14 DAY TRIAL // Facebook seems to become the land where any small rumor gains proportions, unnecessarily scaring people. This time a message is circulating on the web about pieces of cheese containing nails being found in a dog park.
According to thatsnonsense, this is a true story, but it's actually just an isolated incident that happened somewhere in Buenos Aires back in July. Perfil.com covered to story, which tells the tale of a man who walked his dog in Parque Centenario and in the kennel he found pieces of cheese and meat containing nails with filed tips.
The problem is that besides this incident, there have been no other recorded cases, so we're clearly seeing something that is not a tendency as the Facebook post's headline mentions “New trend at dog parks, nails in pieces of cheese, if you take your dogs to dog parks, please be careful!! “
People who have nothing better to do started spreading the rumor like we're dealing with an international trend and all sort of posts could be found on the social networking website, alerting about incidents in parks all over the US. The one single picture that was taken in Argentina is now attributed to parks that haven't experienced anything like this.
This is not the first time these panic-causing posts could be seen, but as I mentioned in an earlier piece, users need to check the facts before alerting others of things that are untrue.
It seems as 7000 members already shared the note and 4500 comments were made on the matter, most of which were probably not coming from people with ill intentions. However, social media members should be more responsible when it comes to spreading news. Sending hundreds of alerts of something that causes unnecessary panic is just as bad as the acts described in these false messages.