Random Dumb Things Pop Culture Had Us Believing Until We Finally Figured Out The Truth 2021 (16 items)

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  (#4) Bullets Ripped Through People Underwater During World War II

  The Trope: A soldier attempting to storm a beach, probably somewhere near Normandy, has second thoughts when he's met with a barrage of bullets and dives back under the surf for protection - only to have bullets rip through the water and puncture his body anyway.

  Why Is It Inaccurate? Consider that, as recently as 2019, US Special Forces were still hard at working trying to invent a bullet that would travel effectively underwater. Water is, after all, 800 times denser than air, which is what most bullets are designed to pass through. In reality, and as The Smithsonian Channel and the Mythbusters have both conclusively proven, bullets can only pass through a few feet of water at the absolute most, continuously slowing down as they go. As it turns out, real soldiers on D-Day could, and did, earn a temporary reprieve from oncoming gunfire by ducking under the waves.

  Notable Offenders: No film is more guilty of this than Saving Private Ryan, where director Steven Spielberg described the difficulty he had replicating bullets passing through water on film without realizing the obvious reason why that was:

  Often the pellets wouldn’t go far enough but at least they gave us a really good reference so we were able to digitally augment the shot with a stronger visual of a projectile coursing through the water.
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  (#7) The Best Old West Gunslingers Always Shoot From The Hip During A Fight

  The Trope: In a quick-draw gunfight, gunslingers rapidly remove their pistol from their holster and accurately shoot from their hip.

  Why Is It Inaccurate? To hit a target, gunslingers - a word from the 1920s used to describe gunfighters - would need to aim their weapon accurately, something that would have been nearly impossible to do from the hip. As Old West Texas Ranger Captain James B. Gillett recalled:

  In all my experience with both officers and desperadoes... I never saw a man shoot from the hip. All of them pulled the pistol, pointed it from the shoulder level and fired.

  Hip shots were so ill-advised and risky that most gunslingers never used the skill during fights. Wild Bill Hickok was apparently one of the few who did. As one admirer remembered:

  Wild Bill saved himself in a good many fights by his peculiar way of shooting. He either shot direct from his hip, without waiting to raise his gun, or else - as was most common with him - on the up-go; that is, he shot as he was raising his pistols up. This fraction of a second advantage over the men who shot on the drop of down-go of their guns, saved his life at least a dozen times.

  But even this account is revealing: Wild Bill's skill was "peculiar," and thus not widely practiced. Instead, skills like his would have been features of exhibitions and Wild West shows.

  Indeed, gun tricks like shooting from the hip had little use in a real-world fight. When the stakes were life and death, not many gunslingers would have gambled with a hip shot to bring their opponent down.

  Notable Offenders: Shane; The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly; Red Dead Redemption 2
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  (#12) Eating Turkey Legs Was Common During The Renaissance

  The Trope: At Renaissance banquets, diners gnawed on enormous turkey legs. 

  Why Is It Inaccurate? There's a big problem with the turkey leg trope: Turkeys are native to the New World and didn't appear in Europe until the mid-16th century - nearly the end of the Renaissance. 

  Before turkeys showed up at banquets, Renaissance diners enjoyed beef, soups, and peacocks. In fact, peacock leg might be more accurate than turkey leg for most of the period.

  As for turkey legs, they didn't look the same in the 16th century. Back then, turkeys were wild game - much smaller than today's birds. The enormous turkey legs we picture today actually became popular at Renaissance Faires. 

  Notable Offenders: Blame this one on the Renaissance Faire and the 1933 film The Private Life of Henry VIII, although it's possible he's supposed to be eating chicken.
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  (#15) You Don't Need To Pull Your String Back All The Way

  Trope: Archers don't need to pull their bowstrings back all the way.

  Why Is It Inaccurate? Unlike a pistol, which only needs to be loaded and cocked to be effective, a bow is only as powerful as its archer. 

  If you want a solid shot, you need to have good form, and that means pulling back your bowstring all the way, until it's taut. This is called a "full draw." A half pull will result in your arrow dropping to the ground immediately. Not effective!

  Notable Offenders: The Hunger Games, Charlie's Angels
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  (#5) Ammunition Never Runs Out In War

  The Trope: Film characters can go an entire two-and-a-half hour movie without ever needing to reload their weapons, despite firing large and indiscriminate bursts of ammunition with alarming frequency.

  Why Is It Inaccurate? Supply chains are an ever-underrated and pivotal aspect of warfare, and the limitations thereof have always ensured that real-life soldiers are a lot more conservative with their ammo than their Hollywood counterparts. This is especially true when it comes to World War II, with infantry usually able to carry 100 or so rounds at most into battle, and often far fewer.

  It’s also especially true when it came to WWII-era aircraft. The notion of one pilot shooting down multiple enemy bogies on a single run is essentially fiction, with Spitfires specifically carrying 14 seconds' worth of ammo on them at a time. Apparently, nobody told Tom Hardy.

  Notable Offenders: Dunkirk, Saving Private Ryan, Where Eagles Dare. In fact, it’d be far easier to list the few programs that make of point of showing their characters reloading and conserving ammo, like Band of Brothers.
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  (#10) Renaissance Men Wore Their Doublets Open

  The Trope: Renaissance men liked to show a fair amount of chest hair while walking down the street.

  Why Is It Inaccurate? That white shirt under the doublet is called a chemise, and wasn't meant to be seen at all - it was the Renaissance equivalent of underwear. So when Joseph Fiennes wanders the streets of London with his doublet wide open, he's showing off his underwear for everyone to see.

  Actors sometimes sport a similarly inaccurate style when they appear without a chemise at all. But the garment served a critical function during the Renaissance. In an era when people washed their clothes less frequently, the chemise kept sweat and grime off people's fancy clothes.

  Notable Offenders: Shakespeare in Love

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