Enigma or Hoax?
What is the Mandela Effect and is it real?
May 16, 2018
Not many people know too much about the Mandela Effect and what it is, but everyone has experienced it at one time or another.
The Mandela Effect is the phenomenon at which a person will misremember particular events that either happened differently or didn’t happen at all. For instance, Fiona Broome, a self-described “paranormal consultant”, first became aware of the Mandela Effect when she remembered a false memory – thinking that South Africa President Nelson Mandela died in prison during the 1980s when, in all reality, he was still alive. However, Broome was not the only person that believed Mandela died in prison during the 1980s; in fact, multiple people remember hearing about Mandela’s passing when he was in prison.
Of course, President Mandela actually died years after he was released from prison in 2013 but this opened up Broome’s eyes to all of the other times when the Mandela Effect occurred. The controversy of how to spell Berenstain Bears or Berenstein Bears came into light, as well, and people weren’t sure which one it was. Many speculated that the correct spelling was Berenstein Bears and distinctly remember it being so, but the actual spelling is Berenstain Bears. There have also been other instances where the Mandela Effect first appeared but not many people notice the effects of it.
Sophomore Megan Foster hasn’t experienced the Mandela Effect first hand but she has heard of the phenomenon and its effects.
“There was this guy in New York City, around the 1940s, and people had this old stamp from this guy that came from this country that didn’t even exist. People were like, ‘Well, where’s this country?’ and the guy pointed to a map and he found the location of where he came from but it wasn’t there on the map,” Foster said. “After that, the people didn’t know what to do this so they put him in this hotel and said they would help him but the next day, the guy was gone. People think that this guy was a time traveler that came from a far off future country but because of the Mandela Effect, everyone thinks this country never existed. It’s really weird.”
Some people believe in the Mandela Effect but some are skeptical and believe in people mixing up stories with other recent events that have already happened. Mr. LaBrot, for instance, has heard of the Mandela Effect but believes that people commonly mix up stories with each other and often confuse them together.
“I think that your brain probably stores information and sometimes things get crossed,” LaBrot said. “Maybe somebody in that guy’s life died and he’s putting Nelson Mandela as the person. I think people take two different stories and put them together. There was probably a famous guy that died but it wasn’t Nelson Mandela but something else probably happened in the 80s with him [getting put in prison] and the stories just crossed.”
It’s easy to get people and different occurrences confused with each other, but at the same time, the Mandela Effect could really happen to people on a daily basis. It’s hard to believe in conspiracies, sometimes, because they speak of the impossible and it’s not everyday that something supernatural happens. I guess the question remains: do you believe in the Mandela Effect or is it a total hoax?
