Beware the Paramyth

[LeftishBrit]

What’s the fastest growing form of woo woo in Britain today?

•Is it perhaps those brash rambunctious religionists at the more happy-clappy end of the spiritual spectrum?
•Is it the quack army and their ever-growing canon of inefficacious alternative therapies?
•Is it psychics and ghosts hunters who’ve plummeted lowbrow TV to new depths?
•Is it the mind-body-spirit brigade of Newage nutters and neopagan fruitcakes who reject formal religion in order to fanny about with their own personalised spiritual delusions?
I suspect not. I would like to propose a new contender that as far as I’m aware, hasn’t even got a specific name yet, so let me try and explain it.



There is a new wave of modern myths sweeping the country that although diverse in nature have a common theme. At the heart of each of these myths is a tiny conspiracy theory that panders to our tabloid fuelled fears that those with different views, traditions and ideas to us, are influencing policies that will bring about the downfall of our traditional way of life.


These paranoid myths (paramyths?) may have a grain of truth at their centre, but have been exaggerated to become outright lies that spread like wild fire by uncritical paramythers more anxious to propagate their ideological agendas than check the facts.


(And a lot more at the link - it's good stuff!)

http://crispian-jago.blogspot.com/2011/11/beware-paramyth.html

[NMMNG]

1. Totally cuckoo

But those sound very much like the RW e-mail forwards that circulate. Crazy shit that nuts believe because of their inborn bigotries and ignorance.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. Oh yeah, and DU can fall prey to those kind of myths too

I am currently pointing out that a story about limes being classified as 'weapons' in a British supermarket is actually explained as a joke by one of the staff, at the end of the story linked to in the OP - but people aren't interested. The 'Brits will call anything a weapon and ban it' meme is too strong on DU.