Editor’s Note: Ask The Fiddler is a lifestyle advice column that aims to remedy more chaos and confusion than it creates. Questions may be submitted to us here at Art of the Prank, and good luck.
Dear Fiddler,
I am afraid of chickens. It”s affecting my livelihood, can you help?
Harlan in KY
Dear Harlan,
I could really get into this if you had said giant chickens. They”re featured in several B horror flicks. But realistically, the biggest actual chicken I”ve found weighs in at a mere 23 lbs. 3 oz., an Australian chap who has since gone off to the great roost in the sky.
Maybe you”ve got tucked away in your subconscious a nightmare memory of the great Tennessee Super Chicken hoax. I can”t find any other reference to it, so perhaps the story was concocted on-site.
Is it perfectly reasonable to fear chickens? A California man was killed by a chicken in 2011. He was attending a cockfight. When it comes to inhumane treatment of animals, it”s hard not to celebrate when the tormented creature strikes back.
Your malady is called Alektorophobia, the fear of chickens. It”s rare, but obviously it exists because someone gave it a name. Wikipedia says: “People with alektorophobia tend to feel uneasy around chickens, or around certain places in which chickens are known to reside, such as farms. “¦ Some people scream, cry, have trouble breathing, have excessive sweating or even heart trouble when they come in contact with an area near chickens, or occasionally even eggs or feathers. In some extreme cases, even a picture or a realistic drawing of a chicken can also trigger fear.” Continue reading “Ask The Fiddler #23: Overcoming a Fowl Fear”