"contrary to popular belief" meaning in English

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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
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      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "Contrary to popular belief, Columbus was not the first person to discover America.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2016 September 13, Tim Dowling, “Order force: the old grammar rule we all obey without realising”, in The Guardian",
          "text": "I regularly have cause to recall a scene from a novel called Madder Music, by Peter de Vries, in which the main character, a writer who specialises in polo, hears a match announcer telling newcomers to the ground that, contrary to popular belief, the ball is struck with the side of the mallet, rather than the end.",
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      "glosses": [
        "The opposite of what most laypeople would think is true."
      ],
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  "word": "contrary to popular belief"
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  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
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      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "Contrary to popular belief, Columbus was not the first person to discover America.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2016 September 13, Tim Dowling, “Order force: the old grammar rule we all obey without realising”, in The Guardian",
          "text": "I regularly have cause to recall a scene from a novel called Madder Music, by Peter de Vries, in which the main character, a writer who specialises in polo, hears a match announcer telling newcomers to the ground that, contrary to popular belief, the ball is struck with the side of the mallet, rather than the end.",
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  "word": "contrary to popular belief"
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