Shaman, those are sad stories. It bothers me that your neighbors have somehow espoused a belief that guns are and were the danger, along with several other irrational and ignorant beliefs. And what is happening in our culture that fear or disbelief are the primary responses?
Well, the problem is that city folks just have a completely unrealistic view of the world. My mom used to talk about friends she had in Chicago back in the 30's that thought milk came from the milkman. It's all the same thing.
That's a big part of the reason why my sons had a farm to go to on the weekends instead of going to the mall between soccer matches. They knew where their meat came from.
Ha! Let me get off the soapbox. This was supposed to be a fun thread.
While I was at lunch, I was trying to think of other wild ones I'd heard. In the case of deer hunting, I started out my career thinking (as I had been schooled by my mentors) that bucks used their antlers to prod does out in front of them to act as scouts. I suppose in back-handed way that's sort of what you see during the chase-phase of the rut, but the motivations are all screwed up. As a result I spent the first few years of deer hunting with great shots on legal doe, but always holding off, knowing with certainty that The Big One was just a few yards behind.
Then there was the one I learned that turkeys always head to water after flydown. I wrecked the first dozen years of my turkey hunting positioning myself between the roost and a the nearest source of water. It has been only in the past few years that I discovered where turkeys really go after flydown:
Where do turkeys go after flydown Then there was the one about how deer always travel into the wind:
O.D. and Playing the Wind Lastly, I leave you with the wisdom of my mentor and departed friend, Buddy Joe Taylor. Joe was the local folklorist and radio personality back where KYHillChick grew up down on the KY/TN border. He was known to the locals as Professor Nitwit.
It Outta be Surefire. 
