Speech: Urban Legends

Did you know that if you say "Candyman" five times while looking in a mirror that you will invoke the evil of spirit of Candyman, who will kill you with his hooked hand? It's true. It happened to a friend of a friend of mine. Don't believe me? Candyman Candyman Candyman Candyman.....

Ms. N., fellow classmates.

This story of Candyman is an example of an Urban Legend. Urban Legends are modern day folklore. They consist of stories that are passed from person to person and meant to be taken as factual by the people circulating them. They do not necessarily take place in an urban setting. The name designates that they are separate from traditional folklore of preindustrial times.

Urban Legends are often based on a small grain of truth. This truth is then distorted, exaggerated, or sensationalized. For example, one episode of the television show Leave it to Beaver depicted the shows central character, an adolescent boy nicknamed Beaver, purchasing a baby alligator and hiding it from his parents by keeping it in the toilet tank. Over the years, this innocent story line evolved into the "Alligator in the sewer system" urban legend that we are familiar with. Families supposedly ordered baby alligators through the mail, then when the pets grew too big to safely keep, they were flushed but continued to live and grow in the sewer system. Some versions of the stories describe the alligators as becoming sixty feet long, blind, and or albinos. Think about it. The flaws in this story are numerous, yet when we are told that it happened to "a friend of a friend," or "my sister's boyfriends cousin'; or "my cousin's boyfriends sister," this somehow lends credibility to the story.

Other Urban Legends had even more simplistic origins. Don't cross your eyes or they will get "stuck." Masturbating will cause hair to grow on the palms of your hands or, worse yet, blindness. Don't swallow watermelon or apple seeds or you will suffer the misfortune of having an apple tree or watermelon plant growing in your stomach. If you swallow gum, it will remain undigested in your stomach for seven years. These Urban Legends were created by parents in an attempt to stop unwanted behaviour. Many were effective. When was the last time you swallowed a watermelon seed? Or your gum? Others were hopelessly ineffective, but did manage to create a sense of guilt or fear.

Author Jan Brunvand wrote, "The Vanishing Hitchhiker: American Urban Legends and their meanings" in 1981. He used urban legends to demonstrate two ideas. First, that we can learn much about modern cultures by studying Urban Legends such as socially acceptable and unacceptable behavior. Urban Legends also play on current societal fears. Emails circulate endlessly warning of horrific accounts of antiperspirant causing breast cancer, aids-infected syringes lurking on gas pumps, and would-be assailants posing as undercover police officers. All scenarios are possible, most are unfounded. Popular websites, such as snopes.com, dispels such emails and urban legends and attempts to uncover their origins.
Jan Brunvand also taught us that legends, myths, and folklore are not simply found in primitive society. Urban Legends are typically anecdotally structured with a plot and characters. Wikopedia states "the compelling nature of the story and its elements of mystery, horror, fear, or humor are part of what makes the tales so attractive." We want to believe them.

The widespread use of email has allowed a new generation of Urban Legends to flourish via the World Wide Web where they are passed on with one effortless mouse click. Many of these are presented as warnings or offers that you are compelled to pass on "just in case" this one IS true.
In recent years these have included forwarding email to a specific number or persons so that a coupon for free Gap clothes with suddenly pop up on your computer. Or forwarding email so that Bill Gates himself will be able to track who is using HIS programs. Last I checked, we were ALL using his programs.

Guess what happens when we circulate these emails? We spread computer viruses, and our email addresses are collected and used to send unwanted and sometimes unethical email.
Others tell tales of missing children, show photographs of Satan himself above the burning twin towers, deadly tsunami waves approaching unsuspecting beaches, and bunnies needing life-saving, and very expensive surgery.

When will we learn. Probably never. But Urban Legends are not without one useful purpose. Without our urban legends, we might not ever keep in touch with our distant friends. Sometimes it's easier to hit the forward button than to actually write a letter or pick up the phone. Just the same, we let others know that we are thinking of them when we pass on the warning that their Swiffer Duster may accidentally kill their beloved pets.

We must, however, consider the "cry wolf" factor. Sooner or later one of these life-threatening scenarios will be true. And no one will believe it or pass it on.

And where would Hollywood be without urban legends? There is actually a movie called "Urban Legends" wherein a serial killer attacks and kills his victims according to urban legends. The legend of Candyman himself is simply the creation of Hollywood. At least that's what I heard. It can't be true. I'll prove it.

Candyman.

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