April Fool’s day is still a day for pranks and tricks. Some of the best ones have been pulled in the media. As reported in the McCready County Record, “…back in 1957, a BBC (British Broadcasting Corp) TV show called "Panorama" announced that because of a very mild winter and the elimination of the dreaded "spaghetti weevil," Swiss farmers were harvesting a bumper crop of spaghetti. Along with this report, the BBC ran film of "Swiss peasants" happily plucking strands of spaghetti off of low hanging tree limbs. Many viewers were taken in by this prank, flooding the BBC with calls asking how to plant their own "spaghetti trees." They were told to place a stick of dry pasta in a can of tomato paste and hope for the best.”
April Fool’s day tricks have lost a little of their luster, however, because of the Internet. Via email, we perpetuate myths like the BBC trick, over and over throughout the year. No, Madelyn Murray O’Hair has no active petition with the FCC to ban Christian programming on the air. If someone forwards the message to you and ask you to send it on, just say “no”. No, there is no movie being made called “Corpus Christi” that portrays Jesus as a homosexual. (I got this one just last week, forwarded out of the office of the City of Lake City.)
Before you forward anything; before you get incensed; make sure that you check out the truth of rumors and petitions. When we perpetuate myth at the expense of truth, we compromise our ability to stand for the Truth – and that is our primary mission.
