Urban legends created by media

Widescreen

Widescreen

Well-known member
Could not help it today but pulled up our reporter when they wrote......

"A man died after his car collided with a power pole"

Cars don't collide with a stationary object, especially a power pole!

also.......

Since when has wind sounded like a freight train, footy results became outcomes and the other day, a roof crashed down, not fell or collapsed!

Any others?​
 
Not exactly urban legends... more like they write english not so good...:)

Now this is an urban legend created by the media:

Jenkem, urban legend

In the mid-1990s, a few sensational news stories reported that street urchins in Lusaka, Zambia, were congregating around sewage ponds in order to gather fecal matter for fermentation, so they could huff the reportedly intoxicating gases. By late 2007, jenkem (as the disgusting mixture was called) was the new reefer madness in American high schools. The Collier County, Florida police put out a stern official bulletin about its dangers, and at least one newspaper in Alabama picked up on the reports and got "confirmation" from their local law-enforcement that local kids were getting high on poop juice. But upon closer examination, no one had actually witnessed anything other than students talking big on the playground and passing rumors; the official descriptions of jenkem's effects in the Collier County bulletin had been drawn from a prank Internet posting. If jenkem proves one thing, it's that relatively well-off American wastoids can find more pleasant ways to get their kicks than breathing in compost. If it proves two things, it's that our vigilant sheriffs are ready to believe the worst. "We've heard that this was something students were doing, and it sounds crazy, but don't think they're not doing it here," said Alabama narcotics investigator Neal Bradley. With such ironclad proof, expect the D.A.R.E. curriculum to include jenkem warnings next semester.

http://www.avclub.com/content/feature/dont_bogart_that_jenkem_18
 
Here's a fun little exercise... search your script archives for phrase "something went terribly wrong"... see how many times THAT gets into scripts.

Other things that bother me:

"The very latest"... it's either the latest or it's not, there are not degrees of latest.
"Somewhat unique"... Again, it's either unique or it's not.
"Our camera captured..." hey, I shot, give me credit.
"Exclusive"... nobody cares.

I could go on and on...
 
Widescreen said:
Could not help it today but pulled up our reporter when they wrote......

"A man died after his car collided with a power pole"

Cars don't collide with a stationary object, especially a power pole!
​
Click to expand...



I'm a bit puzzled by this one. I thought at first I didn't properly understand the meaning of "collide" so I looked it up on Merriam-Webster's web site. Here's what it came up with:
Main Entry:col·lide
Pronunciation: \kə-ˈlīd\
Function: intransitive verb
Inflected Form(s): col·lid·ed; col·lid·ing
Etymology: Latin collidere, from com- + laedere to injure by striking
Date: 1700

1 : to come together with solid or direct impact <the car collided with a tree> 2 : clash <colliding cultures>
Click to expand...
If a car can collide with a tree why can it not collide with a utility pole?​
 
You kept an MG running long enough that it was able to collide with something?
THAT'S news.
 
He got an MG going "too fast?" That's news too ;)


A good urban legend that media outlets love to report on around thanksgiving time is "Cyber Monday," that day after black friday when supposedly everyone gets online to finish shopping.

Turns out Cyber Monday was created by a marketing firm out to boost use of the internet. It amazes me that so many "journalists" fail to understand this. It's not like you even have to dig - -the info is out there in plain sight.
 
How about "Frankenfish", AKA, the "snakehead".

We created this one right here in my hometown!!!


An exotic, invasive, carniverous fish that can eat anything, walk on land, live out of water for 3 days, grow to enormous sizes, with huge teeth.

Reality? They're fish. Fish that eat other, smaller fish - something which 99% of ALL fish also do, by the way. They can't walk - only flop around and wiggle with little or no directional control. They DO have teeth, which are large and pointy, but so do many other fish native to America. The CAN survive for a long time out of water if they are kept damp. So can catfish and eels. They grow to 3 feet long - about the same size as many large, native predatory fish already found here. They can spread like crazy. So can nearly every other fish in a favorable habitat. The fact the the fish tolerates poor water conditions where other fish won't survive just means that most of the fish in that water will be snakeheads, because they're the only things that can live there.


