u/Ok_Marzipan9097

My understanding was that the Mandela Effect refers to phenomena where the collective recollection differs from the historical record BECAUSE of the way our memory works. So when you say, "that must be the Mandela Effect", does that mean you are admitting your memory must be wrong, or does it mean that you feel your memory is right and the historical record is wrong? Or does it just mean that the two don't match up? Interested in both colloquial definition and actual definition if they vary.

Even the Webster's definition gives room for both. It says: "the experience of many people having the same false memory" but then goes on to explain it was coined by a paranormal researcher which at least implies the term was coined by someone open to alternative explanations and the way a term is most commonly used often becomes its eventual formal definition even if it starts as meaning something else. I think I might be using an outdated definition.

Why is there a split in the types of skepticism expressed by different generations? Regarding the Mandela Effect it seems older millenials on up are more likely to consider the possibility, or even insist, that current realities have been distorted and changed and then lied about. Younger generations are more skeptical in the other direction, insisting that there have been no changes and can come to that conclusion without doing much independent research aside from what they read in forums and what can be gleaned from a quick google search.

It was easier to lie before the digital age. And people took advantage of it. We were taught things as fact in school that were in reality much more nuanced and sometimes plain wrong. All authority figures, from parents to teachers to leaders of countries, could teach their views and their versions with little fear of being fact-checked, as long as they were careful.

Then as we gained more access to information, we found out we were misinformed about so much. Is that why it is no stretch for us to consider or even believe that some Mandela Effects are actually thought experiments or that they hide bigger lies or even alternate realities?

Younger generations have grown up with a different level of accountability. Many lies, half-truths, and exagerations are called out almost immediately, espeically in their personal lives through social media. Their lives are recorded and archived to a large degree in real time. Is this what causes their trust in the status quo? If it survives on the internet, it must be true?

I think that seeing if people will refuse to believe something exists as an absolute based on what they can find on the internet would be an interesting and useful social experiment. The real world is analogue, it is sound waves and refracted light and other elements that are so complex and complete we still don't fully understand them.

Digitizing reality by definition leaves infinite space between the numbers. What if someone is interested in finding out what happens when they pick and choose what to include? Is that harder to believe than believing an entire generation has a false memory of a movie that never existed?

When someone asked me if I remembered a genie movie from the 90s, my immediate response was, "Yeah, there was this really bad movie with Sinbad called Shazaam". They told me it never existed. I had forgotten about Kazaam until they told me that was actually the movie I was remembering.

Then I remembered how my middle school self had laughed that Shaq (I was not a fan) was now trying to be an actor and had ripped off a movie that was horrible to begin with. They came back, saying I was getting Sinbad confused with Shaq!!?? Blew my mind. I was totally confident I could find evidence that this was simply a movie that went 'out of print' as we said in the days of analogue.

It was a strange experience to find that there was no evidence of this movie, not even on Sinbad's filmography. Cornucopia, monacles, misspellings are all understandable false memories. Somewhat ironically, I feel that Mandela dying is an extremely poor example of the Mandela effect because he continued to be extremely present in the news until his actual death. The ending of appartheid was one of the most significant and widely covered news storied of the time. His biopic was a major release, too.

But most people I ask about a 90s genie movie independently come up with Sinbad and/or Shazaam as a response and most are shocked to find out it doesn't exist. (Yes, microscopic sample size) Still, anyone who has had their memory tested in any meaningful way has also probably been faced with hard evidence that they remembered something incorrectly. So while it was unsettling that people across the globe can remember a movie that never existed, I had to think it more likely than not was never made.

But it kept bugging me. One of those things that shouldn't really matter, but after countless news stories detailing how we have been lied to by the industry for years, I found myself thinking about the movie again.

I remember watching it at a friend's house, but it was kind of on in the background and I wasn't really paying attention. I guess I was 13 or so at the time and saw myself as a skater-artist who was too cool for a dumb kids movie. But I do remember a scene where Sinbad was watching his TV show through his pointy, curly genie shoes and the joke was that he was laughing hysterically at a lame joke he made on the show. But I figured that could have been a scene I remembered from another of his movies or that I was even getting the actors confused.

I did a general google search without even mentioning Shazaam and the only results that came back were that that never happened and that I was referencing posts where "many" were claiming this was part of the nonexistent movie.

So I tried similar search terms, this time without even mentioning Sinbad. Maybe I am thinking of another actor? Nope. Still comes back as part of the made-up story in this nonexistent movie.

So where did my memory of that come from and why do so many have the same specific memory? Why did I remember Sinbad's Shazaam before any kind of prompting? Again, not talking about a detail like a misspeling or a particular article of clothing. Talking about a full length movie with an actor that in no way resembles Shaq.

I then found a clip of a 90s show where the joke was "nice pants, Shazaam" and the actor was wearing Hammer pants. Not hard evidence, but what else would the reference be to? DC character did not wear that style of pants.

Why is it not plausible to think this could be some kind of social experiment? It was a very forgetable movie. Some people claim to have seen it multiple times, but the vast majority of us probably didn't even watch it completely once. It has absolutely zero similarities to Shaq's Kazaam, other than the genie theme.

Yeah, Sinbad says it didn't exist. I am willing to consider that as a strong possibility. But why can't we consider it a possiblility that Sinbad has some motive to lie? I don't want to put that on the same level as the lies others in the industry have told us for years, but we have hard evidence that the entertainment industry has at the very least some players that are as influential as they are morally bankrupt, so someone lying or forcing someone to lie about a kids movie as part of a social experiment is not even close to being as extreme as some of the other smoke shows going on.

I'm not convinced either way and hope I can stop thinking about it because it doesn't really matter. Just might be a minor example of AI and its engineers deciding what version of history we will be left with.