They say 60 percent of people will believe whatever you say if you put a percentage in it… You
probably believed that, huh?

And the reason you may have believed that is because it is in print and published by a trustworthy news source. The hidden truth is simple: People are evil and they lie. They lie at home, they lie at school, they lie in court and the most shocking place that people lie is online.

The Internet has become a conduit of not only information but a destructive device used to deceive those who are foolish enough to believe everything they read.

In today’s age of viral cat videos and mysterious slender men it is hard to believe anything that is read on a screen. I consider myself a skeptical person.

I stopped believing in Santa at the age of 7 and the Easter Bunny at the age of 10. I am not that easy to fool. If I can’t see it, I probably won’t believe it.

For a while, however, I decided to give the Web a chance and be more open to believing that not everything has to be fake.

There has to be at least one truthful fish in the sea of lies that is the World Wide Web. I just wanted to believe … in mermaids. I was flabbergasted when I saw the documentary of life under the sea and real life video of mermaids.

This was a game changer. Mythical creatures are real! It will only be days now until the hunts for unicorns and bigfoots start, I thought. And then my bubble burst. I was sharing my amazement with my table in class when my AVID teacher killed my dreams. “It was a hoax!” she said. “You didn’t see the disclaimer at the end of the video saying ‘this is fake’?”

From that moment on I took a personal vow to only scientifically accept information given by the CNN, FOX News,
TMZ, People Magazine and BBC news networks.

Not everything one reads can be trusted. It is up to the individual to decide what is credible and what is not.

For all you know this story could be a lie and I’m just hoping you’re gullible enough to believe it.