Art & Understanding

Urban Myths

Rumors have the power to create false realities‹and life-threatening situations

by Patricia Nell Warren

Recently my business partner, Tyler St. Mark, had an unsettling discussion with a gay male friend. Roscoe (not the friend's real name) is an intelligent and educated guy. So usually Tyler listens respectfully to what Roscoe says. But this time, Tyler was amazed as Roscoe assured him that many gay men like to stuff live gerbils up their rectums. No, Roscoe hadn't done the gerbil thing himself. And he had never seen somebody else do it. But he knew men who said they’d done it.

Tyler, who was once a lifeguard and emergency medic, was stunned by Roscoe’s willingness to believe this mother of all urban myths, and hastened to share his amazement with me. The two of us decided to do an informal survey of other gay male acquaintances. To our further amazement, we found that a significant number believe as Roscoe does. No, they’d never done it, but they knew someone who...etc. They could even describe techniques for doing it properly.

The idea of gerbil stuffing has been around for at least two decades, and the Internet is now full of sites that debunk it. Some are devastatingly witty. Now and then, there’s a “news report” allegedly based on somebody’s real-life trip to the emergency room. ER records do reveal that some adventurous Americans—mostly heterosexuals, incidentally—are fond of sticking objects (yams, light bulbs, Coke bottles) up their gazoos. Even the TV series ER featured such a case. Invariably, though, “gerbil reports” turn out to be as fictitious as a Harry Potter novel. Like the one that supposedly appeared in the Los Angeles Times, about the guy whose partner lit a match to see the problem better, touching off an explosion worthy of air raids on Baghdad. Indeed, gerbil stuffing is now in a class with another urban myth, cow tipping. One would think that only hardcore bible-pushers still believe that gerbil stuffing is logistically possible and actually done. Fred Phelps always shows up with a “Save the Gerbils” sign.

So it’s unsettling to find so many gay people believing in gerbil stuffing. Why? Because it’s a pernicious piece of anti-gay propaganda, crafted by religious righters who had a vested interest in portraying gay men as self-destructive and nasty. Why are some gay people so ready to believe it, when it amounts to believing the worst about themselves?

My point is: Urban myths about health are destructive, yet America teems with them. Some teen girls still believe you can get pregnant off toilet seats. People believe that movie-star fad diets work, that all fats and cholesterol are bad for you. Men believe that only women get breast cancer and osteoporosis. Older people believe they will lose their mental capacity as they age. I could go on and on with the list. Some myths are about HIV and AIDS. In the last few years, government-sponsored public relations campaigns have created an urban myth about a “sub-Saharan surge in HIV infection” that is allegedly happening, especially in San Francisco. When recent San Francisco figures showed that the local infection rate is actually dropping—with zero recent infections in April 2003—most media ignored the news.

Blind belief in urban myths may help explain why HIV prevention programs often fail. There are many myths about why unsafe sex is okay. “I have the right to express myself.” “If I pull out in time, it's safe.” “Only the passive partner can get it.” “Only gay white men get it.” Urban myths also convince people that they can trust big corporations and ASOs with their lives—even as some of these very same institutions are being hauled into the courtroom, and their executives or directors sentenced to prison time, for having lied, embezzled, cheated their stockholders, cooked the books, etc.

In short, urban myths are destructive because they make it hard for people to wake up and smell the coffee. Intelligence and education don’t prevent Americans from swallowing these health legends whole. Indeed, believers will fight you tooth and nail if you try to show them that their cherished beliefs are not fact. It’s a paradox: In our information-rich society, many people still don't have a handle on vital information because of urban myths.

What’s the answer to this problem? The solution won't be simple, but it can start with each of us asking hard questions, instead of believing everything we’re told about anything—and that includes stuffing gerbils and tipping cows.