Urban Legends
Rowland Croucher
TOUCHED BY AN URBAN LEGEND
by Terry Mattingly
Did you know NASA scientists proved that God really made the sun
stand still just like it says in the book of Joshua?
Have you responded to the urgent prayer appeal from Mrs. Fatima
Abass Yakubu Idris, the wealthy Nigerian widow cancer victim who
wants to donate $7.2 million to your church?
Did you hear about the upcoming movie in which Jesus and his
disciples are gay?
Surely you've seen this email bulletin: "CBS will be forced to
discontinue 'Touched by an Angel' for using the word God in every
program." Now, the disciples of atheist Madalyn Murray O'Hair have
"been granted a federal hearing on the same subject by the Federal
Communications Commission (FCC) in Washington D.C. Their petition,
Number 2493, would ultimately pave the way to stop the reading of
the gospel of our Lord and Savior, on the airwaves of America."
It's hard to believe that after 30 years and 30 million letters to
the FCC, this false report continues to haunt pulpits, pews and the
Internet.
Believe it. The O'Hair, FCC and "Touched by an Angel" email is back
in the top 10 at the San Fernando Valley Folklore Society's
sprawling "urban legends" site (www.snopes.com). And with the
Angels era ending at CBS, Cathy Holden is bracing herself for more
right-wing email blaming the show's demise on a vast left-wing
conspiracy.
This will all end up in a revised entry at www.TruthMiners.com, her
website that strives to convince other conservative Christians that
passing along half-truths, scams and urban legends is not a
doctrinally sound thing to do. Her niche-audience page includes 100
of the most common emails and links to larger secular research
sites.
"This story will not die. I mean, 'Touched by an Angel' has been on
for nine years," she said. "Anybody who reads a newspaper knows
that everybody who's involved says it's time to end the show. But
people who send these emails don't read newspapers. Then they get
an email about that atheist O'Hair lady and they say, 'That's it!'
"You just want to tell them, 'Get over it. Go on with your life.' "
Holden became fascinated with urban legends when she helped a
Baptist church outside Orlando start its website. The minute she
signed on the junk emails rolled in, including a new incarnation of
the O'Hair report. It took five minutes online to dig up the truth.
The church lady who forwarded the rumor said she did it for fun.
What's the harm?
"I said, 'Wait just a minute. I just told you this is a lie and you
don't care?' ... Ever since, I've been trying to get people to
realize that a lie is a lie. This is not harmless. People get hurt.
Christians have to believe truth matters," said Holden.
The O'Hair story originally was read in pulpits, shared at prayer
meetings and printed on church mimeograph machines. Now people
simply click "forward" and their email goes global.
Most of these messages take two forms -- outrage and inspiration. A
major theme is that mainstream media hide the truth, said Holden.
"There's that vast conspiracy out there ... and it's keeping us
from hearing all of the really bad stuff that our enemies are
doing. The media also keep us from hearing any inspiring stories
about good things that are happening. All that gets covered up,
too. So we have to pass on these stories by email in order to beat
the conspiracy. You see?"
So untraceable stories spread about President Bush leaving a
reception line to evangelize a teen-ager, a pastor's wife preaching
to passengers on the doomed Alaskan Airlines Flight 261 and a
little girl's testimony converting actor John Wayne. The list goes
on and on.
"The bigger the story the more we like it," said Holden. "We can be
really syrupy, sappy people and we tend to fall for things that
grab our heartstrings. It's all about our feelings. ... My ultimate
hope is that if we can get people to care about what is going on in
their Internet lives, then this new concern about truth may
actually spread into other parts of their lives at home and at work
and at church. Wouldn't that be interesting?"
[Moderator's note: Do bookmark the TruthMiners website, which also
gives links to other well-researched and commented sites that list
all you need to know about hoaxes, chain letters and other cyber-
junk. Another Christian site is
<http://www.websitesforjesus.com/hoax.html>. Failing all else,
Google will quickly give you innumerable leads.]
-------------------------
Prof Terry Mattingly (www.tmatt.net) teaches at Palm Beach Atlantic
University and is senior fellow for journalism at the Council for
Christian Colleges & Universities. He writes a weekly column for
the Scripps Howard News Service.
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Shalom!
Rowland Croucher
http://www.pastornet.net.au/jmm/index.htm
(9800+ articles)