politics
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In Kindergarden, my teacher told us about the presidential race (Ford/Carter) taking place the next day. Imagine my disappointment and utter confusion when I woke-up the next day, turned on the TV, and did not see Ford or Carter racing around a track (a horse track specifically in my mind) to see who wins & becomes President.
JB
Up until I was about 15, my dad had convinced me that Karl Marx was one of the Marx Brothers, I was eventually corrected by my teacher in front of the entire class.
Mike S.
I heard my parents talking about the upcoming elections in 1976, talking about Carter. Well, in my small world, I thought that Kotter from the tv show Welcome Back, Kotter was running for president.
Until about 1982, when I was 12, I thought that Feminism had fixed everything so that there was no more sexism. I was assured by my parents that it didn't matter that I was a girl, I could do anything, because the world was feminist now.
And then when the Equal Rights Amendment didn't pass, imagine my surprise and horror. And then gradually getting to see and experience painful sexism especially after puberty! Moving to Texas sure didn't help.
I also thought some vague hippielike partner to "Feminism", which took place in "The 60s" had fixed racism as well. I don't think I ever heard of the actual civil rights movement until I was at least 12 or 13. Nor did I know of any other feminist movements until maybe late high school.
Liz Henry
When I was about 6 I thought the President got to be President because he was the best human being there was in the whole country and that an election was some kind of beauty contest for men. When the word "Watergate" kept getting mentioned on the TV news I thought it had something to do with a dam (perfectly logical assumption for a 7 year old kid) but when I asked "What's Watergate?" all I got for an answer was " The President told a lie." Somehow I got the notion that if you were President and you told a lie you would have to be killed for the punishment, or sent to jail forever. It took an amazingly long time for me to be completely disabused of this belief; now I take it for granted that the President will always lie because it's what Presidents always do, and what's more, they will always get away with it.
Demitria Monde Thraam
We were Catholic growing up, and I thought everyone was. When I heard that Kennedy was the first and only Catholic President, I just couldn't belive that then-President Reagan was not a Catholic. It freaked me out.
top belief!
When I was a young child I used to believe that when you ran for presidency, the person that could run the furthest without stopping became president.
top belief!
I use to think that the prime minister would sit down at a big table and name everything so we would know what to call it.
raewyn (australia)
top belief!
Born in the USA in 1951, the Communist scare was in full swing when I was young. I was about four, I think, and the kid across the street was named 'Conrad.' I confused this with the word 'Comrade,' which was what the bad guys on TV called each other. I told my mother that the people across the street were Communists. "Oh!" she was sincerely interested, "why?" I told her that they called their son "Conrad." I'm sure my mother got a big laugh out of that one.
Allen Whipps
top belief!
I used to believe that the Queen and Margaret Thatcher were best friends and imagined them going to each others house for tea.
Zoe Moakes
being from england when i was young i used to think that the british and usa boycott of the 1980 moscow olympics was due to the cricketer Geoff Boycott. it was the only boycott i knew at the time!
wicket
top belief!
In 7th grade we were learning about annexing. I wanted to be a politician and show the U.S. that Canada was tough and not to be messed with by taking over Maine. After all, it was nice and small and close to the border. What we would do would be have secret meetings where we would tell people to move there, then wait 18 years so they could have kids who would be of legal age to vote too, and then one of them would make a bill or something proposing that Maine join Canada and then all the Canadians there that would vote yes. I still, kind of, think it would work...
a proud canadian
I'm Spanish, and as soon as I was told that Ronald Reagan spoke English I thought he must be the king of England.
R.A.
i used to believe that Margeret Thatcher was the queen (because of the amount of coverage on TV) and that Great Britain was the only land in the world surrounded by endless sea.. i put this down to the weather updates on TV, which one day confused the hell out of me when it zoomed out to europe...what planet was this??!
My older sister also used to believe that the world in 'olden times' was actually black and white as shown on the TV.
Greig (Torquay)
When I was seven, Watergate was all you heard about on TV. I believed that someone had kidnapped Nixon and was holding him (tied up and gagged) next to a "water gate" which I pictured as a dried up dam. I thought that the kidnappers were going to drown him by opening the water gate. When I heard about payoffs and bribes, this only confirmed my belief.
When I was a kid I found out Hitler was an artist. I could not believe he was an artist. Artists are colourful creative people and they dont look like that.
C S Wagon
I used to believe that all Republicans were Protestants and all Democrats were Catholic.
Cy Hilterman
I thought the President of the US was like the King of the World, and because he was America's president he would have to be good. After all, America was good. He always was and would always be President. Then people started complaining about him (Nixon)and saying how he did bad things, and I thought "How could this be? He's President of America and America is good." Then they started talking about imnpeachment, and I thought they were talking about peach-mint ice cream!
Kdees
I used to think that the poster of Margaret Thatcher on the door of the Conservative Party office was in fact the lady that lived there.
Sam
I belief that it was Ingvar Carlsson who killed Olof palme The swedish primeminstry only becurse Ingvar want to be the new primeministry
Andreas
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