You know what this suddenly reminds me of? The crazy carry-on at the time of the 1999 eclipse.
That eclipse was quite extensive over Britain, though only Cornwall got the totality. Lots of people talking about the best way to watch it. Two crazy things happened.
1. Sensible advice not to look directly at the sun even when most of the disc was obscured got translated into an irrational fear of the eclipsed sun, as if it was emitting gamma rays or something. People (including my mother) ran indoors in fear when they realised the eclipse had started, because the warnings were so over the top.
2. Eclipse viewing "glasses" (they were cardboard and plastic), very dark sunglasses made for looking directly at the sun, were monstered in the media. There had been some warnings that if they were scratched then they could let in too much sunlight which could damage the eye. Fair enough, but I think adults are smart enough to realise when that has happened and look away immediately. But we had TV presenters seriously warning people off the things, tossing them away on-camera and so on. Sales were minimal. It was only when TV footage of crowds of people viewing the eclipse through these glasses in Europe (which got the eclipse a bit later than Britain) was shown at teatime that people realised how they'd been misled.
In fact someone at work where I was, in Sussex, had a pair, and passed them around. She was Irish, I don't know if that had anything to do with it. We were all standing outside, under this weird dark-blue sky, shivering with chill, with this apparently bright sun, which could be seen through the glasses to be merely a tiny crescent. It was amazing. But according to the BBC and all the newspapers these glasses were rubbish and shouldn't be used.
Lunch-time happened and I went home, because my mother was staying with me at the time. I found her cowering in the house in fear of the spooky, unearthly light. Thérèse had let me take the glasses home with me, as the eclipse was half over by this time, so I persuaded mum outside and got her looking at the sun through them. Still, it was hard to dispel the fear even by calm, careful explanations.