I used to believe that if I went to bed with my glasses on I would be more on guard against thieves and wierdos in the night.

Dee Mac

I was always a good little kid. My reasoning was, "What's the worst that they can do to you if you're bad?" Well, you can get detention, then be suspended, then they can arrest you and put you in jail and then put you on trial and if you were still bad, they could kill you. I didn't want to die because I still wanted a pony.

britishbroccoli

When i was little I thought that drinking and driving ment you can't drink while you drive. Well duh?! So one day we were driving in the car the whoel family and my dad was driving drinking orange juice. I was freaking out in the back seat! Wispering to my sister and telling it was illigal. Finally i got some nerve to tell my mom in the front seat, and she just told me to shut up. Then after told me what it really was.

Mandy Ont.Ca

Growing up in the late 70s in Detroit, there was a lot of crime news on tv.
Being young and not knowing the word rape, I thought that the newscasters were saying a woman was "raked" and it was someone scratching a woman with a metal rake (like you use to till earth.) Still a violent image, but weird how your brain compensates.

stacy

When I was little I used to believe that college really meant jail. So when my older sister was planning to go to college, I cried.

Jacob

I used to believe that if I watched America's Most Wanted, the criminal that they were looking for would get mad because I was watching it and come get me.

Kim A.

When I was growing up, they had just introduced the V-chip. Since I would always watch Nickelodeon, it was only Y and Y7. Since I was 7 at the time, I thought that it was illegal to watch Y7 shows if you were under 7. So whenever shows like "Are You Afraid of the Dark?" would come on, I'd kick my younger sister out of the room and tell her "You have to get out of the room! It's Y7! You're not allowed to watch it! It's the law!"

Anon

When my brother was little he put a banana skin in the bathroom bin. We only put food waste in the kitchen bin, and my mum said he had to put his banana skins there in future. My brother got really worried and asked "Why is it against the law?" Even though we reassured him he was worried all that day that he would be put in jail!

AMT

Me and my cousins used to watch Law and Order a lot, and often times people would get convicted for assault and battery. Well, I knew what assault was, and I knew what it meant to be battered, but it never really clicked that "battery" meant the act of battering someone. So I just thought they were talking about batteries, like AA, AAA, and so on.

I'm really glad I never asked anyone about that.

Katie♥

I used to beleive that you would be put in jil if you didn't do what your parents told you to by the count of 1. I thought that they would just take you to jail and keep you there untill you died.

S.D.P.

I used to believe (for quite a long time actually) that when somebody was 'Raped' it meant that they had been attacked by a 'Rake' the garden tool used for clearing up leaves. I always thought it was a horrible way to be attacked... which I guess it is.

MarkyPants

When the news were talking about "movie pirates were arrested for camcording a movie in the theater," I thought that they meant pirates from the seas.

Anon

I used to believe that the search lights that you can see from the airport at night sometimes meant that a criminal had escaped from prison and the police were search for him. I entirely blame this one on my father, since he's the one that told me that! (I realize that HE knew it was a joke, but a five year old little girl certainly didn't!)

Kimberly

I used to believe that if someone did something very bad, and got sent to prison for like 150 years or so, that they would have to finish their prison term even if they died in prison. That means their dead body would be just sitting there, in the cell for 150 years, stinking up the prison. I also thought you were forced to eat rat turds in prison, it's what my mother told me.

BeTHaNY

When I was 14 or 15 I used to believe that rape just meant anal sex, so I wondered why rapists were sent to jail. What was all the fuss about, different people like different things and they shouldn´t be punished for that!!! (I was corrected many (many) years after that..., i´m a lawyer now...)

Flower

I used to believe that "Prosecuted" meant "Executed". When someone said they were prosecuted, I thought they were gonna die.

Anon

I used to love to walk with one foot on the curb and one foot in the gutter. My father told me when I was very young to be careful not to get arrested for jaywalking, but as a kid I still did it, thinking myself to be a rebel. I believed that "jaywalking" was walking that way until COLLEGE when I said something to my new college pals who were doing that in the streets of Washington DC and they laughed hysterically... I was mortified.

GullibleAmy

When I was seven I tried to make a movie play on a TV at the store. The TV went off and made a loud noise and I ran away because I thought I was in trouble. A lot of store workers came to check out the TV. I thought they caught me on camera or something so the next day when I went to the pool and saw a police officer I thought he was looking for me. I went over bawling my eyes out and told him the whole thing. (oopse!!!)

Kuro Kumori

I used to believe that there were no thieves in the real world. People just invented them so that comic books would have a more interesting plot. :)

G.M.

I didn't realize that alcohol figured in "drinking and driving" at all - I just thought that you weren't allowed to drink anything because it was distracting and you couldn't keep both hands on the wheel while doing it.

Anon