E-Folklore and the E-cynic

There are a couple of things that have become a constant in my internet life. One is the email form of "chain letters", the other is Snopes. They belong together, don't they? One begot the other, I think.

Like anyone who has at least one friend... and it is rumored that I have a couple of those... with access to the internet I get "chain email" (or maybe it's "e-chain mail"). These are the equivalent of those rumors we learned to pass in school. Only they've developed into something much more than who was seen steaming up the windows of a car in the parking lot before school started. Much more.

We get recipes, tips and hints, and internet-lore. Just today, I received an email from an old friend touting a "Proposed 28th Amendment" to the U.S. Constitution. A couple of weeks ago, I received a tip on how to treat burns with flour. This is where Snopes comes in. It saves from even trying to cram one more factoid into my overloaded brain. I cannot take too many more factoids before my brain does a complete meltdown and its containment building collapses in a stinking heap. So I turn to Snopes to verify.

The flour burn treatment is flat out false. It might even be dangerous since there are much better treatments and the email cautions against the best one recommended by the medical community in favor of this method. When I was a child, the conventional wisdom of moms (and they were the seat of authority on such things when I was a youngster) said to throw a layer of Crisco or butter on a burn. Because of that folklore, learned at the hem of my mother's dress, I had visions of burn victims in hospitals covered in lard. Add the flour and what do you have? Human filled pastry is what.

Anyway, Snopes shot that flour thing down and also that 28th Amendment rumor.

The internet giveth and the internet taketh away.