How Rumors Spread

How Rumours GET STARTED

This is a single-panel cartoon meme illustrating how rumors start via ambiguous language and out-of-context listening. A military officer is on a phone call while shaving the head of a new military recruit (known as a 'private' in military rank). He says into the phone 'Can I call you back? I'm shaving my privates right now'. An onlooker outside the window hears this line, misinterpreting the double meaning of 'privates' — which can refer both to the military rank, or to intimate personal body parts, leading the bystander to believe the officer is engaged in an inappropriate, salacious act instead of his actual task. The bottom text explicitly labels the scenario as an example of how rumors get started.

This meme was sourced from an RSS feed of the Reddit r/Meme subreddit, where it was shared under the title 'How rumors spread'. It is a widely circulated classic pun-based cartoon joke, often used to satirize miscommunication and how easily false, misleading rumors can form from out-of-context ambiguous statements.