Some cherished notions are like tattered teddy bears you can't stand to throw out. The journalistic fraternity can attempt to set the record straight on misreported facts but it's harder to alter views already formed and fossilised. For example, while people may grudgingly accept the home minister's recent assertion that the nude woman in the ear-squat debacle is Malay and not Chinese, it could prove more difficult to budge entrenched public opinion that the Malaysian police are often naughty.