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People Share Their Creepiest Haunted House Stories

I hate haunted houses. I've even skipped the Haunted House ride in Disney World.

Our homes are suppose to be sanctuaries. Not some afterlife hot spot for spirits run amok.

You wanna haunt a place in afterlife, find a nice cemetery. Or at least chase down the people who did you wrong when you were here.

Leave me and my little space alone. I have enough issues with living, breathing psychos.

I am not a bump in the night person. I already have enough issues falling asleep, so I will not be living in or visiting any haunted places. And if I find out it is a spiritual vortex, I'm out!

Redditoru/scarymovie77wanted to hear about real estate that leaves people unnerved, by asking:

What is your "my house is haunted" story?

Maybe it's PTSD. When I was a kid, there was a haunted house across the street from my apartment in Queens. Some murder had taken place there so of course nobody would buy it. And the owners let it fall into decay...

Bless Me Father

max von sydow priest GIFGiphy

"A pastor died of a heart attack in the house I grew up in (before we owned it)."

"When I was a baby, I was sick with Croup. Apparently in the night I was having trouble breathing and was beginning to suffocate. The ceiling light fixture in my nursery fell out of the ceiling and smashed on the floor, waking my parents who found me choking. Parents are absolutely convinced the pastor's ghost had intervened and saved my life."

- Mekrikulous

"shave and a haircut"

"When I was little, I had a loft bed with a desk underneath. I've always been a pretty heavy sleeper, I could fall asleep at a concert, so it was strange when I began waking up at 3 in the morning every morning. What was even more strange were the noises coming from the attic. Shuffling, knocking, boxes moving. My 9 year old brain rationalized it as an animal or bird that had gotten in."

"After a few weeks of crap sleep, I decided to knock back on my ceiling the "shave and a haircut" pattern because I was bored and hadn't interacted with whatever was in the attic. I waited in silence for a few minutes until I was about to fall back asleep, and then I heard it. From the ceiling a foot from my face, it knocked back the pattern. Every night when I woke up, I'd knock and sometimes get a response."

"It gradually stopped over the years but I still wake up at 3 am every night. It's weird but it only happens in my room, I sleep fine in hotels and other houses. 13 years later and I've just been getting weird vibes around my house. I feel like I'm being watched. I sometimes hear someone saying my name, most notably before bed and whatever said it is VERY close to my ear. I can feel their breath as they whisper, and it freaks me out so much that it takes hours to get back to sleep."

"The shuffling in the attic also started up again but I don't want to knock back anymore. There's a lot of weird sh*t that happens, things get moved, my dogs and cat stare at the same blank spot, but these are just what's been currently happening. I just don't know what to do anymore."

- almost_a_person

"don't be scared'

"I was a kid outside playing in the middle of the day. We lived in a 2-story apartment complex and I was located underneath a set of stairs and between two apartments so the air was very calm. My childhood friend and my sis were a bit farther from me by a locked storage room and my friend stopped and swore she saw the doorknob move. The door was usually open if it was in use but it was locked shut."

"They both stood there staring at the doorknob trying to see if it moved again but I was spooked and turned around to book it when halfway through my turn, a whisper in my ear stopped me in my tracks. It was the voice of a young girl. I stood there listening to her and I could feel her breath tickling my ear."

"I don't recall much but I do remember that she said "don't be scared." I think the gist was that she was trying to be encouraging. After she was done I turned around to see who was talking to me but no one was there. I was completely surprised to see that there was no girl so I finally booked it out of there lol."

- sumichica

"AWEEEE"

"My house is super haunted, but its too many little instances to put into one story. I guess I'll just go with the most recent one. A few nights ago I heard running upstairs, despite being home alone. I thought it was my cat, but then he came downstairs, and the running continued. I was a little spooked, but its not the worst thing that's happened in this house. The running lasted for quite a while, plus a few knocks."

"The next morning I was cleaning upstairs in that room and my cat crawled into a box of fabric. I thought he was being cute so I said "AWEEEE" and started to pull out my phone to take a picture. While I was still reaching for my phone, I heard a mocking "AWEEE" right behind me. I completely froze and just let myself process it for a few seconds before checking the room. Obviously I was still alone. That one spooked me a little."

