in reply to IN-style operator for set of possible values

This is almost exactly what you've asked for, but less typing:

if( $myfruit =~ m[bananas|apples|oranges] ){
   print "I like $myfruit!";
 }
 else {
   print "I don't like $myfruit!";
 }

[download]

To be absolutely certain, you could use: m[^(?:bananas|apples|oranges)$]

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