Misconceptions

A really good friend of mine recently started writing for the Odyssey– you can check her first article out here— and reading it made me think all about misconceptions.

For example, fortune cookies were not originally a Chinese tradition.

Also, Bats are not really blind. (HaHa to everyone who ever told me I was “as blind as a bat!” A better phrase would be “as blind as Ray Charles”, because he really is blind, but that’s just my opinion.)

Many people believe these common “facts” and others stories simply because that is what they have always been told. For example, when you learn a history concept in elementary school, like the story of Christopher Columbus, everything is simple. The first time you are taught that this guy was looking for America and once he found it he treated the natives nicely and with respect. When you reach high school, you discover that really Columbus had no idea where he was and thought he had discovered Spain. He also was a complete jerk to the native people of the New World.

But I mean he did sail the ocean blue in 1492, so at least my elementary teacher got one thing right.

Sorry for the history lecture, as it turns out, you learn about Columbus in college too. I’m pretending writing this post somehow correlates with me studying for finals.

I hope you have a great week!

— Mac