Back when I was a little kid I apparently believed that television shows differ from TV to TV. One day I went to a friend's house and watched TV. and when I told my mom about one of the shows I saw, I was suprised to hear my younger brother and sister saw the exact same episode even though I knew we all liked that show.

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In about second grade, my mom used to always watch Beverly Hills, 90210. Well, in school, we learned the phone number to call the police and fire department—911. I ran home and excitedly told my mom. When she asked me what the number was I told her, "90210."

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When I was little, I genuinely believed that villains in movies were actually bad people. I thought that when movies needed bad guys, they would go into the local jail and pick someone up. This led me to believing that Glenn Close was a terrible person after watching her in 102 Dalmatians. I know now that famous people (for the most part) are not evil and there is such a thing as "acting."

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I'm almost 22 years old and until a few months ago I did not realize that Masterpiece Theater is not in fact Master P's Theater. Luckily I realized this quietly and on my own while my girlfriend was flipping through channels.

Master P's Theater is a tale brought to you by I Used To Be Stupid. Have your own you'd like the world to see? Submit it now!

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A quickie from the anonymous bin:

When I was five or six years old I believed that when someone grow up in a movie they waited five or ten years for the actor to grow.

Aging Actors is a tale brought to you by I Used To Be Stupid. Have your own you'd like the world to see? Submit it now!

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All throughout the 80's I would visit the arcade at a nearby mall when my mom would take us there to go shopping. During one of those visits a new game had appeared: Thunder Blade. This was a groundbreaking video game experience for me. Before Thunder Blade I always held the assumption that if I was piloting an airplane or helicopter, I would need to push the flight stick forward to go up, and pull it back to go down. Thunder Blade, and every flight game I've played since, was exactly the opposite. Pushing the stick forward made it go down, and pulling it back made it go up.

Having my beliefs about flying radically changed by Thunder Blade made, I felt like I had just unlocked the secret to flying. I was certain that because I now had this knowledge in my head that I could fly a real life helicopter without issue.

The cumulation of this new belief was a while later while on the playground during recess. Some of my friends were talking about helicopters, and I very matter-of-factually told them I knew how to fly one. I don't think that they believed me.

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Delby from Brooklyn watches one Jim Carrey movie, and ends up recreating a scenario out of a different Jim Carrey movie. How strange is that?

Growing up in New York sure wasn't easy. So many things and people to be afraid of. What made it worse for me was that I was an overly curious youth.

I would often listen to many adult conversations, which were mostly about suspicion of government, the media, and world politics. I was also an unusual child. I would watch National Geographic, The Discovery Channel, and a lot of movies.

One particular movie that stood out to me was The Truman Show. After watching this movie I combined what I heard from adults with what I saw on TV and my childish mind became convinced that I was being watched 24/7. I believed that everything was a device for surveillance. To me the smoke detector was a camera. The lights on the street, the exit signs at school, the mirrors in the bathroom all had a spy on the other side of the wall. Everything and everyone was watching me.

The reasons for which I believed that I was being watched progressed over time. I first thought that I was just like Truman and I was in a reality show. Then I figured that I was a government experiment which they kept tabs on. Later I would come to believe that I somehow was a future hero of civilization. That a group of some sorts from the future was keeping me safe so that I could fulfill my duties as a the future savior of humanity; sort of like The Terminator.

The sad part is that I truly believed all these things. I wasn't imagining this world, I was stupidly believing it to be true. How stupid was I?

1984, Jim Carrey Style is a tale brought to you by I Used To Be Stupid. Have your own you'd like the world to see? Submit it now!

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Nate shares the following misconception of broadcast media:

Being a sports fan, I used to regularly watch NBA games on the weekend with my dad, sometimes a double header. What confused me on the day of a double header was that as soon as the first game was over, the next would start in a completely different looking arena. I inquired as to how they could paint the floor so fast for two totally different teams, and have it be dry in enough time for them to immediately start playing on it. I was informed that it was actually a different arena.

I also thought the radio worked in a similar fashion, with a large stage with the bands in a line waiting to go live and play their one song and quickly getting out of the way for the next performer.....

I was completely stupid.

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Meghan from Duluth, MN almost unlocks the mystery of full motion video:

When I was very young I didn't understand how the TV worked, specifically, how all those tiny people could fit in the box so I could watch them.

I figured that all of the cartoon characters were real, but anything that wasn't a cartoon, was just a bunch of photographs. In order to make it look like a real show, Mickey Mouse (or some other cartoon character) would switch the photographs really fast in order to produce a moving image. Oddly, Bo and Luke Duke (from the Dukes of Hazzard) were exempt from that rule, and were real, just like the cartoon characters.

It's odd that I got the general concept of cell animation, just completely screwed up when it was used.

The Mysteries Of Television is a tale brought to you by I Used To Be Stupid. Have your own you'd like the world to see? Submit it now!

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Sam writes in:

When I was a child, my mother had little discretion with regards to what I watched on television. As a result, I lived on a regular diet of violent and sexually explicit content.

At the age of 6 or 7, I asked her about the actors who were shot and killed on these shows and why they would voluntarily give up their lives for television roles. I think it was the fake blood that threw me.

How did I make it through 2nd grade?

Television Violence is a tale brought to you by I Used To Be Stupid. Have your own you'd like the world to see? Submit it now!

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