- ghostthingz

People Share The Craziest Lies They've Told That Came True | George Takei’s Oh Myyy

Spinning

Librarian Ghost GIF by GhostbustersGiphy

"When I was younger I set up the camera on my PSP to spy on my brother, later on, I watched the video just to see the office chair spinning around on its own, wish I was joking."

- Mosey04

And the neighborhood kids, we were all idiots who thought it would be fun to take turns daring one another to go inside, at night. If you didn't go in, you were ridiculed and laughed at. I should've said go ahead laugh, I don't care, I'm not going in. But I didn't say that...

Carl's House

Horror Reaction GIF by SpongeBob SquarePantsGiphy

"My friend Carl's last apartment had 2 ghosts. One was a little girl who would play with your hair while you were hanging out in the living room as well as running along the vertical blinds making them swing back and forth. The second I never saw or heard but I did feel him. One night, I locked myself out of my apartment (we lived in the same complex one building over from each other) so I asked to crash Carl's place for the night while he went to work."

"But he had told me don't go in to his room. There is a male ghost who will tell you that you don't belong in there. His previous roommate had let several friends crash his room and a tall black shadow opened the door and said get out to all of them. Freaked them the hell out. So here I am on the couch in the living room. Head on the end of the couch that looks down the hall to the bedrooms and bathroom. I swear I was being watched. Then it hit me. I needed to pee. And the bathroom is right across the hall from Carl's bedroom. Fan. Tastic."

"So I slowly creep down the hall and about 5 feet from my goal I said hey man I just need to use the bathroom. Then it felt like a cloud of energy got pulled back into the bedroom despite the door being closed. So I did my thing and hauled @ss back to the couch but I put my head on the other end of the couch. Nothing outstanding but just a really creepy vibe. On the positive side at least Carl had someone looking out for him."

- SouthPaw7896

On Camera

"I connected a webcam to my computer way back when I was a kid. Middle of the night the camera was trained in the hallway. All of a sudden hallway lights flicker on and you see a dark figure run into my brothers room. 30 minutes later you see my brother walk down the hallway himself going towards his room. He had been playing on the family desktop all night. Really freaked me out in the morning when we reviewed I'm the footage. I believe it's still saved to the laptop not that I know where it is lol."

- throwawayyyayahah112

finally morning...

"I used to live in a basement apartment when I was in grad school. The landlady lived in the main house and while she herself was super nice and cool, her house always felt really off to me. However, she charged a reasonable amount of rent and I was only 2 miles from school. About a week or two after I moved in, I had gone to bed and the apartment was pitch black at night."

"If my landlady ever wanted to speak to me, I would hear the doors above the stairs unlock and she would call out to me. One night, I heard movement on the steps but I didn't hear her unlock the doors and it was probably 2 in the morning. She certainly didn't call me saying she needed to talk to me."

"I hear these heavy steps descending the stairs but I'm so scared that I shrink further in my bed to hide. The floor begins to creak towards my door and then nothing for a few seconds. I'm not sure if it is safe to relax and go back to bed. Then I hear the door knob start to turn. My fear makes me so scared that I pull the covers over my head to hide."

"I prayed the whole time under the covers. The next thing I know it's finally morning. I stayed in that apartment for two years. When it was my graduation, I slept in a hotel because there was no room for my family to sleep. That night in the hotel was the first restful sleep I had in what felt like forever."

- juventina11

"fire monster"

"Growing up our house was blessed 3 times before it became... Normal. Stuff would fly off shelves and countertops. The dog would constantly bark at the attic entry as my brother screamed "fire monster." And 1 night it sounded like someone broke in and was stomping down the stairs so my dad got his gun ready... And nothing was there. As a child I would see shadows around but probably had no idea what to think of it. Me and my brother would go to the basement together cause we were both too scared to go alone. Lol."

- Lime-Original

I didn't do it.

Neon Flickering GIF by Samm HenshawGiphy

"Found random crucifixes on door knobs. We aren't Catholic."

"One morning, my sister woke up and everything that was in the attic was in her bedroom. She had attic access in her bedroom. Mom was shocked, sister was lazy, dad was out of the country. I didn't do it. Explain that."

- CaptainAwesome06

Didn't hear a door open...

"My parents bought a (at this point) 110 year old house about 10 years ago and it feels everybody but me has had a paranormal experience in the house. My parents said they've seen a short, kinda chubby ginger kid appear at random spots in the house. Sometimes just standing in the washer/dryer room and vanishing, sometimes they'd see him at the top of the stairs and he'd walk towards my room (hooray) and disappear. Eventually, my parents were tired of it so they had my grandfather (very Christian guy) come and bless the house, and the appearances stopped."

