Rumors & Hoaxes - Stay Out of Malls on Halloween E-mail

[dragonladybug]

CountriGal - "I know whut'ya mean about the fambly geniuous, er, genieyos, oh heck, the smart people".  I am from Georgia, ya know.  I have a couple of in-laws that we speak to slowly - they're not really stupid, they just don't listen.  



 

[countrigal]

Heck I always tell my sister that she's just proving that old joke about blondes... She's a natural (couldn't tell by looking at me or the rest of our family) and unfortunately acts ditzy, so...  It's gals like her that gave birth to the blonde jokes unfortunately.  Worse yet - she doesn't always realise when she's being slow, silly, or just downright stupid.  And that's my blood, folks! (hint of Jeff Foxworthy in that line.  )  I kid her that she's lucky her son takes after me.    

[diamondlady0102]

If ya go to msnbc's website, they have information out there about this Mall email going around, it's definetly a hoax and they don't have ANY information out there about it at this time according to the FBI.



Lots of malls have Halloween parties for the kids though.  Question, are your local malls cancelling haloween because of this "presumed threat?"  We are not...mall is going to carry on just as it always does every year, but just added security.



diamondlady0102

[execsec]

Our local mall is canceling the trick-or-treat event at the mall.  It was in the paper today and it said that the decision was made before the Sept. 11 tragedy. Like I believe that!!!! Anyway, my children will be trick or treating at the events set up on the University of Oklahoma campus (sororities & dorms, etc.)

[kittie]

Can I just tell everyone that we've had the same 'urban' myth going around in England for years.  It tends to come out every Christmas (my friend was going out with an Irish chap, he bailed out and told her not to visit the shopping centre because the IRA were going to bomb it) and we've had a new variant recently (a woman was stopped by an arab man begging for money, she gave him £5 and he was so grateful he told her not to go shopping in town on such and such a day).

Please ignore these.  They are purely urban myths made up by some sad person wanting to cause havoc.  These myths are passed on by people "just in case" they are true, but sadly these people just spread unneccessary panic.

You're not helping anyone by passing these emails on.

[kittie]

Andrea

Just wondered if you'd heard the same variant of this urban myth in  your neck of the woods as we've been hearing in Birmingham.  

We've had the "a woman is stopped by a Arab beggar for money, she gives him £5 and he tells her not to go into Birmingham town centre on such and such a date".  

We tend to get it every Christmas as well, but this time its an Irish chap who tells a woman not to go to Merry Hill Shopping Centre/Birmingham because the IRA is going to bomb it.

It's a shame people fall for these.

[andream]

You know Kittie, I think this is what's great about us all being here together, different perspectives.  On this side of the pond, you've dealt with this kind of threat before, on the other side, in the US, it's a rare thing.  I stillstand by my original assertion that the absolute worst thing about the propagation of this particular urban myth was the fact that the original sender posted her work email and full name. Gee can't you imagine how Proud her employers were to find the FBI at their door because of misuse of the company Email system? Egads! ;0

Andrea,
DeskDemon.com

[kittie]

Andrea

I agree with you.  I can't believe that people  send around this stuff using company resources.  I've recieved loads of emails in the past from people via email (yes - they do put their full name, job title and company on them!!!) and I've had to put a stop to them - ie email everyone on the distribution list and tell them not to pass it on.  One memorable one was where young women in the office were targetted with an email that told them not to go out to clubs in Birmingham at night because someone was sticking hypodermic needles in people and giving them all sorts of nasty diseases.  Never proven, never happened.  

Perhaps we should just have a topic on urban myths here - perhaps if people post them all here we can dispel them once and for all and stop wasting people's time (and stop those people who aren't used to these things from worrying).

[copyboy007]

A couple of websites to look up recent hoaxes are:

http://www.urbanlegends.about.com/
http://www.snopes2.com/