Saudi-Arabia: Sewing machine frenzy in red mercury hoax

Started by Syt, April 19, 2009, 09:01:41 AM

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Syt

April 19, 2009, 09:01:41 AM
http://www.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUSTRE53D48H20090414
QuoteRIYADH (Reuters) - Saudi police are investigating the origins of a hoax that had hundreds of people believing that old sewing machines may bring fortune because they contained an elusive, and probably mythical, substance known as red mercury.

Saudi newspapers on Tuesday published pictures of Saudis proudly posing next to old sewing machines awaiting prospective buyers at traditional markets.

The English-language Saudi Gazette newspaper said some buyers were willing to pay up to 200,000 riyals ($50,000) for an old Singer sewing machine proven to contain red mercury.

Mobile phones are supposedly employed as instruments to prove the existence of the phony substance. Popular belief in the Middle East has it that it can help uncover hidden gold treasures, though there are other theories which say it can be used to create a nuclear bomb.

"If the line cuts off when the telephone is placed close to the needle ... that proves the existence of the substance," Saudi Gazette said.

Al-Eqtisadiah newspaper said "poverty provided a fertile ground for the red mercury rumor to spread in Saudi society, especially the middle class."

"We have to find out who started this hoax. We cannot be 100 percent sure of getting in the short-term to the person or persons who started this," an interior ministry spokesman told Reuters.

"People hope to make profit. This is no different to cases of citizens who put their money in untrustworthy schemes," he added.

Thousands of Saudi citizens have lost their life savings to financial scams consisting mainly of operations to raise money for real estate projects.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.
—Stephen Jay Gould

Proud owner of 42 Zoupa Points.

jimmy olsen

#1
April 19, 2009, 09:10:30 AM
 :lol: WTF?
It is far better for the truth to tear my flesh to pieces, then for my soul to wander through darkness in eternal damnation.

Jet: So what kind of woman is she? What's Julia like?
Faye: Ordinary. The kind of beautiful, dangerous ordinary that you just can't leave alone.
Jet: I see.
Faye: Like an angel from the underworld. Or a devil from Paradise.
--------------------------------------------
1 Karma Chameleon point

The Brain

#2
April 19, 2009, 09:12:17 AM
They are like children.
Women want me. Men want to be with me.

Razgovory

#3
April 19, 2009, 04:25:33 PM
I seem to recall Bin Laden trying to buy "Red Mercury".
I've given it serious thought. I must scorn the ways of my family, and seek a Japanese woman to yield me my progeny. He shall live in the lands of the east, and be well tutored in his sacred trust to weave the best traditions of Japan and the Sacred South together, until such time as he (or, indeed his house, which will periodically require infusion of both Southern and Japanese bloodlines of note) can deliver to the South it's independence, either in this world or in space.  -Lettow April of 2011

Raz is right. -MadImmortalMan March of 2017

Caliga

#5
April 21, 2009, 07:00:55 AM
These people are still living in the 14th century, as I've stated numerous times.  :lol:
0 Ed Anger Disapproval Points

Grey Fox

#6
April 21, 2009, 07:12:36 AM
I have an Idea.
Colonel Caliga is Awesome.

Ed Anger

#7
April 21, 2009, 07:32:45 AM
Quote from: Grey Fox on April 21, 2009, 07:12:36 AM
I have an Idea.
I thought I smelled something burning.
Stay Alive...Let the Man Drive

derspiess

#9
April 21, 2009, 10:25:10 AM
That's even better than Korean Fan Death :lol:
"If you can play a guitar and harmonica at the same time, like Bob Dylan or Neil Young, you're a genius. But make that extra bit of effort and strap some cymbals to your knees, suddenly people want to get the hell away from you."  --Rich Hall

Malthus

#10
April 21, 2009, 10:30:04 AM
Quote from: derspiess on April 21, 2009, 10:25:10 AM
That's even better than Korean Fan Death :lol:

I had to google that. Wierd.  :lol:
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

Malthus

#11
April 21, 2009, 10:32:25 AM
Quote from: Syt on April 19, 2009, 09:01:41 AM


Thousands of Saudi citizens have lost their life savings to financial scams consisting mainly of operations to raise money for real estate projects.
[/quote]

That would *never* happen here in the West.  ;)
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

Grey Fox

#12
April 21, 2009, 10:33:27 AM
Quote from: Malthus on April 21, 2009, 10:30:04 AM
Quote from: derspiess on April 21, 2009, 10:25:10 AM
That's even better than Korean Fan Death :lol:

I had to google that. Wierd.  :lol:

:wtf:
Colonel Caliga is Awesome.

Malthus

#13
April 21, 2009, 10:36:13 AM
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

PDH

#14
April 21, 2009, 10:40:15 AM
Fan death isn't funny!  My great grandfather died of fan death when he woke up to turn off the fan and fell over hitting his head.   :mad:
I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.
-Umberto Eco

-------
"I'm pretty sure my level of depression has nothing to do with how much of a fucking asshole you are."

-CdM
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