We blew it way out of proportion, and created our own Urban Legend right here...
 
The Jenkem story was run over here as an April fools story but was picked up by Fox and run as fact…
There was a book out called ‘Urban Myths and Legends’ that I had given to me. I was listening to a local radio station and every day they had a weird news story from around the world and I realized they were reading the stories straight from the book, word for word in the same order… it really pissed me off, especially when the storied turned up on other media who just copied it blindly.
More recently I’ve heard stories from the Onion reported as fact… usually in the ‘Only in America’ segment.
Does nobody check anything any more???
 
Not an urban legend, another "mis-speak" I used to hear all the time: Someone got electrocuted and now they're in critical condition. Wrong, if someone gets electrocuted, they're dead. If they're still alive, they just got shocked.
 
The one I always remember around here is the one where there are roving gangs of thugs in cars who drive around with their lights off at night. When you blink your headlights at them they U-turn and beat you to death.

In my first small market I worked in we ran this. Apparently the PD PIO was watching because he called immediately after the story ran (A Block) and we had to make a retraction in the B Block. Hilarious.

It turned out that we had gotten a prank fax and we had a producer who made no calls on it to the PD, just typed up a VO and ran it.

See how easy it is to trick newsrooms? Especially small market ones with idiots as producers.
 
Hank Scorpio said:
The one I always remember around here is the one where there are roving gangs of thugs in cars who drive around with their lights off at night. When you blink your headlights at them they U-turn and beat you to death.
Click to expand...

We had a guy out here last fall who tried to use a derivitive of this urban legend to explain how he got the snot beat out of him. I guess this guy didn't realize it was a widely known urban legend. Of course both the media and cops did some major eye rolling but you have to believe it until you know otherwise.
Long story short he was cheating on his girlfriend with another woman (who was cheating on her boyfriend) he found out and gave the dude a major ass whoopin. Now he's facing charges for filing a false report and probably got ass whooped by his girlfriend too.:D
 
We like to let people know that the entire area is preparing for the winter storm that is coming. Except its January and people already have all they need. Sometimes, it just feels like we are straight up making sh1t up. We try and argue that out in the field, it's not happening. But those who sit under fluorescent lights all day know otherwise.
 
My favorite media spread urban legend: The Democrat and Republican parties are completely different.

No they aren't. Picking between the two parties is like picking whether you want a sick walrus to crap on you or barf on you. Either way, it's a bad day for you!
 
A little off topic, but...
How come we start a story with "an unspeakable crime..." and then go on to speak about it for two and a half minutes?
 
There's always the big "West Nile Virus" scare that crops up every spring as the mosquitos hatch out...

I had a great bite from a County Health worker a few years back when it was at its height...."Of 1000 who contract WNV, only about 50 will develop noticable symptoms (5%). Of those 50, only about 10 out of 1000 will require hospitalization for their symptoms (1% of 5% of 1000). Of those 10, only about 1 in 100 will die. That's 1% of 1% of 5% of 1000 or only .005% of the original 1000 who contracted the WNV will die."

I'm good with those odds....

The source went on to say off the record that since WNV only attacks Blue Jays and Crows, if a geneticist could figure out how to make it affect grackles they could make a fortune...Anyone who has been to a major city in the South of the US knows the little S#!t makers I'm talking about...
 
The Daywood said:
if a geneticist could figure out how to make it affect grackles they could make a fortune...Anyone who has been to a major city in the South of the US knows the little S#!t makers I'm talking about...
Click to expand...

Amen to that! I looked up some stuff about these pesky birds awhile back and they are now as far north as South Dakota in the summer months.

As you know, most major shopping centers around here with live oak trees look like a movie scene from Alfred Hitchcock around sundown.

cm
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top