What were some misconceptions you had about the world when you were a child?

[Bandit3 the Worker]

- aspartame was really dangerous for you and could cause cancer.

Actually this is true.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

A few more things I believed:

I thought people automatically lost all their teeth the moment they reached adulthood.

I thought that items dumped in the Ohio River would float upstream, land in the Atlantic Ocean, and float to Europe.

I thought that going through an underwater tunnel like the Holland Tunnel would be like scuba diving, only in a car.

I thought actors on TV weren't real people.

I thought TV channel numbers were the same in every city.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

I also used to think the Eastern Hemisphere was called "Droid."

[kcguy]

When I was born, my dad was 44 years, 6 months, and zero days old.  I thought people celebrated half-birthdays on one of their parents' birthdays.

[DC Al Fine]

I thought that the word algorithm was some sort of joke at Al Gore`s expense that I didn`t understand.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

I thought "Izod" (the shirt) was "eyes odd."

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

-The President controlled everything
-It was unpatriotic to not like the President
-Since the President elected, he/she was inherently good because if he/she was evil people would not like them and vote for someone else.
-China still had Emperors
-If a country had a President it could not be communist
-Japanese people couldn't read because they didn't use the Latin alphabet
-Most of the standard national stereotypes
-Britain was a tyrannical monarchy

I'll add more if they come up...

[Nash]

I thought for an embarrassingly sizable portion of my life that like my hometown, every other city in the world had a twin city of similar size and more sad, grey demeanor. The fact that my parents often visited Dallas and Tampa did not help this misconception, with the St. Petersburg situation being doubly confounding, as I for a short time also held the belief that a latter twin city's name also had to begin with the word Saint.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

I used to think it was illegal to chew bubble gum in communist countries.

I also thought Walter Mondale was born in Ceylon the country instead of Ceylon the town in Minnesota, and therefore ineligible to be Vice-President.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

I used to think it was illegal to chew bubble gum in communist countries.

I also thought Walter Mondale was born in Ceylon the country instead of Ceylon the town in Minnesota, and therefore ineligible to be Vice-President.

It also would have made him ineligible to run for president in 1984.

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

After reading the end of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, I became freaked out that Voldemort was lurking under the headscarf a Muslim girl in my 2nd-grade class was wearing.

Yeah.

[Fed. Pac. Chairman Devin]

I had to be a Democrat because I was still in school. It was okay to tell racist jokes, because they make fun of us. (I actually believed that longer than I want to admit.) I remember thinking it was weird when a friend of mine told me his class was all White. I tought all police officers were corrupt and dishonest. Oh yeah and I remember thinking nobody went to prison if they didn't do anything wrong.