"My brother has talked about staying up late and night and hearing someone walk up the stairs (they're very old so they are VERY squeaky), walk to his closed door, jiggle the door knob (original doors, so there was a quarter turn of play in the knobs) a bunch, stop, and walk back down the steps and stop. Didn't hear a door open or close, they just stopped at the bottom of the steps."

"My mom has also described seeing something peek out from around corners at her as she's sitting watching TV at night, she thinks it's probably just her slowly falling asleep and seeing things, but is still unsettling for her. There was a period of time where the mudroom door would kinda flex randomly like a change of air pressure. This usually happens whenever someone opens an outside door and closes it, but nobody ever was near a door, or the doors were locked."

"Probably just some weird phenomena caused by an old house, but still creepy. And yet here I am, who probably spent the most time up and alone in the middle of the night in that house, not seeing or hearing anything that wasn't explainable from night terrors and sleep paralysis (which I've always had, at multiple houses)."

- FoxxyPantz

I didn't flinch or look over...

"I lived in this big pre-war building in NYC and every night after I put my daughter to sleep in her room, I would lay in my bed and watch tv. The way my bed was angled I could see a sliver of the hallway out of the corner of my eye. I would always see this tall shadow pass by the door and it would jar me! I would always look over but see nothing after that. After a few years, I got so used to it- I didn't even flinch anymore."

"In fact, I had honestly started to believe I just had some sort of vision problem that caused me to see the shadow in my peripheral vision. Eventually we moved out but a week before we did- my daughter and I were just hanging out on my bed one night watching tv. All our boxes were pretty much packed, the whole apartment was ready to go. I was laying on my bed in my usual spot and my daughter was laying at the foot of the bed playing with her dolls."

"Again, my vision problem acted up and I saw the shadow out of the corner of my eye. I didn't flinch or look over, I hadn't in years- I was so used to it. But all the sudden my 8 year old child goes "Who was that?" Hoe. Lee. Heck. I jumped up out of the bed. "You saw that?!?!!!"

- meowatthemoons

"raccoons in the attic"

"Moved into a new apartment about a year ago, and shortly thereafter, I heard kids stomping around on the floor above. "Oh great," I thought, "noisy upstairs neighbors." And then it hit me: I don't HAVE upstairs neighbors. Or downstairs neighbors. The whole joint is mine from ground to roof. Some friends suggested that maybe I have raccoons or other critters in the attic, but I've had those before, they don't sound anything like that..."

"And a week or two later, the "raccoons in the attic" were vacuuming the carpets. Must be g-g-g-ghosts! Actually, what it is is some bizarre architectural quirk that makes stomping around on the floors next door propagate horizontally and sound like they're coming from over my head. Been living in apartments since 1978, have never experienced this kinda thing before."

- DrColdReality

"I'm home"

"We knew a guy named Mr. Weltzheimer had died in our house, and when anything weird would happen—things falling off shelves or foreign coins appearing on the stairs—we'd joke it was him. One day my mom and a neighbor were replacing the toilet in our bathroom, and were busily working away upstairs when my mom heard the door open and close and a deep, booming voice say "I'm home." She thought it was me (at the time, a teenage girl) joking around. But it wasn't. I was over at a friend's house. When she came down to investigate, all she found were the locked front and back doors."

- justamie

Falling

place cockroaches GIFGiphy

"Cockroaches falling out of the ceiling."

- Luxray209

Pinocchio

"I've posted about this before but it wasn't the house it was the freaking Pinocchio puppet. The thing was made of wood and looked like someone tried to convert the Disney version to polygons. The cheeks and all had sharp corners and points. One day the AC was off (it was hung under a fan) and it turned to me and started reaching out. Then the air kicked on and it went limp. We gave it back to the gifter and one of their walls burned down. Never saw it again."

- Abby-N0rma1

No Zoom

"Okay I was in my bedroom at my desk on Zoom for school, and I always keep the door closed so there aren't any distractions. My room has a lot of empty space, especially at the entrance. And my desk chair faces the window so I can't see the rest of my room while at my desk. Well one day I'm on Zoom for my English class and I hear my door stopper go off."

