Claim:
There is a "teatime alarm" in the U.K. that rings out at teatime, enjoining everyone to stop what they're doing and have tea lest they be fined.
Rating:
False ( About this rating? )
In 2023 and 2024, viral videos claimed that there was a "teatime alarm" in the U.K. that rings out at teatime, enjoining everyone to stop what they're doing and have tea. Failure to comply, the videos said, results in fines:
This post, from May 2023, had received more than 171,000 likes on TikTok, as of this writing. The same TikTok user had made another video explaining that the sound came from poles around the country, and demonstrated how the teatime alarm worked:
Several other posts also purported to demonstrate or explain how the alarm worked. One Welsh creator on TikTok emphasized national rivalries between England and Wales by telling his audience that where he lives, King Charles III has no authority to tell the Welsh what and when to drink. He added, without denying that the English were indeed subjected to the teatime alarm, that the poles in Wales were merely 5G poles, designed to relay signals for mobile phones:
This claim, brought forth by British creators under the hashtag #teatimealarm, is a collective prank that plays off the cliché of Britain's attachment to tea and the rituals around it. It takes aim at gullible people who live outside of the U.K. For this reason, we gave it a "False" rating.
The poles in the videos are indeed 5G cell towers. This is not the first time they have been the object of curiosity. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in April 2020, rumors began to circulate that they were linked to the virus — either transmitting it or lowering human defenses to it — leading some people to set fire to them to stop the spread.
Even before the pandemic started, people suspected the newly installed 5G poles emitted radiation that might cause cancer . Still, the installation of 5G masts, as they are known there, has continued apace.
Claims that 5G can make people sick and be therefore used as a weapon also abounded, as did claims that it was a tool of mass surveillance. But in the case of the "teatime alarm," 5G masts were simply weapons of mass hijinks.
We have previously reported on Britons' relationship to tea in regard to the nation's soldiers.
Sources:
5G, Is It a Weapon and Should We Be Scared? https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/5g-weapon-should-we-scared-dr-michelle-dickinson-mnzm- . Accessed 15 May 2024.
'Conspiracy Theorists Burn 5G Towers Claiming Link to Virus'. AP News , 21 Apr. 2020, https://apnews.com/article/health-ap-top-news-wireless-technology-international-news-virus-outbreak-4ac3679b6f39e8bd2561c1c8eeafd855 .
Does 5G Pose Health Risks? 14 July 2019. www.bbc.com , https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48616174 .
'Is 5G Making You Sick? Here's What Experts Say'. Forbes Health , 12 Jan. 2024, https://www.forbes.com/health/wellness/is-5g-safe/ .
Rascouët-Paz, Anna. 'All British Tanks Are Equipped with Water Boilers for Tea?' Snopes , 12 Mar. 2024, https://www.snopes.com//fact-check/british-tanks-for-tea/ .
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