5 Stupid Product Myths That Had Real-World Consequences

Fast-forward to 2015. After fears of genetically modified food spread among the scientifically illiterate, the rumor came back, and this time, it was personal. For no known reason, a handful of Chinese tech firms started pushing the "mutant chicken" agenda, now complete with doctored photos of six-winged, eight-legged chickens that, be honest, you would totally eat.

We guess the 11 herbs and spices mostly consist of genetic resequencers.

Still, the viral messages damaged KFC's brand in China enough that they took these shadowy string-pullers to court over it, winning handily. The real winners, however, are us -- the people who get to live in a world with headlines like "'Spider Chickens Are Not Real,' Says KFC.'" Ain't the future grand?

Look fairly innocent to you? Good job, you're sane! If you were also paying attention in history class or just asked to come up with a reason a company that sells tea would use this image, you might (correctly) conclude that this is an image of the Boston Tea Party. You showoff.

But some people apparently decided it was a slave ship, and further purported that the circled K on the label was a symbol of the KKK. Leonard Marsh, the company's president who happens to be Jewish, had to explain in a $100,000 ad campaign that the symbol actually signifies that a product is kosher. Which makes sense, because of, you know. The Jewish thing. He went on to clarify that a business begun by "three Jewish boys from New York" would be the last to support the KKK, and the whole country came together in awkward silence.

We can actually trace the rumor pretty far -- almost to one specific snot-nosed jerk. It seems to have started on a playground somewhere it New York City, spreading from there to New Jersey, Eastern Pennsylvania, and Southern Connecticut. We know that because the rumor became a nightmare for Lifesavers president William Mack Morris. He pretty much went to bed one night the king of the bubble business, and woke up to plummeting sales and endless calls from retailers and reporters. So he hired a private investigator to try to figure out where the rumor came from.

If Morris had been a different sort of man, this could very well have ended up the sort of ruthless businessman vs. scrappy ragamuffin story that would have starred Macaulay Culkin in the '90s. But a People portrait of Morris paints him as a pitiful figure, moping in his office and sadly failing to blow bubbles. "'I don't care about bubbles,' he finally said. 'I care about the gum.'"

In the end, Bubble Yum came out on top, but it cost them. They eventually resorted to taking out ads in dozens of newspapers assuring consumers that their gum did not contain spider eggs. Honestly, the most shocking part of this story is that it worked. If Hershey started running YouTube prerolls touting their completely semen-free chocolate bars, you can bet we'd have some questions.

It was demonstrably false. For one thing, he'd never even been on the show. Even if he had, not even the frothiest Grand Wizard would dare to say that to her face. Still, the rumor took off, and people from just about every ethnic group came to believe he'd said it about them. Hilfiger remembers seeing it in Filipino tabloids, and one of his Jewish executives informed him that it had made its way to the Jewish community. Finally, in her beatific grace, Oprah invited Hilfiger on her show to address the rumors.

While it took a personal toll, this story is unique in that the Hilfiger brand actually suffered no financial loss due to the rumor. In fact, according to Hilfiger, their sales doubled when people thought he was a racist jerk. Let's aggressively not think about that.

For more, check out If Superstore Ads Were Honest - Honest Ads (Target, Walmart Parody):

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