The story was about how he first heard of the terrorist group known as the Baader-Meinhof Gang -- and then heard about it again a short time later from a different source.
Other readers started to write to the Pioneer Press about their own experience of hearing about something new and soon afterward hearing about the same subject again from a different source. The paper began a special column for “Baader-Meinhof” stories.
I’ve had that happen many times, but didn’t know there was a name for it. For instance, a friend recently gave me a book I’d never heard of; the next day the woman next to me at yoga said her reading group would be discussing the same book that evening. (Nothing mind-blowing, but an example of the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon nonetheless.)
So now you’ve heard of the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon (sometimes referred to as the “BM phenomenon”).
If you come across this term from a different source anytime soon, you will have had a “BM” experience in its purest form. I’d be happy to hear about it.
I read The Gurnsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society today (and really enjoyed it -- thanks for the recommendation!) and marked p. 116: Have you ever noticed that when your mind is awakened or drawn to someone new, that person's name suddenly pops up everywhere you go? My friend Sophie calls it coincidence, and Mr. Simpless, my parson friend, calls it Grace.
ReplyDeleteYou get it girl! It's dangerously close to a BM in its purest form . . . would have been in purest form in Guernsey if the sentence had continued with "and my Aunt Mary calls it "Baader-Meinhof." Tee hee.
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