"You know those spring door stoppers on the bottom of the wall behind doors? I turn around and this thing is flicking back and forth, full speed and everything, and mine is pretty stiff too. My door never opened and there was no one else in the room with me. I was scared to do my classes in my room for a whole month but it never happened again."

- bloomedtomb

Giggles

"I was sitting in the living room watching TV with just me and my mom. The hallway had her and my Dad's room at the end. As we're watching we heard someone talking that didn't sound like it came from the TV. We muted it and heard it coming from the bedroom. The TV wasn't on in there. We both cautiously walked towards the bedroom and heard giggling which freaked us the heck out."

"It was coming from the closet which was open but we couldn't see anything in there. There was clearly a child's voice talking but it was... weird. Like words were spoken but they weren't words. It was almost like something the sims where it sounded like words but was not. Thank God it was in her room and not mine!"

- MC_Knight24

Go away Alice!

alice in wonderland GIFGiphy

"We live in an old farmhouse that used to be a boarding house for farm laborers. My four-year-old son was upstairs in his room and my wife could hear him talking to someone. She asked him who he was talking to. He said "Alice. She used to work here and feed the men but she died because she couldn't breathe."

- PutnamPete

In the Yard...

"Moved into a hundred year old house. Anytime I went downstairs while my daughter was napping, I would hear it running through the house, several times I thought it was my cheeky toddler that had woken up. Figured out it only happened when I left her alone upstairs sleeping & firmly believed it was just a small child spirit checking on her. Still creeped me the heck out. Came back upstairs one day & told it how I knew it was worrying about her, and checking in on her but that I would never go further away than the yard."

"That I appreciated that it cared, but it was actually making me really scared. I said that if she was ever in actual danger that I would absolutely appreciate it's help if I didn't realise but otherwise it was only making me worried. I only ever heard those footsteps once more: in the first few days I bought my second baby home from the hospital. I think my little friend was just reminding me that it would watch this baby for me too."

- Maid_of_Mischeif

When I went in, I swear I heard screams. So I screamed and turned to run and fell through the floorboards. That did not go well. I hate haunted houses.

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The All-Time Biggest First Date Red Flags

Reddit user APT3993 asked: 'What’s the biggest red flag you have seen on a first date?'

When you're on a first date, one of three things will happen. Either you'll like the person and want to go out again, you like the person fine, but not romantically, and won't want to go out again, or the person will display a behavior that is so off-putting (or make you genuinely fearful), that you won't even want to see the person ever again.

My best friend and I are basically the same person, so when she met a guy who he had a lot in common with, she figured I'd like him too and set us up (I had previously told her I was okay with being set up).

Well, it turns out the guy actually hadn't read any of the books, watched any of the shows, or heard of any of the bands he talked about with my friend. I didn't understand why he would lie about all these things until I left the table.

When I came back, he was on the phone with someone and he was telling them he only told her he liked all those things because he liked my friend. When he found out she was in a relationship, he decided he'd let her set us up in the hopes that he could date me until my friend and her boyfriend broke up, and then he could swoop in.

I just walked out and when he finally texted me asking what was up, I told him I overheard him, then proceeded to block him. My friend was mortified to hear about the date, and I decided never to be set up again.

I'm not the only one who has gone on a date and discovered a huge red flag. Redditors have experienced this too, and are eager to share their stories.

It all started when Redditor APT3993 asked:

"What’s the biggest red flag you have seen on a first date?"

Dates Of Relationships Past

"They won't shut up about their ex."

– SiriusGD

"Had this happen to me on a 2nd date."

"Asked if she could use my computer, I said OK. Then she pulls up her ex's FB profile to browse through it, and she spent the next 10 minutes comparing me to him, saying he she thinks that I will turn out to be controlling and manipulative like him because we both grew up on a farm and we both like cars."

"Ummm, wut?"

– alwaysmyfault

"He angrily told me I would “love” his ex wife. Proceeded to cry while talking about her. They’d been divorced for 5 years. I genuinely hope he is doing better."

– TX_Mothman

"She constantly compared me to her ex, and sat on her phone for most of the night, then expected me to pay for her two bottles of wine, plus really expensive meal and desert."

"She asked me out btw, not the other way around."

– Stuspawton

I Know What I Want

"The guy who tried to change my order with the waitress because he didn’t think the drink I’d asked for was sufficiently feminine."

