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.
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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!
The earth is only 6000 years old. Tell that to the Sumerians
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
If you have "organ donor" on your driver's license then EMTs will let you die to take your organs
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.
I strongly suspect marijuana was involved somewhere along the line.
The world is flat, and it only looks round from space due to gravity distorting light.
It's obvious that the world isn't flat, cats would've knocked everything off over the edge.
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
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.
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.
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
Black cats are literally the most precious creatures on planet Earth, how dare you
Well... I am definitely not supersticious, but will never walk under a ladder. You never know what the person on it might be holding, paint, water, a hammer... and just my luck would dictate the item falling right at the moment I am walking underneath that ladder.
Yeah, I always thought that was just common sense disguised as superstition so even the idiots will pay attention
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I've had a pitch black cat for 10 years and he is the sweetest little thing I have ever met. He knows when I'm sad and cuddles up to me with his purry little meow. He's the only of my four cats that will stay in my bedroom all nights. No fuss, just lots of cuddles. The alarm goes off and he tries to wake me. Good boy, Indie!!!
Jehovah Witnesses stopped coming to my house after my black cat slinked out of the door during one of their housecalls, causing one of them to visibly shudder. I'd call that good luck!
Black Cats in medieval Europe were connected to witchcraft, and that witches could transform into black cats, so bad luck was associated with it. Walking under a ladder comes from a ladder against a wall forming a triangle, or the trinity and it was thought in medieval times that walking under it would be "breaking the trinity" and therefor bad luck.
I had a black cat when I was a kid. He was huge and loved being outside. We called him a small panther because that's what he looked like. He loved to cuddle with just me. He also used to bring us dead things which is a sign he wanted to take care of us. He was an amazing cat!!!!
I feel the walking under a ladder myth has an underlying cause and effect, like, "I just walked under that ladder and a tin of paint fell on me" - "oh, how unlucky"
I read once that the ladder is connected to capital punishment by hanging. Other than the executioner, the only person that walked under the ladder up to the scaffold was the person about to be hanged.
Load More Replies... Black cats have the greatest personalities. And if you look at an old German painting of barmaid with a white cat on her shoulder, the white cat signifies a hangover.
I’ve owned a black cat for 17 years. She’s only bad luck if I forget to feed her
Since getting a black cat I've started a good paying job that I love, work for a fantastic family I love, have gotten a ton of free really cute clothing I love, and my marriage is stronger than ever. Sooo.....when's the "BAD" luck supposed to kick in?
As far as I know, black cats were considered bad luck because there were none in Europe but were common in Turkey and other places where pirates came from. They brought them in their ships to fight mice and seeing a black cat in an european village meant the pirates had landed nearby
I've had black cats for many, many years. They've all been wonderful.
this can be extended to: ANYTHING is an omen of bad luck. I'm pretty sure all of these started because of selective perception
This one's not a superstition, especially if the guy on the ladder is painting and you wear a Canali suit.
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Cats were common in out-of the way homes that would be prone to mice, the black ones being particularly good at hunting (maybe some preference amongst the more 'free thinking'). As such, 'witches' who lived alone would want them as company. Cue religious asshat who goes on a 'cats are evil' spree and almost causes the black plague. Don't know the mirror cause (other than price). The ladder one could be because of any knock causing a person and ladder to land on you, therefore being unlucky? There are also things about triangles being the shapes in ramshackle construction (for their strength) and therefore being easy to look down on. I can't remember the connection with ladders, but there was one once upon a dim morn... Also, the psychological aspect of luck is more effective than much else. Remember those emails? Better to believe you get better luck from being a good person, because even if you dont: you are being good.
Black cats are awesome. Though nothing good happened to me for years after I broke a large mirror in my room. I choose to blame that moment and have been cautious since then.
The mirror one goes back to when servants broke a mirror it took 7 years pay to replace the mirror. And if they didn't like where they worked they were stuck there between that and loss of wages. You can see why it's 7 years bad luck
Oh, my cats have absolutely cast a spell on me. It causes me to be unable to resist petting them, scratching them, and letting them sit on my lap. I can't control it.
Cats and witches have a story. Old ladies who lived alone in medieval times had cats. They did not get sick with the plague. So...witches and cats were instruments of witches. But the truth was simple, although unknown to them. Fleas carried the bubonic plague, and those fleas came with rats. Rays did not enter houses with cats, ergo...
When I was getting my most recent cat, the recue people had a choice of a black cat, a ginger cat and tabby. I wanted the tabby but it didn't want me. I turned down the balck cat because I'm unsteady on my feet as it, a black cat would blend in too well as night and I was afraid I'd step on it. Yep, I now have a very nice but weird ginger cat.
