , NASA Report

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Jill Rhodry
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

It's obvious that the world isn't flat, cats would've knocked everything off over the edge.

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#10

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Breatharianism. The idea that people can live without food and all we really need to survive is oxygen. Not sure how this group still exists

Akatsiya , Artem Kovalev Report

#11

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Dinosaurs were placed in the ground by the government in order to discredit religious people and prove evolution...or something like that. I can't remember the details. It gave me an aneurysm.

deleted , Jon Butterworth Report

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#12

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing we only use 10% of our brains

Black-Byte , Robina Weermeijer Report

#13

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Whales control the weather and are currently causing global warming.

Because apparently their movements affect ocean currents or air currents or I don't even know what. I wish I were making this up.

dynamouse , Todd Cravens Report

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oktopus
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

First I've heard of that. Though to be honest I'm more worried about those butterflies causing hurricanes.

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#14

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing A black cat is an omen of bad luck and if one crosses your way you have idk how many years of bad luck. Along the same lines is the mirror 7 years of bad luck, and walking under a ladder. Like, excuse me? Can that cat ration enough to put a f**king spell on you?? And how tf are inanimate objects gonna cast a f**king spell????? Like it just seems extremely dumb

ComicCat-Laz , Clément Falize Report

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Loverboy
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Black cats are literally the most precious creatures on planet Earth, how dare you

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#15

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing As recently as 1993, when I had my youngest child, there were people telling me during my pregnancy to get rid of my cat because it would get in the crib and "take the baby's breath away." The fact that I had an almost-four-year-old who survived household cats didn't hold water with them.

sirdigbykittencaesar , Kari Shea Report

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censorshipsucks
Community Member
11 months ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

The issue is the cat is a selfish beast who will sleep on top of the baby, because a cat is programmed to find something squishy and warm to sleep on. It's not a frequent issue but you need to make sure they can't. The much bigger risk is their litter tray. It contains poops with toxoplasmodium gondii in it. You want to clean that often with gloves and wash hands after.

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#16

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing David Icke's theory That every world leader, member of royalty and figure of importance is reptilian.

0wl-Exterminator , Annie Spratt Report

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Loverboy
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

As an anthropomorphic reptile I can confirm that the president is a lizard. And Mark Zuckerberg.

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#17

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing I can't decide which one of these are worse.

- Having a discussion with a friend and his buddy about Bruce Lee. Then the topic of his death comes up. The conspiracy theories start to fly but it didn't really get too ridiculous until my friend's buddy piped up.

"Bruce Lee actually died when he set himself on fire while cooking hot dogs. They covered it up because no one wanted to think that the world's greatest martial artist would have done that to himself. But anyone who does a little reading will know this."

- At work we were discussing fighting games. The one guy then blurts out that the reason Asians are so good at these games is that the machines are built by other Asians to have *genetic decoders* built into the buttons. Once the machine verifies that you are Asian, the game gives you unfair advantages over your opponent. He was completely serious about this theory. When he was finished talking, there was a good 8 seconds of complete silence until my friend piped up and says, "That's.....got to be one of the stupidest things I've ever heard."

InferiousX , Man Chung Report

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CV Vir
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

This person has no idea how DNA testing is actually accomplished, do they?

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#18

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing An idiot told my wife a few weeks ago that if you are being mugged at an ATM you need to type in your PIN backwards. He thinks this will allow you to withdraw money as normal but "alerts" the police who dispatch a squad car to your location imediately.

When she asked what about people with mirror image PINs and PINs such as 4444 he still maintained that he was right. No actual answer, just insisted he was correct.

Creabhain , Eduardo Soares Report

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General Anaesthesia
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

You type the last four first, then the second to last and so on. Do we need to explain everything to you?

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#19

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing My father once told with with absolute seriousness that if a snake bites you, and you survive, the snake dies instead. Apparently this is an old wives tale from India, but he defended it for a solid ten minutes before begrudgingly admitting that it didn't make any sense

Nightslayer9522 , Tyler B Report

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Doctor Strange
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

If it bites you and you die, its venomous. If you bite it and you die, its poisonous. If you both bite each other and neither of you die, its kinky

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#20

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing The moon landing is fake.

feel_the_burns , NASA Report

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Doctor Strange
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

The American government did, indeed, film the moon landing. However, they hired Stanley Kubrick to direct the film, and he was such a perfectionist that he insisted on shooting on location.

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#21

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing So many people genuinely believe blood is blue inside their body

wizmey , Hush Naidoo Jade Photography Report

#22

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing There is an activist group (with a large following) that claims that clouds in the sky are not real. They are just figments of everyone's imaginations because the government brain washes everyone into thinking clouds exist.

Seriously?

dubefest , Michael & Diane Weidner Report

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#23

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing My all time favorite is Chinese buffets are just a way of making us fatter and easier to invade.

