this post was submitted on 21 Jul 2025
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Science Memes
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It's amazing to me that an episode of the Simpsons like 30 years ago created such a widely believed completely made up fact.
That fact wasn't as cromulent as they made it out to be.
ETA: also, the myth about birds exploding by eating rice. An entire generation used bubbles at their weddings instead, in part because Lisa didn't fact-check a myth. (Not complaining about the result though: bubbles are lovely floating orbs of happiness, whereas thrown rice is a messy waste of food.)
The bird myth predates the Simpsons though. I did hear it was greatly spread by all the churches\wedding venues because they all didn't want to keep cleaning up all the rice.
For sure, Lisa doesn't tend to make up such ideas whole-cloth. It was just the first place I heard the myth and I remember kids at school spreading it after that episode. So it definitely spread the idea.