How do rumors get started?

I started to take a stab at answering this question in the interest of quickly defining the quality of rumors as we hear them. Some of them get more amusing, but some are the same old, same old...and after thinking about it, I have some ideas. Your thoughts welcome, of course.

1. Foamers. These people haven't the faintest idea what's going on, and usually ask dumb questions that serve no purpose. These rumors are also usually the most outlandish and easiest to dismiss. Some is youthful excitement, and as a teacher, I don't have any problems with this. Some is not, and I don't mind hanging these people by their toes until they come to their senses.

2. Intelligent foamers. Count me, I suppose, in here. I can see a railroad map as well as anyone, and wonder why this stub track or that stub track or that under-used mainline still belongs to XYZ railroad when it could be used much better by ABC railroad. We shake our heads...and come up with ideas that are much smarter than what's currently out there, without realizing there are always very sound ideas for the way things are.

3. Union ameliorations. X jobs are lost to either a shortline or mainline downgrade. Members grumble. Someone, somewhere within the ranks talks about a new coal contract, or new customer, or the purchase of all or part of another railroad as a way to keep everyone focused on the horizon instead of the job loss at hand. You'll have to ask your local trainmen if it works.

Politicians and their foolish promises are sub-1 as a category, as they serve to make non-foamers (i.e. normal taxpayers) pay attention to something they had no idea about, which stirs everyone up, but railroad-literate people see what they say and rememebr countless times when we/you had to take the pipe. It's like this, I guess: when a train or locomotive appears in a movie or TV show and is used foolishly, or dangerously, and regular people "oooh" and "aaah", while we all shake our heads. Atomic Train, anyone?

There's more, but this is a start.

Dave Becker

Pabs,

1.) "Arcade and Attica gets $23.3 million for North Java Maglev project."

2.) "GVT extends to Rochester, double-track & CTC for Ethanol Plant."

3.) "Mechanicville Yard to reopen as Starbucks..."

Is that the kind of stuff you mean? Rumors?


Highly unlikely on the net.....

An example of a rumor that simply cannot be tolerated at any railforum was one that recently appeared at several boards that at best could be called "loosely' moderated, or more to the point, "unmoderated'. The rumor was that on July 3, Amtrak was to post "180 day notices' pursuant to ARAA '97 covering the discontinuance of all transcontinental trains W of Chicago. The person, incidentally a registered Member here at this site, originating that rumor is the leader (likely ad-hoc) of a rail passenger advocacy group.

Suffice to say, the rumor was without foundation.

That the owners of those sites that permitted such to stand, along with the resulting "you're full of S$%^' follow up postings did the railfan and passenger train riding communities a disservice. Had such material been posted at our Amtrak Forum during my term of service as its Moderator, absent confirmation from a major news source, it would have been killed as soon as I had knowledge of such.

That was a whole other category of rumor, ones that are malicious. (I'll assume that that rumor was indeed such.) I don't see many of them, as most people I've encountered here are positive people, but they definitely exist at the local level, whether the negativity is that "the railroad's gonna shut down" or "they're gonna run everything at night while we sleep."

So, GBN, why do you think THAT one got started?

Dave Becker

I can't be sure, Mr. Becker, but somehow, as ugly as this may sound, the individual was trying to "fan the fire" to stir up interest in his possibly waning advocacy group.

That seems to be any and all of their agendae - even the ones that have the $$$ to buy full page ads in the Sunday New York Times (impeach Bush, NOW - we can't stand by and let him serve out his term, kind of stuff, etc.).

Most of the rumors I see are more of the railfan wishful thinking kind, where the poster seems to lose sight of the difference between a "wouldn't it be great if...." fantasy and the more unappealing truth.

Would like a defnition of "foamers" or "phoamers". I know at one time railroaders referred to railfans in general as "foamers" as in dogs foaming at the mouth and anxious for any handout or attention. Has this progressed.

I ask this because of Pablo's opening post on this thread. HIs use and spelling of the word.

And also now that I am here: to topic.

Rumors are started in many ways, by many people. Sometimes inadvertenly when something is overheard in part or read and taken out of context, when something is misunderstood when the person hearing and passing on the information has no real idea of what the information is about--remember the game "pass it on" when one person whispers a statement into the ear of another who inturn whispers into the ear of another, etc., and remember the results? Propagandist and politicians know how to use partial information and out of context statements to shape arguements to make their points and gain their goals.

Still another rumor is the total lie made up to misguide people. These forums were recently used for such purpose much to the embarrassment of all of us as users. Concocting a story which implicated a railroad by quoting a non existing employee was quite disturbing to me as well as several others. It opened us all to criticism justifying being labled "foamers" in the worst sense of the term. Integrety, credability, sincerety, and trust any of us had from professional railroaders...and others...was trarnished if not lost entirely. This goes for each of us as individual railfans as well as railroad.net in particular plus any other forum on the internet, any association or society or organization of railfans. Those who foisted the rumor, who concocted the story, will probably get away with it unless they are personally known by the moderators or administrators of the forum. Anonomity is part of the internet; so these two, even if known, can return under different names, different email addresses, or even the same email addresses, undetected. It is a shame because they have hurt us all.

I'm not sure how rumors get started, but I heard there is a secret society, that regularly visits the Forums, and creates new topics, when things get slow. Just what I heard.............

I hope you are giving them more credit than they deserve! I used to do talk radio and I know I was often set up by a society within my first to third call; the topic of the week was set. This was at a small station with no producer/screener and no tape delay. Plus I was novice enough not to catch on for the first week or two. But lets hope that kind of thing doesn't really happen here; there are too many good topics and real things to talk about without inventing or forcing a subject. Let PARADE and USA WEEKEND play that game, not railroad.net or its forums.

I would like to thank the Adminsitrators of this site for taking care of the matter which I discussed earlier here. It was an act of vandalism to this site by some posters who were indeed deal with.