To not point out story is an urban legend?

My friend who is a primary school teacher had to stop two of her pupils from trying to steal a penguin on a zoo trip. They got as far as getting it into a bag. Maybe it is one of those things that because it’s a story that’s out there that you do get people now actually trying to do it. Somebody else has quoted a news article reporting on an incident of it happening. I guess it is therefore a slight possibility that it’s true.

The stupidest one I heard was a girl ordered a mcchicken sandwich without mayonnaise but upon biting into it it had mayonnaise. The staff swore they hadn't put mayonnaise in...turns out the burger had an abscess. Funny how proceed chicken can do that eh...

I remember a work colleague telling the one about the chicken abscess thirty years ago! She said it had happened to a relative of hers. She also told one about a man who tied his dog to a level crossing barrier while he went to help someone whose car had broken down and then the barrier went up. I later read an article saying that that one had been doing the rounds for centuries and the original version involved a donkey and a windmill, though that must have been an urban myth too. This same colleague also repeated the one about the non existent Captain Pugwash characters Master Bates and Seaman Staines.

I made my mum look a tit when she told a story of her friends and her doing a Ouija board as teenagers and it spelled out "I'm under the car" or something..they looked and there was a cat that came running out from under the car. I pointed out I'd read the exact same story in a magazine

DH claims the spider one happened to his sister after a trip to the Amazon. He's spectacularly gullible though.

I’ve read the glittery pubes thing on here at least twice and the kid called L-a. Each time the poster was called out and each time, the OP insisted it was true.

My mum is adamant this happened to her friend.

This is why I'm always desperate to tell people of they've got something wrong. I want to spare them future embarrassment when they find out. I worked out in the ends that nobody likes you to tell them, and stopped, but I still wish people would do it for me.

If you are going to say anything you need to find a humorous way to do so that doesn't embarrass the other person, otherwise you risk causing shame.

People believe all sorts of things. An urban myth is just an amusing anecdote.

Storytelling to create a bond within a group. It worked and look here, it’s working again 😁

Aw, don’t say anything. It can make people feel a bit shit. I can be quite gullible I must admit. I’m not stupid (I don’t think😆) but I do tend to take things at face value a lot. I’ve showed DP quite a few videos, only to have hm say ‘That’s AI. It’s really obvious.’ Not to me apparently. I suppose his scathing comments have helped me spot fake stuff. But it makes me feel very small. Maybe I’m too sensitive.

In primary school back in the 90s, one girl said her and her sister said "the candyman" three times into a mirror and he appeared in it and started slashing her.
Absolute bollocks obviously but a few believed her.

I remember the KFC one except it was a mouse not a rat and the spider one!

Yeah, well, obviously it wasn’t true, hence me feeling stupid. What can I say, I was young and gullible and the guy was a former paramedic who told a convincing story. 😆

I saw that one recently on insta so scary

Its unlikely she is the one. Involved but multiple penguins have been stolen from zoos. And if she said something smaller chicks and ducking get robbed from pet farms daily.

Lutz Pfannenstiel ‘borrowed’ a penguin.

Oh and about someone who had a party trick of putting a snooker ball in their mouth, but one day did the cue ball instead (which is either bigger or smaller I can’t remember) and then either had to have all their front teeth out or died… I can’t remember the ending

I’m a HCP and have been told countless times about the elderly, toothless patient from whom a nurse accepted and ate some Brazil nuts, only to be later told by the patient that he had sucked the chocolate off them.

I remember that one

and one about someone buying a Doberman puppy in a pub, taking it to the vets because it wasn’t eating dog food and it turned out to be a Black and Tan guinea pig. Love that one.

Snopes has a “Penguin in backpack” section

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/birdnapped/

I often check Urban Myths on Snopes … the “classic” section is full of stuff

Kentucky Fried Rat https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/critter-fritter/

I once called out someone retelling the snake urban legend, they were adamant it was their friend which I found crazy, a few years later I was called out for retelling the David Beckham paying off someone’s mortgage story and felt totally humiliated. I’m normally quite cynical but the story was from an uncle who lived not far from the beckhams so seemed legit!

Our shiny new KFC(it was so long ago it had its full name) was built at the side of a sea water lake so the animal ending up battered in ours was seagull. No one questioned why the population wasnt decreasing or how they were capturing enough birds without anyone is seeing.

His knackers must have been the size of the rugby ball for that to happen.