Biggest lie ever?

  • Thread starter lemonsky
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You forgot:

* Aliens don't exist.

* The big bang theory (not the tv show)

* time travel

* There is nothing faster than the speed of light

* ...


I'll stop now before I start to believe my own lies. :D
But there is nothing faster than the speed of light...
 
Black people can't swim?

Of all the racial stereotypes out there, this is one I don't understand. That is to say, I don't understand where it comes from or what it is based on.
 
Of all the racial stereotypes out there, this is one I don't understand. That is to say, I don't understand where it comes from or what it is based on.

I'd never heard it. I'd heard that Welsh people were just Irish people who couldn't swim, but that was a) clearly a joke and b) actually sort-of funny.

I can't understand where "black people can't swim" might even have begun.
 
I can't understand where "black people can't swim" might even have begun.
Start with racists suggesting that black people are monkeys and follow the thought process through to "chimpanzees can't swim".

In fact chimps can swim, they just don't often do it and I'm not sure it's ever been observed in the wild, so it was thought that they can't right up until the mid 1980s - some zoos still use moats as a barrier for chimp enclosures.
 
I would have thought that it was because that because black people (at least in the USA) are more likely to be poor than whites, and more likely to live in impoverished neighbourhoods than whites, they would have had less of a chance to learn how to swim.
 
Start with racists suggesting that black people are monkeys and follow the thought process through to "chimpanzees can't swim".

In fact chimps can swim, they just don't often do it and I'm not sure it's ever been observed in the wild, so it was thought that they can't right up until the mid 1980s - some zoos still use moats as a barrier for chimp enclosures.

and
Why don't black Americans swim?
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-11172054
 
That's an interesting article. Having taught primary in the UK I find it astonishing that there's anywhere in the world where the state doesn't prepare its children to be able to swim at least 10 metres. I was actually very surprised to find that it's not part of the Scottish core either.
There's very few coastlines in the USA. There's more in Scotland, but if you fall in the water there you're dead from hypothermia in 30 seconds.
 
All this was inspired by the principle – which is quite true in itself – that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying. These people know only too well how to use falsehood for the basest purposes.

That is perhaps the most unreadable font I've ever seen used on any forum elsewhere. I have no idea what you said because I can't force my eyes to move through that ..... stuff.
 
The biggest lie ever told is the biggest lie ever told which is the biggest lie ever told to another person who is the biggest lie ever told who has the biggest lie ever told that has been passed on to this forum which is the biggest lie ever told and posted to the biggest lie ever told thread.

Therefore... THIS BIGGEST LIE EVER TOLD is the biggest lie ever told!

DUN DUN DUN....
 
No one's said it ?, Really ?...

9/11

*shots fired* :P

Edit* - All the conspiracies and such, not whether the event actually happened.
 
There exists information relating to the JFK assassination, the Apollo program and 9/11 which will likely remain classified for many decades to come.

So naturally all these are fair game for lighthearted suspicion as lies or conspiracies. But all of these events are foundational to our current understanding of reality, validity of our current government, and the status of truth and morality in our current culture and worldview. So they are off limits to serious challenge, let alone revelation or proof as lies.

Most of alive today may never know the full truth of any of it, and for very understandable reasons.
 

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