‘What’s something you once believed only to later realise it was propaganda?’ – 21 people who discovered they’d been completely hoodwinked

It’s said only the truly paranoid among us think the world is out to get us, and yet sometimes it turns out that those incredibly suspicious people are correct: we’re being tricked and cheated at every turn.

They’ve been discussing how easily we can be fooled on the AskReddit page after user amc_visions visions posed thus question:

What’s something you once believed only to later realise it was propaganda?

And lots of people who found out they’d been duped spoke up about it, like these:

1.

‘That diamond engagement rings are some ancient, timeless tradition. I was floored when I learned the whole concept was invented by a De Beers marketing team in the 1930s.’
–Embarrassed_Year4720

2.

‘McDonald’s coffee lawsuit. That woman was seriously hurt, and I hate that I ever believed otherwise.’
–UselessGuy23

3.

‘Not sure it’s ‘propaganda’, but I used to believe that lemmings occasionally committed mass suicide. Thanks, Walt Disney, for “proving” this myth.’
–Pithyperson

4.

‘That my Halloween candy would have drugs and razorblades in them.’
–effinmetal

5.

‘I love how many people swear to this day, even the tiniest amount of MSG in Chinese food makes them sick, yet they can put down an entire bag of Doritos in one sitting without batting an eye.

Just because your food doesn’t advertise on the front of the package that it contains MSG doesn’t mean it isn’t a major ingredient.

They usually label it as monosodium glutamate (which is what MSG stands for), and people don’t even realise they are eating it all the time. It’s the secret ingredient that makes a lot of things extra delicious.’
–Roadside_Prophet

6.

‘That paid closed source software is more secure than free open source software.’
–TxTechnician

7.

‘I would say the propaganda about saturated fat and cholesterol. I grew up thinking foods like margarine and sugary cereals were healthier than an egg.’
–Anonymous92916

8.

‘That we were saving the trees by switching to plastic bags. One of the biggest and most damaging lies of a generation.’
–metdear

9.

‘A and B type personalities were invented by tobacco researchers to explain the prevalence of heart disease in smokers: A type personalities were driven, hard-working, under lots of stress, focused, and of course, more likely to smoke. Ergo the frequency of dying from heart disease was correlation, not causation (in their hypothesis).’
–hansn

10.

‘All rich people must be smart!’
–noodles1119

11.

”Breakfast is most important meal of the day’, which turns out to be one of many successes of marketing propaganda.’
–Minute-Prune-2919