Saigon in 1966 was, as always, a city of rumors. It breathed rumors, consumed only rumors, for the people of Saigon had long since ceased to believe anything stated officially as fact. Rumor was the only medium. Among the stories of comets falling and bombing halts there was that year one rumor that stood out from all the rest. A work of art, a Fabergé among rumors, it was so embellished with circumstantial evidence of murders and secret meetings, so exquisitely crafted of inference, coincidence, and psychological truth, that its purveyors established its value without question. The central theme of the rumor was that Premier Nguyen Cao Ky and a number of other highly placed politicians in Saigon belonged to a secret society formed in northern Vietnam before the Indochina war. The aim of this society was now to subvert the Saigon government and enlist the Americans in helping the North Vietnamese to conquer the south. (FitzGerald, 32)
Definitions
- Rumor: 1. A story or statement in general circulation without confirmation or certainty as to facts. 2. Gossip. 3. Archaic. A clamor, a din. (Random House)
- A collaborative interpretation of events that "allow[s] people some measure of joint control over ambiguous, stressful situations." (Samper)
- A "collective problem-solving interaction" arising from "a combination of anxiety, uncertainty, and credulity." (Bordia and Rosnow)
- Urban legends are similar to rumors but more complex and resonant. They crop up in somewhat different versions across geographic space and over time, like modern folktales. Their themes are "expressed through developed narratives, involving the teller through circumstantial evidence situated in his/her close environment and resorting to the ubiquitous validating character of a friend of a friend." (Campion-Vincent)
Examples
- Foreigners posing as tourists are kidnapping village children in order to sell their body parts to wealthy Americans whose own children need organ transplants.
This rumor "surfaced and re-surfaced" in Latin America from the mid-1980s through the mid-1990s. There were several incidents in which foreign tourists were attacked (and some killed) by people who believed the tourists were threatening their children. (Samper)
- CNN video footage of Palestinians celebrating news of the 9/11 attacks was a hoax. The footage shown was actually a decade old, shot during the first Gulf war.
This rumor has been traced to a Web posting made by a graduate student in Brazil the night following the attacks. He wrote that one of his professors had told him s/he had copies of videotapes with the exact same footage from 1991. CNN received media queries about the claim within 24 hours of the posting. CNN issued an official denial of the allegation, backing it up with a statement from Reuters (which provided the footage) that the film was authentic. Nonetheless, the rumor continued to circulate. (Callahan)
- The wrap-around sunglasses worn by U.S. soldiers in Iraq give them X-ray vision. The soldiers use the glasses to ogle women through their clothes.
This was one of a number of rumors about the US military that New York Times reporter John Tierney found circulating in Baghdad in August 2003. American soldiers "can definitely see through women's clothes," an engineering student told Tierney. "It makes me angry. We are afraid to take our families out on the street." Tierney found that the rumor "would not die," even when a soldier let a boy try on his glasses to see for himself that they were just sunglasses. "He was still convinced they had X-ray vision," the soldier told Tierney. "He kept saying to me, 'Turn it on, turn it on.'" (Tierney)
Notes from Research and Practice
- Rumors are not solely about information. They also serve psychological and social needs. They can resonate even if their factual basis is proved false. As writer Jessamyn West said of good fiction, a rumor can, for believers, "reveal a truth that reality obscures."
- Rumors thrive when people lack credible information on, or explanations for, current events. (Bordia and Rosnow)
- The stronger an emotional reaction someone has to a rumor, the more likely they are to pass it on - even if they don't or can't really believe it. (Fearn-Banks, 44)
- People tend to judge the credibility of a rumor by the reliability of the person or source they hear it from rather than that of the original source. (Callahan)
- Rumors can help individuals form activist groups by articulating shared anxiety, outrage, or grief. (Samper)
- Stakeholders often understand that an organization can't comment on a rumor for legal or institutional reasons. In those circumstances, however, it's crucial that you make clear to stakeholders why you can't speak. ("Industry rumors")
- Third party credibility is always helpful in responding to rumors. It's especially helpful when a respected, independent person or institution is willing to comment on a rumor that you are unable to comment on yourself. ("Industry rumors")
- One business communication specialist puts rumors into six categories, each requiring different handling:
1) Intentional rumors - "started to achieve a purpose;" (i.e., 'You might see Madonna if you come to our restaurant at lunch today...')
2) "Premature fact" - "an early version of what will eventually become the truth" (e.g., an in-house rumor about pending personnel changes);
3) Malicious rumors - "started to damage competitors' businesses";
4) Outrageous rumors - stories so unbelievable that most people think they cannot have been made up;
5) Nearly true rumors - rumors built around a kernel of truth; and
6) 'Birthday' rumors - rumors that come around as regularly as birthdays (i.e., urban legends) (Fearn-Banks, 44-5)
- An article on best practices by corporate PR specialists found that the most effective responses to rumors served one of two purposes:
1) They limited stakeholders' uncertainty as to what might happen next (by reiterating values, principles, or priorities; by setting time limits on upcoming decisions or changes; by renewing commitments to agreements or procedures; etc.); or
2) They improved the quality of official communications with interested groups. (DiFonzo and Bordia)
Conclusions
- It's easier to discourage rumors than it is to stop them. The way to discourage rumors is to engage in open and candid public communication with important stakeholder groups, and to respond to stakeholder concerns before they become a source of anxiety and speculation.
