Everyday Canvas

Rumors and My Experience with One

Prompt: Rumors

What do you think about rumors? Do you tend to believe them, maybe sometimes? And have you ever tried to track down the source of a rumor about you or someone close to you?

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I think rumors are especially harmful if believable and if the atmosphere around a rumor supports it. Truth is, there's no good or easy way to fight a rumor. Yes, people and companies in business can be more transparent and communicate more clearly with people in general, and they can also take legal action. If the rumor, however, is once believed, it leaves a doubt behind it, even after it is proven to be false.

This is because rumors, especially when based on incomplete or non-existing information, can be very hurtful. Their idea can lead to speculation and conjecture, and if the rumor targets certain people, it not only harms those people but also others around them.

Rumors play on people's emotions and spread rapidly. Unfortunately, once a rumor starts, it can take a sensational and a believable life of its own, with each retelling twisting the details every which way. Such rumors can damage reputations, create division among people, and incite fear and panic. Even in business, a rumor can affect stock prices, the trust of the consumers, and overall image of a brand or a public person.

If so, why do people start rumors, then? The motivations can vary from malice to attention-seeking or by people who genuinely believe the information to be true, even if it's not.

Then very rarely, some silly people start rumors on purpose with good(!) intentions. Such a terrible thing happened to me when I was 21 and in college after my degree. The person who started the rumor, on purpose, was my mother's second cousin who lived a block away from us. She thought a person who was a friend of the family and I would make a good couple and she started a rumor that we were engaged. There was no basis to this rumor whatsoever!

Suddenly, my entire extended family was gossiping about me and that person. I wouldn't have heard about it unless, until my best friend and cousin hadn't scolded me for not telling her such an important news. I immediately told her that there was no such thing. She said, "But I heard it from a very reliable source." "What do you mean," I growled. "Do you mean I'm myself not a reliable source to you?" "But everybody is talking about it!"

Anyway, after that she did believe me, possibly with some doubt. Still, I appreciate her coming to me with that question and alerting me. A few months later, another member of the family came to me with such a question, also.

I was so mad and so disappointed in my family for gossiping about me because I sensed, at the time, malice in that rumor. I had loved my extended family even much more than I loved my parents, and I decided to go far away from them, and I did so, later, when I got the chance.

Unfortunately, I only learned about who had started the rumor, years later, after I had married my husband. My mother told me the truth about her cousin who had started the rumor, only because my mother felt embarrassed by my evasion of the family. She knew about the rumor's background much earlier, she said, but she was afraid to tell me because she knew I would go pick a fight with her cousin, while her cousin had all the good intentions in the world. Good intentions, my foot!

I also learned, from another source, that one of my uncles had given a good and long lecture (i.e. scolding) to the rumor-starter. After that, all went back to its original, sweet form of a relationship between me and my extended family, and I was only evasive to that rumor-starter cousin of my mother's.

This is why I never believe any rumors, even if, and especially if, it is in the popular news, newspapers, or online. As they say, "Live and Learn!",