Black cats are lovely creatures unless you wake up at night and see eyes staring at you
If you have ever stared into the eyes of a pissed off cat, then you know it is 100% possible for a cat to put a curse on you.
This is true. When my wife and I first moved in together we got a black cat. I have been with her for 30 years. When will this curse stop?
Black cats are luck in the UK - Often brides have a horseshoe and black cats in their wedding decor
No no no it‘s only if it crosses your way from left to right! Trust me, I was born in Poland! (My family is so weird. They simultaneously totally believe in God AND tons of superstitions! …… actually… no it makes total sense that those two go together so well
I recall when I was a kid the superstition was that if one crossed your path left to right it was good luck, right to left it was bad. Or was it the other way round? Anyway, I'm sure nobody took any notice of it. The ladder one is the only one that makes some sense, i.e. there might be someone up the ladder to drop something on you. Oh, and mirrors were incredibly expensive items, so if you broke one belonging to someone else there was a pretty fair chance that trouble was about to come your way...
Anyone who believes this really is using 10% of their brain
I've got a book called the dictionary of superstitions that has a bunch of stuff like this, funny to read!
Mirrors were crazy expensive. Walking under a ladder is a good way to hurt yourself or those on the ladder.
The only bad luck with a black cat I've ever had was my dog killing my kitty. His name was ogre and I miss him so much.
Walking under a ladder can be dangerous, who knows what might drop onto your head.
fortunately these seem to be old european/western supersitions. Other countries have other superstitions. For example in South Africa some people put their bed higher up on bricks. Google it.
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.
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.
David Icke's theory That every world leader, member of royalty and figure of importance is reptilian.
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."
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.
You type the last four first, then the second to last and so on. Do we need to explain everything to you?
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
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
The moon landing is fake.
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.
So many people genuinely believe blood is blue inside their body
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?
Everybody knows that clouds are the remnants of Ymir's brians.... duh!
My all time favorite is Chinese buffets are just a way of making us fatter and easier to invade.
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.
That if you startle a pregnant woman the baby will come out cross eyed
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.
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.
Yep. I know a few masons and they couldn't organise a pissup in a brewery.
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.
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
That the Mona Lisa is actually Leonardo da Vinci in drag
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
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.
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
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.
"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
Illuminati conspiracy is the dumbest s**t I've ever heard of. I even heard that they controlled the earthquakes in Haiti
Not just Haiti, but also they are allegedly reptilians who drink adrenochrome etc etc. Idiots will swallow anyhting that sounds outrageous.
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.
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.
Note: this post originally had 47 images. It’s been shortened to the top 35 images based on user votes.
In case it's not obvious, conspiracy theories drive me insane. I have an overwhelming urge to be mean to a person who says stuff like this. No idea why it triggers me so much. Like, I guess I expect everyone to have a modicum of logic.
its like talking to religious fanatics. They'll always try to talk themself out of it in a way that doesnt make sense. we had curfew for a while during the lockdowns. People were screaming that it was a list and it was NEVERRRR going to end. So when it ended and i confronted them they said "it was a test, it will come back later" [eye roll] Masks idem dito. it was never gonna end. Oh it did. It was a test. People were screaming we're living in a dictator ship and North Korea is better. So how come you're venting your shti on internet and why dont they shoot you on your demonstrations that were not allowed. Ah i can go on forever geezz
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1) If you put salt on a birds tail it won't be able to fly afterwards. 2) If you put a penny on a railroad track, it will shock the conductor when the train runs over it.
My cousins (twins) where both born with both genitalia. Their parents waited until they were both in their teens to have anything done. One decided on female,the other decided to go make.
It took more than 20 odd years of marriage before I found out my husband thinks that carbon dating is b******t, and that dinosaurs didn't live that long ago. I was dumbfounded. It's taken a while, but I've managed to explain to him what carbon dating is, and he's come around - but geeze, it scared me! LOL
I'll add my own "crazy s**t" story. We ate "Kosher" and one day my parents said we can not eat cheese anymore. Because...wait for it....wait for it...ENZYMES! The manufacturers might be using Pork enzymes to make cheese. Me; Why would they use pork enzymes when cow enzymes are already there to make the cheese? Plus the cost to add those enzymes and replace the cow enzymes would make the cost very prohibitive. Thier response; Oh, they will do that to *forgot some bogus reason*. I was fairly independent by then, despite being a teen. told them I thought it was ridiculous and I was going to buy cheese with my own money and that was it. Six months later, they finally admitted what they were "told" was incorrect. Didn't get an apology, but never expected one in the first place. After High School I went directly into a University (a hard one to get into I may add) and they didn't even know I was in a University, they thought I was in a JC.
for me its the one that they withhelding the foe cure cancer if cancer could be cure that easily they would sell it like Tylenol
I couldn't make it through this list. The stupidity levels made me have a migraine. I can't anymore.
