Yeltsin wasn't tired, and Shapoklyak didn't have an umbrella. What is the "Mandela effect"?
July 18th is International Day of Nelson Mandela, the renowned anti-apartheid activist. NeMoscow pays tribute to him, as it supports any struggle against oppression. But today we'll talk not about Mandela himself, but about the curious effect associated with his name.
How does the "Mandela effect"—a phenomenon associated with false collective memory—occur? What "memories" are so deeply ingrained in people's memories that they have no doubt they are true? Read our cards—you're sure to find some surprises.
1. Nelson Mandela spent many years in prison. "...Where he died—in the 80s or so," your brain adds. Many other people around the world think so, too.
In fact, Mandela was released in 1990, addressed the nation, became president of South Africa, carried out a raft of reforms in the country, and died peacefully in 2013 at the age of 95 in his home in a suburb of Johannesburg, surrounded by his family.
2. In 2009, at the Dragon Con science fiction and fantasy festival, when the conversation turned to Mandela, it turned out that many of the panelists were not only certain of his death in the 1980s, but even provided details, including news reports and a speech by his widow.
Writer Fiona Broome, who participated in the discussion, coined the term "the Mandela effect." And—in the best traditions of the genre—she explained this phenomenon as a person's transition to an alternate reality.
3. Scientists explain this effect by the peculiarities of our memory: the brain doesn't record events like a video camera, but rather reassembles memories each time we play them back, filling in the "gaps" with logical details. People don't so much "remember" as reconstruct the past based on attitudes, stereotypes, and social confirmation;
Below are some examples of the "Mandela effect".
4. In his New Year's address on December 31, 1999, Boris Yeltsin didn't say, "I'm tired, I'm leaving." He said, "I'm leaving, I've done all I can." The phrase "I'm tired, I'm leaving" became popular thanks to the KVN show: soon after Boris Yeltsin's resignation, speeches appeared in which the former president's words were repeated in precisely this version.
Interestingly, back in 1998, the Ural Pelmeni team practically predicted Yeltsin's resignation, releasing a number in which Akela, in Yeltsin's voice, says, "Listen to me, free pack, you understand. I'm going to the valley of vacations. You need a new leader. I'm talking about Mowgli." There was definitely some alternative reality involved here.
5. Everyone knows that Nikita Khrushchev, speaking at a UN meeting in 1960, banged his shoe on the podium and shouted, "I'll show you Kuzma's mother!" This is quite consistent with Khrushchev's character, but in reality, everything was different. 1. Khrushchev took off his shoe and waved it, but he himself was sitting at the table with the entire Soviet delegation, and British Prime Minister Macmillan (according to another version, the representative of the Philippines) was delivering a speech at the podium. The famous photo with the shoe on the podium is a photomontage. 2. Khrushchev uttered the phrase "Kuzma's mother" in official settings twice, but at different times and in different places: at the opening of the American exhibition in Sokolniki and during a trip to Los Angeles.
6. The "Mandela effect" often manifests itself in quotes from popular films. For example, Darth Vader in Star Wars doesn't say to Luke, "Luke, I am your father!"
Here is the exact dialogue:
— Obi-Wan didn't tell you what happened to your father?
- I know everything. He said you killed him.
- No. I am your father!
7. Old Lady Shapoklyak never had an umbrella—childhood memories deceive us. An umbrella even appears in some sculptures of this character, but it never appears in the cartoon itself.
Do you remember the line, "Five minutes, five minutes—is that a lot or a little?" from Lyudmila Gurchenko's New Year's song? That line never existed either: our memories likely just combined two songs: the aforementioned "Five Minutes" and Valery Leontiev's "Three Minutes" ("Three minutes, three minutes—is that a lot or a little,/For life to run, run, in three minutes?").
