The Most Ironic Examples Of The Cobra Effect

The "cobra effect" comes from theBritish colonization started in India.The British government worried about poisonous snakes in the region. They offered a bounty for every snake killed. This worked well at first. Then, locals started breeding the snakes for profit.

Government officials stopped the program when they learned this. The Indian region then got even more cobras.

During French rule in Hanoi, they found a rat problem in the villages. The regime started a bounty program, like the British cobra one. It paid a reward for killing rats. People gave severed rat tails for cash. Colonial officials noticed rats in Hanoi without tails.Rats in Hanoi had no tails.

Vietnamese rat catchers caught rats, cut off their tails, and released them in the sewers. This let the rats reproduce and make more rats, increasing the catchers' money.

Starting in the 1940sand going into the 1960s, the Quebec governmentThe Canadian federal government gave subsidies for building hospitals, but provided little for orphanages.Government funds paid $1.25 a day for orphans and $2.75 a day for psychiatric patients. To get more money, the Catholic Church of Quebec often misdiagnosed orphans as mentally ill, affecting up to 20,000 people.

This resulted in 80% of the misdiagnosed childrenreporting a traumatic experience between ages 7 and 18. Over 50% said they suffered physical, mental, or sexual abuse.

America's war on drugs started seriously in 1971. Richard Nixon declaredDrug abuse.The War On Drugs became public enemy number one.The War On Drugs aimed to stop the illegal drug trade. It backfired like prohibition, bringing wider consequences.

Itcreated a permanent underclass by making drug crimes federal offenses. This took away voting rights and stopped chances for education and jobs. On the upside, it fueled cartel violence in Mexican countries!by making drug crimes a federal offense, stripping offenders of voting rights and removing opportunities for education and employment. On the bright side, it's fueled cartel violence in Mexican countries!

In the early '80s,the CIA funded MAK., which stands forMaktab al-Khidamar, a group that funneled money, arms, and fighters from the outside world into the Afghan war against the Soviet Union. America does this often. The US backed Stalin in WWII and Lon Nol in the Cold War, but no situation has been made worse like what happened in the Middle East.

Gun buyback programs mean everyone wins. Fewer guns hit the street, and more money goes into people's pockets. If you don't know how it works, here is the breakdown: You bring your gun to a government drop point. You get money. The government destroys the gun, meaning one less gun globally.

However, in some real cases, people withused cheap handguns.Sell guns to the government, then buy a better one with that money.

Prohibition started in the 1920s to stop the alcohol trade.Prohibition ended up pushing small businesses and suppliers out while organized crime took control of the illegal alcohol market.Alcohol stayed popular because...Criminal organizationsProducers of alcohol had big funding and increased other illegal acts like prostitution and gun running.

Early '90s saw...Physicist Tadj Oreszczyn found a way to cut energy use by putting south-facing glass rooms in British homes. The sun would heat the glass, warming the house and cutting heating bills.

He was totally wrong. Instead of using the conservatory as a hot room, People started using them as living spaces. They installed heating. Then they did...raisingtotal energy use.

From 1980 to 1981, the French government offered rewards for ghost nets—fishing nets left in the water that kill marine life—found along the Normandy coast.Most people found along the Normandy coast did not act like decent human beings.They vandalized perfectly good netsto turn them in for a reward instead of actually searching for ghost nets.

Feral pigs became a problem in Fort Benning, GA. So, the local government The movement offered a bounty.on the other white meat. Bring in a pig's tail, and you get money.This action led to...to 'bounty hunters' feeding existing pigs and increasing their numbers to kill them and keep the cycle going.

In 2003, Babs...sued Kenneth Adelman and Pictopia.com for posting a picture of her homeonline, thinking it would draw stalkers or crazy fans to her. Bbefore the lawsuit, only six people downloaded the file, two of whom were Streisand's lawyers.

Her...lawsuit got attention, with 420,000 people visiting the site, creating the phrase, "The Streisand Effect."

In the 19th century, ...Theobald Mathew started the Cork Total Abstinence Society, It relied on "The Pledge." to keep a person sober forever. Thousands swore never to drink again. But some people felt the urge and feared breaking their pledge. "No problem," they thought, "we'll Just drink ether.."

So, while trying to end alcoholism, Theobald introduced everyone to Etheromania..

Since 2004, e-cigarettes have slowly gained popularity globally. A CDC survey showed teen smoking of tobacco cigarettes dropped from 13% to 9.2% after the e-cig started.

But, the number of high school students trying e-cigarettes E-cigarettes tripled in one year.E-Cigarettes hit over 13%. We do not know if these numbers will grow, or if this is just a trend.

The Internet Watch Foundation added the Wikipedia article for the Virgin Killer in 2008.The Scorpions released an album, Virgin Killer.The Scorpions released an album.The album generated a child p*rnography blacklist.They claimed the album's artwork was "the artwork showed a potentially illegal indecent image.The image depicted a child under 18.

TThe article quickly became a popular page on the site. Publicity about the censorship spread the image to other sites.

In November 2007, Tunisia blocked YouTube and DailyMotion after footage of Tunisian political prisoners went online. Activists and supporters then began linking the location of then-PresidentZine el-Abidine Ben AliActivists used Google Earth to show a palace and videos about civil liberties.This turned a small human-rights story into a big global campaign..

In 2002, President Bush enacted tariffs on steel imports to protect the US steel industry. This raised the cost of US steel and caused the loss of between36,000 and 74,000 other jobs, including 15,000 to 30,000 manufacturing jobs. This was not as bad as the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, which caused a 50 percent drop in U.S. trade in 1930.The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act caused a 50 percent drop in U.S. trade in 1930. The 2002 tariff did...The 2002 tariff weakened President Bush's arguments for more global trade by placing limits on worldwide subsidies and tariffs.

In 2005, Americans with too much credit card debt could file for bankruptcy. Critics viewed this policy as a way out. The critics were correct.

In response, tthe Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act was passed.This act made filing for bankruptcy much harder... People who would have filed for bankruptcy defaulted on all their loans.

The installation of smokestacks started to decrease pollution in local areas.This pushed the pollution out of sight and memory.The resulting toxin spewcaused pollution to spread at a higher altitude, creating acid rain globally.

In 1989, Mexico passed Hoy No Circula ("You Don't Drive Today"). This banned a percentage of city cars from driving daily. They organized it by license plate number: if yours ended in a 5 or 6, you could not drive on Monday, forcing you to carpool, take a cab, or use Uber. The next day, you could drive, but someone else had to walk.

The problem is Hoy No Circula only worked between 5 am and 10 pm.Drivers face traffic pollution between 5 am and 10 pm. A study showed air pollution levels rose during off hours, showing how much people drive.

Supporters claim abstinence-only sex education beats comprehensive sex education. This method focuses on teaching morality that restricts sex to marriage.Research shows abstinence-only sex education fails to stop unwanted pregnancies.It also fails to stop the spread of STIs.