to be embarrassed for falling for this urban myth

[yesway]

I just forwarded an email and everyone who I sent it to spotted it as an urban myth straight away.

It's the one where baddies put a doll in a car seat by the side of the road covered with a blanket and you stop the car and get attacked.

It was coupled with the one where the baddies throw eggs at your windscreen which when you try and wipe it causes a 92.5% reduction in visibility (how could I not have seen the lie in that figure alone??) and then you stop and they attack you.

[ blush]

p.s. I'm hoping to find some hard evidence from some of you that this is in fact true

Of course card cloning isn't an urban myth.

Though my brother's MIL's dog's llama has his card cloned by an airport x ray machine. Fact.

The car seat one happened in Home and Away to Selina!

If one shopped Ocado there would be no razor-wielding gypsy threat.

The doll in the carseat always happens on an isolated country road.

THAT'S when I know it can't have originated in the UK. Who has ever got over 3rd gear on the school run? Don't think I've ever driven down a road with less than 10 vehicles on it.

So the doll in the car seat would, unfortunately, go the same way as the squirrels, foxes and hedgehogs.

Squished.

Oh, and if they nick your PURSE not your handbag and leave your screen door gaping as they leave, you can bet your bottom dollar it is junk mail from Arkansas.

Don't be taken in by this urban myth about a child abduction
A completely false rumour about a child being abducted in an Asda supermarket has been spreading like wildfire on the internet and by text message in the past couple of days.

It?s a hoax story that appears regularly in a variety of guises, both in the UK and in the US. The story is usually that a little girl is abducted from her family while they are shopping, then taken to the toilets, where her head is shaved so she can be smuggled out as a boy.

This urban myth has circulated for more than 10 years and sometimes rears its head. It?s as untrue today as it?s ever been.

It?s clear from the number of calls we?ve received in the last 24 hours that it?s doing the rounds again.

Here?s the latest version some people have received as a text message or email:

?Dear All. This is a very serious message that I hope you can pass on to as many people as you can. Last night at the big Asda in Manchester a 3 year old girl went missing. Fortunately their policy when something like this happens is to lock the doors. The little girl was found in the toilets with 2 Romanian women. One shaving her head and the other dressing her in boys clothes. This come from an employee who was there last night. Please pass the message round to as many as you can and remain extra vigilant with your own children.?

It was on the adsa site loool

your.asda.com/2009/11/13/don-t-be-taken-in-by-this-urban-myth-about-a-child-abduction

I remember a few years back finding one of the more notorious ones pinned on the noticeboard at work (it was the Asda car park axe murderer in the back seat one). I was having a bad day so wrote URBAN MYTH! IGNORE! on it. And got told off.

There was a woman who used to be on a club email list who was a muppet for this crap and forever forwarding on WARNING! TELL YOUR FRIENDS.
I just used to email back to the list (as I do now to anyone stupid enough to forward crap email) FFS! SNOPES!

olderandwilder it was the opening chapter to Tony Parsons latest book, about the guy who had a heart transplant and adopted the donors characteristics.

Sukie1971 I recently watched a programme on this subject and it turns out it may have some weight to it as we have brain cells in our hearts, that may contain memory. so urban myth may be busted there!

www.heartmath.org/research/research-our-heart-brain.html

Sukie - thank you!! You have put me out of my misery!!

Looks a bit woo to me, that heartmath site.

Does it?!

Well, I've not had a really thorough look, but it smacks a little bit of Dr Gillian McKeith-type science to me.

No no lol its not i watched a documentary on it, that site was offered up by a biology professor. Its true they have found them on the heart its establishing what they can do, now that is the interesting part. It may explain a million things and nothing. i will try to find a better link for you.

I can't believe that bloody Asda thing is still on the go.

I first heard this I don't know when, then someone actually repeated it to me as an 'it happened to a friend of mine' story about 10 years ago.

Very embarrassing when I pointed out it was an urban myth (can't keep my mouth shut emoticon), and she couldn't meet my eye, either because she knew she'd made it up about her 'friend,' or she thought I was a neglectful mother for not believing this tosh.

She was totally convinced by it.

www.unclesirbobby.org.uk/mindshock.php

I heard a really awful story last year about some lads going on a boys night out, taking drugs and one having a "bad trip" and kidnapping a child and locking it in his wardrobe believing it to be a gremlin.

Really not cool and quite sickened that such an "Urban myth" was ever thought up

myth. but probably has happened before could again, depending of what drugs are used.

a similar thing actually happened to my dh, a man was lying in the road and another man flagged him down...he was hit with a brick and they tried to steal his car...unfortunately it was true in our case.

Ooooh, vairy interesting, Sulk. I wish I'd seen it.

Might be able to get it on i player (cant remember the channel thought) it was repeated last year or the year before i think, i had not realised it was actually that old.

www.viddler.com/explore/hawker1009/videos/4/

I think that may be the full programme .

Some urban myths are just silly or just made up to scare people for shits'n'giggles. But quite a few have a nasty undercurrent of racism, misogyny or homophobia.