ChiefChivo , Ulysse Pointcheval Report

#24

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing A coworker of mine believes that if you play the phrase "Yes we can." backwards, it sounds suspiciously like "Thank you Satan.", and so Obama must have made a pact with the devil in order to win the presidency. The strangest part is that he isn't particularly political, or outspokenly partisan. His real concern is ACTUALLY Satan.

Produent , Markus Spiske Report

#25

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing That if you startle a pregnant woman the baby will come out cross eyed

m0ther0fg0ds , Ömürden Cengiz Report

#26

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Magnetic balance improving bracelets. I will immediately write you off as dumb or at least very gullible if you wear one of those those things.

Nsekiil , Stephen Leonardi Report

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CV Vir
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

However, the placebo effect is real and it’s possible that this is one example.

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#27

Freemason here.

I am constantly amazed by the people who claim that Freemasons have some kind of New World Order conspiracy going on. The only thing even *more* amazing is how people who are **not** Freemasons can describe to me in detail how the entire conspiracy works, except that I, myself (you know, the guy who's *actually* a Mason), don't know about it because I'm apparently not high ranking enough.

For those who don't know, there is no "head" of Freemasons. It's a fairly loose conglomerate of Grand Lodges which oversee local lodges. In the US and Canada, each state/province has it's own head 9Grand Lodge) - there isn't any national head. In Great Britain, England, Scotland, Ireland each have their own Grand Lodges. There's no head of the organization to flow down any kinds of instructions.

Also consider: Local lodges are filled with (mainly older) members of the community, like your grandfather, uncle, the neighbor across the street, etc. Generally, I'm amazed that the local lodges can successfully plan a charity fund raiser (or sometimes, even a picnic). Planning a far-reaching extra-government conspiracy is, well, you know. Just nuts.

taonzen Report

#28

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Birth control pills will cause the downfall of society.

As my sociology professor explained, "Birth control pills let women have all the sex they want and don't have to worry about having babies, and there are more and more women who are using them and never settling down and having families. With no women getting pregnant anymore, the government will have to step in and start creating a workforce using cloning technology. These clones will grow up in a government-controlled school and trained to be mindless automatons whose goal in life is to work and to serve their government masters - they will be chemically neutered so that they aren't concerned about sex and marriage, and they will all be the same race."

Funny enough, he never thought about what would happen when the government officials die off and there are only clones left.

Diredoe , Thought Catalog Report

#29

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Some guy told me about how the Illuminati gets two dead bodies every year and place them in the Coca Cola tanks. Then they use them to ferment the Coca Cola the public drinks to control us

fluffy-muffin , Evonne Yuwen Teoh Report

#30

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing That the Mona Lisa is actually Leonardo da Vinci in drag

deleted , The Free Birds Report

#31

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing A moron I worked with, swore that the diet Pepsi I was drinking was flavored with aborted fetuses from planned parenthood... He was serious.. Google it... This dude had tattoos on his eyelids too, so not real bright to begin with

OB-14 , Andrew George Report

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censorshipsucks
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

because yes, the illuminati really have time, interest or energy to do s**t like that. for what end? I always ask these nuts (a) for what purpose would they do that and (b) how does it make them money or give them more power? They can never explain.

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#32

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Definitely the Korean urban myth of sleeping with a fan on will you. I’ve heard it explained as the blades chopping up the air creating gaps so that you suffocate in your sleep

LosAngelesLio , Andrew George Report

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Robert T
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

This has all the hallmarks of a parent trying to get the kids to turn the fan off at night to save electricity.

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#33

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing In the past few months my friend went out with a girl that said she didn't believe in dinosaurs, I don't know why this bothers me so much I mean who cares what someone else thinks right? But f*****g hell dinosaurs the evidence is so f*****g overwhelming it's like saying every night the people from the Truman Show turn on the moon.

rozyhammer , Markus Spiske Report

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Tucker Cahooter
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

"People from the Truman Show turn on the moon"...sounds interesting...make sure David Icke gets to hear about that and he can weave that into a worldwide conspiracy involving the Pope, the Illuminati, the Royal Family and Jews and publish a thick boring book on it

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#34

35 Annoying Myths And Conspiracies That People Really Need To Stop Believing Illuminati conspiracy is the dumbest s**t I've ever heard of. I even heard that they controlled the earthquakes in Haiti

punkgx , Thought Catalog Report

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censorshipsucks
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Not just Haiti, but also they are allegedly reptilians who drink adrenochrome etc etc. Idiots will swallow anyhting that sounds outrageous.

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#35

The Phantom Time hypothesis. That 300 years of European history between 600-900 AD were just made up.

This is also my favorite conspiracy theory.

Seamus_OReilly Report

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Bell-acose
Community Member
11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I prefer the phantom thyme theory. you know…how oregano and thyme are the same herb, just marketed differently in order to make the lizard people more money so they can fund their nefarious schemes.

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