"I ordered beer. I don’t remember exactly what he thought I should have, maybe white wine? It was a long time ago."

"The waitress was looking at me like ‘You heard that sh*t too right?’ and I told her actually I wouldn’t have anything, thanks, and I left."

– MaggieLuisa

"He changed it FROM A BEER TO SOMETHING ELSE!!?! That’s amazing to me. Like it’s bad enough if you ordered an IPA and he said, “I dunno, sweetie, your delicate female taste buds probably can’t handle the hoppiness. Hey, honey, why don’t we get the lady a Coors.”"

– AdaptiveVariance

The Position Of Boyfriend

"We met for drinks after work (since we both work in the same industry) and she showed up with a list of interview questions. She literally had a checklist on her phone for me to fill out. I thought she was joking at first, but the questions were extremely personal, like how many sexual partners you've had, the oldest, the youngest; How much money you made the previous year; If you owned a house, a car, a boat, a plane; Did you have a criminal history; Where do you parents live; Are they alive; Who did you vote for in the last election; All kinds of stuff like that."

"I even proposed that we could just use that as a conversation starter and we could work through them like that as a fun way to get to know each other. I was really trying. She tells me that she's not answering any of them because I'm trying to date her, not the other way around!"

"I laughed out loud thinking she was kidding, then realized she was absolutely serious. I wished her all the best in the dating world, chugged my beer, overtipped the waitress, and left."

– OkFrostina

"Yeah, I would really push that to the limit without getting law enforcement involved. Start with all the times I have ended up in rehabilitation, my abductions by UFO, the wild, kinky sex partners I have had, the millions I have lost before living under a bridge, etc."

– passporttohell

Scary As Hell

"Had a guy who insisted on buying the most expensive pizza at the restaurant despite my protests then kissed my head when he walked past me to use the restroom. After dinner we walked along the waterfront, he kissed me and then immediately tried to choke me "to be sexy". First date, last date."

– Twours1944

"What the sh*t?? Who taught this idiot that choking in public on the first date all without consent is a great get-to-know-you move??"

– villainsimper

Stranger Danger

"This was literally the day of a first date. But I had matched with an older man when I was still on dating apps. We planned to go on a hike on a very beautiful day by the water. On the day of the date, he wanted me to leave my car at his place, while he drove us through the backwoods so we can beat traffic. I said I’ll be happy to drive myself, and he laughed and canceled. His reasoning was he’s been stood up so many times and he didn’t want to waste his time and me not show up. I said “okay!I apologize for the inconvenience. I hope you find what you are looking for. “and blocked him."

"The red flag was when he genuinely got upset that I didn’t want to ride in a car with a stranger through the backwoods for our first date."

– Jesusdoescrack

"You should have said “you fear being stood up, I fear being murdered.”"

– The_She_Ghost

Truly Gross

"He pointed to another woman at the bar and said she was his ex. But she happened to be my lesbian roommate."

"Yes, I told him I knew he was full of it cuz she was my roommate, and I pointed out her girlfriend who was there with her. I don’t remember what he said exactly but he had no choice but to admit he was lying. I wish I had asked why he said it. I assume to make me jealous? Like that’s a good way to start a relationship? Obviously, that was the only date."

– Grapegoop

​Those Who Came Before

"He told me he had been divorced 5 times. I'm taking the advice of 5 women I don't know."

– 13liz

"The way you phrased this killed me 😂"

– CumulativeHazard

Got Her Feeling Emotions

"Does bursting into tears after I told them I didn't like a TV show count?"

– JumboDakotaSmoke

"I'm curious as to what TV show it was?"

– ladydamnation

"Grey's Anatomy."

– JumboDakotaSmoke

"bursts into tears"

– akennelley

Um...What?!

"He took me to his house (he lived with his mom) just so HE could eat dinner with his mom while I sat in the living room. I listened to them eat and talk about my looks like I couldn't hear them. Apparently, I was pretty but "needed to be taken down a peg or two." I said my period had started so I had to go home. A future abuser and his enabler mommy."

– BigMcLargeHuge77

Ew...Just Ew

"We went to a movie. He spent the first half with his hand inside one of his socks, then pulling it out and smelling it, putting it back in, repeat, repeat."

"Then he spent the second half trying to hold my hand. With his sock hand."