- In some cases, the best response to a rumor is to do nothing. Publicly responding to a rumor can backfire by giving it more credibility than it had to begin with. ("Why would US officials be so upset about this story if there wasn't something to it?") The key to judging when, and how forcefully, to respond to a rumor lies in understanding how concerned your stakeholders are by the allegations. When a rumor starts to threaten your relationship with a stakeholder, it's time to speak up.
- Bordia and Rosnow's definition of rumor-mongering suggests an 'equation' for the resiliency of a rumor that might look something like this:
(Lack of information) + (anxiety) + (lack of trust) = persistence of rumor
Rumor 'control' that focuses exclusively on the facts of a case is not likely to succeed because it addresses only one of the three elements that feed a rumor. An effective response must also include 1) steps to address the concerns underlying the rumor and 2) efforts to increase stakeholders' trust in official sources. In fact, given the documented cases where evidence has done nothing to stop the spread of a rumor (see Tierney and Callahan), it is probably wiser to put limited public diplomacy resources into allaying anxieties and building stakeholder relationships than it is to try again and again to set the record straight.
- Attempts to quash a rumor by getting news media to stop reporting it are risky. This approach might be effective in a case where a malicious rumor had not spread far or found much of an audience. However, with genuine rumors (rumors that resonate with the public) this strategy only makes the lack of information worse, and risks increasing public anxiety and mistrust. (Another problem with trying to censor the news is that it damages the public standing of news media that might otherwise be able to provide third party credibility for your claims.)
- Questions that can help you decide how to respond to a rumor include:
- What kind of a rumor is this?
- Is there any truth to it? Does it point to a problem we need to fix?
- Is the issue important to our stakeholders? Which ones? Why?
- Are our stakeholders paying attention to the rumor? If so, what's their response to it? Do they want to hear something from us about it?
- Can we provide information that might dispel the rumor? Do we need to be more open with information in general?
- What's the underlying concern or anxiety expressed by the rumor? Can we do anything constructive to address it?
- What is the state of our relationship with the groups influenced by the rumor? Could or should we do anything to improve the quality of that relationship?
- Are there credible third parties (independent media, academics, community figures, etc.) who might help dispel the rumor?
Malicious Rumors / Disinformation / 'Smear Campaigns'
A favorite Soviet trick [of the 1960s] was to forge a letter or pamphlet containing outrageous sentiments (usually racist or imperialist), make it look as if it originated with USIS [the U.S. Information Service], and then give it wide circulation. Although the "black propaganda" forgeries were believed by some, the device backfired with others, who saw through the forgeries, sympathized with USIS, and blamed the Communists for making trouble. (Sorenson, 156)
There is such a thing as malicious rumor-mongering. Communications literature tends to look at such cases in a business context, but the phenomenon certainly occurs in politics and diplomacy as well.
One (rather simplistic) way of looking at a malicious rumor is to treat it as an attempt by a rival to break your relationship with a key stakeholder group. In those cases, the appropriate response is to tend to your relations with the group in question.
However, there are certainly more complex cases where the actual target of a malicious rumor is not the party being smeared, but rather an allied person or institution. Allegations that a US-funded education project is distributing pornographic images to children might be an indirect way of criticizing the local government, or of forcing the government to work with a party or union, or even of pursuing some material gain, like steering a textbook contract to a particular company. In those cases it's important to understand who is involved in the rumor-spreading, and why. It's also important to understand and accept what you can and can't change about the situation. You have some control over your reputation and your relationship with stakeholders. You have little if any control over what other people choose to say about you.
Sources
Bordia, Prashant, and Ralph L. Rosnow. (1998, December) "Rumor rest stops on the information highway." Human Communication Research, p 163. Retrieved from InfoTrac Expanded Academic ASAP database.
Callahan, Christopher. (2001, November) "Anatomy of an urban legend: How the bogus notion that CNN's footage of Palestinians celebrating the September 11 attacks was actually a decade old took root on the Internet." The American Journalism Review, 23:9, p 46(3). Retrieved from InfoTrac Expanded Academic ASAP database.
Campion-Vincent, Veronique and Nancy Scheper-Hughes. (2001, August-October) "On organ theft narratives." (Exchange of views.) Current Anthropology, 42:4, p 555. Retrieved from InfoTrac Expanded Academic ASAP database.
DiFonzo, Nicholas and Prashant Bordia. (2000, Summer) "How top PR professionals handle hearsay: Corporate rumors, their effects, and strategies to manage them." Public Relations Review, 26:2, p 173. Retrieved from InfoTrac Expanded Academic ASAP database. (Also available online, from the Institute for Public Relations.)
Fearn-Banks, Kathleen. (2002). Crisis communications: A casebook approach. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.
FitzGerald, Frances. (1972) Fire in the lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam. Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
"Industry rumors challenge even the savvy PR veteran." (2004, July 26) PR Week, p 9. Retrieved from InfoTrac Expanded Academic ASAP database.
Random House Webster's College Dictionary. (1991) New York: Random House.
Samper, David. (2002, January-April) "Cannibalizing kids: Rumor and resistance in Latin America." Journal of Folklore Research, 39:1, p 1(34). Retrieved from InfoTrac Expanded Academic ASAP database.
Sorenson, Thomas C. (1968) The word war: The story of American propaganda. New York: Harper & Row.
Tierney, John. (2003, August 7) "G.I.s have X-ray vision, of course." The New York Times, p A-10. Retrieved from ProQuest National Newspapers database.