I remember going through a period around ages 11 to 14, where I would have believed every one of these conspiracy theories. I also loved paranormal stories, alien abduction stories, etc. And I saved my money to order bogus products from the back pages of comic books. Then I outgrew it. I almost envy people who stay in that credulous mindset. There's something fun and magical about it.
But, critical thinking skills are a huge asset for living and functioning. I don't envy the gullible and those who lack critical thinking, they are dangerous.
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My favourite conspiracy theory at the moment is, that ōLand and the ōCash- blockchain is a giant hoax. In my opinion 2,5 million users in 10 months without marketing, of which 600000 are active daily just speak for itself.
surprising none of the major entries in this list included religion as a whole
When I had a child I was told: 1) Put a wet tissue on their forehead to stop hiccups - poor baby had one on for hours, whilst still hiccuping. 2) If I didn't put the bible in his cot on a certain page, the evil spirits would get him. 3) Cutting a child's hair before they're talking fluently stunts their speech
In case it's not obvious, conspiracy theories drive me insane. I have an overwhelming urge to be mean to a person who says stuff like this. No idea why it triggers me so much. Like, I guess I expect everyone to have a modicum of logic.
its like talking to religious fanatics. They'll always try to talk themself out of it in a way that doesnt make sense. we had curfew for a while during the lockdowns. People were screaming that it was a list and it was NEVERRRR going to end. So when it ended and i confronted them they said "it was a test, it will come back later" [eye roll] Masks idem dito. it was never gonna end. Oh it did. It was a test. People were screaming we're living in a dictator ship and North Korea is better. So how come you're venting your shti on internet and why dont they shoot you on your demonstrations that were not allowed. Ah i can go on forever geezz
Load More Replies... 1) If you put salt on a birds tail it won't be able to fly afterwards. 2) If you put a penny on a railroad track, it will shock the conductor when the train runs over it.
My cousins (twins) where both born with both genitalia. Their parents waited until they were both in their teens to have anything done. One decided on female,the other decided to go make.
It took more than 20 odd years of marriage before I found out my husband thinks that carbon dating is b******t, and that dinosaurs didn't live that long ago. I was dumbfounded. It's taken a while, but I've managed to explain to him what carbon dating is, and he's come around - but geeze, it scared me! LOL
I'll add my own "crazy s**t" story. We ate "Kosher" and one day my parents said we can not eat cheese anymore. Because...wait for it....wait for it...ENZYMES! The manufacturers might be using Pork enzymes to make cheese. Me; Why would they use pork enzymes when cow enzymes are already there to make the cheese? Plus the cost to add those enzymes and replace the cow enzymes would make the cost very prohibitive. Thier response; Oh, they will do that to *forgot some bogus reason*. I was fairly independent by then, despite being a teen. told them I thought it was ridiculous and I was going to buy cheese with my own money and that was it. Six months later, they finally admitted what they were "told" was incorrect. Didn't get an apology, but never expected one in the first place. After High School I went directly into a University (a hard one to get into I may add) and they didn't even know I was in a University, they thought I was in a JC.
for me its the one that they withhelding the foe cure cancer if cancer could be cure that easily they would sell it like Tylenol
I couldn't make it through this list. The stupidity levels made me have a migraine. I can't anymore.
I remember going through a period around ages 11 to 14, where I would have believed every one of these conspiracy theories. I also loved paranormal stories, alien abduction stories, etc. And I saved my money to order bogus products from the back pages of comic books. Then I outgrew it. I almost envy people who stay in that credulous mindset. There's something fun and magical about it.
But, critical thinking skills are a huge asset for living and functioning. I don't envy the gullible and those who lack critical thinking, they are dangerous.
Load More Replies... My favourite conspiracy theory at the moment is, that ōLand and the ōCash- blockchain is a giant hoax. In my opinion 2,5 million users in 10 months without marketing, of which 600000 are active daily just speak for itself.
surprising none of the major entries in this list included religion as a whole
When I had a child I was told: 1) Put a wet tissue on their forehead to stop hiccups - poor baby had one on for hours, whilst still hiccuping. 2) If I didn't put the bible in his cot on a certain page, the evil spirits would get him. 3) Cutting a child's hair before they're talking fluently stunts their speech