– Deleted User

Bad From The Start

"She asked if I could order for her because she was uncomfortable talking to the brown waitress.

"Added: Same girl would not stop talking about Kardashian gossip even though I told her I know nothing about them and didn’t care to know."

– CanaDoug420

Stop, Theif!

"He showed up drunk with a bouquet of flowers he admitted he stole from his mother's flower shop."

– LookAcrossTheWater

​Cringe-Worthy

"Went to a charity coffee shop for a date. It was “free” coffee where they just ask for donations which went toward their org’s efforts to feed and house people. They explained this to him and asked if he wanted to make a donation for our drinks."

"He said no."

– Shredded_Wheaties

Oh, yikes! I would be so embarrassed!

In fact, I'm kind of losing faith in dating as a concept.

people sitting inside plane
Hanson Lu on Unsplash

Commercial aviation began in the late 1920s, spurred on by early aeronautical companies and several record breaking solo flights.

Since then, there are few places on Earth that can't be seen or accessed by plane. Only icing limits humans from low altitude flights over certain areas like the polar regions, while a lack of landing locations keeps some areas accessible to only the smallest pontoon planes.

From January through December 2022, United States airlines carried 853 million passengers. Globally, air travel reached a high of over 4.7 billion passengers before the pandemic limited flights.

Since then, global air travel has rebounded to over 3.7 billion passengers.

With almost 100 years and over a trillion passengers, the people who crew these flights are bound to have seen everything happen that possibly could at airports and on a flight.

Keep reading...Show less
A skeptical man
Photo by Timothy Dykes on Unsplash

We've all heard our fair share of conspiracy theories, from thoughts about the White House to aliens and beyond.

But some conspiracy theories have become truly strange and nuanced, and it's hard to stop listening to the person explaining their beliefs, because as weird as some of these theories sound, they could almost by some stretch of the imagination make sense.

Intrigued, Redditor Accomplished-Leg-991 asked:

"What's the weirdest or craziest theory you have heard of?"

Seems Plausible.

"Traffic barrels are left up for so long because the Department of Transportation bought too many and has no place to store them."

- dailysunshineKO

The Grass Is Always Greener

"The truck driver that delivered my flooring gave me this gem: The push for green lawns in the US is by Big Pharma."

"The cliff notes version is that to get green grass, you need pesticides, pesticides cause cancer, and cancer is good business for drug companies. It was like a 20-minute long rant to get to that conclusion and it was an adventure."

- StillBald

"I need to drink with him for one night. That cannot possibly be the only banger he's got."

- karenalphas

The Ice Wall

"Recently TikTok kept giving bizarre suggestions where people trying to prove Ice Wall in Antarctica that Earth is bigger and something is hiding behind ice wall in Antarctica… What the h**l."

- XenophanesJunior

"It's a weird subset of flat earthers, who believe in an 'infinite plane' that lies beyond the ice wall (guarded by NASA, of all people), and the reason? The infinite plane has endless amounts of gold mines and gems they can mine for infinite money."

- bag2d

Tinkering with the Algorithm

"That Walt Disney was cryogenically frozen, and they made the movie 'Frozen' so that when people googled 'Walt Disney Frozen,' the movie would come up first."

- LizardPossum

"They updated this theory, but now it is with Taylor Swift. It basically says that she went to that Kansas City Chiefs vs NY Jets game so that when people search 'Taylor Swift Jets,' it will only show news about the game, and not about her going everywhere with her private jets."

- abirll

"It's so wild now these rely on people being completely unable to go to page two of a Google search."

- LizardPossum

The All-Important Celebrity Weddings

"I had a coworker that fully believes the government controls the weather so celebrities can have nice weddings."

- pinballgizard

"Out of all the reasons to control the weather, celebrity weddings are a top priority for the government."

- Suspicious-Craft4980

The Truth of Social Security Numbers

"Your social security number indicates which bank you were sold to at birth."

- compuwiza1

"Ah, sovereign citizens..."

- CaptainMikul

Dinosaur Bones, Huh?

"Dinosaur bones were placed on earth by Satan to trick people into 'abandoning' God."

- River_7890

"There's a big American Church whose members believe that dinosaur bones exist because God made the Earth with leftovers from a previous planet."

"Mental gymnastics to justify their belief that the Earth is only 10'000 years old and C14 dates dinosaur bones as being millions of years old..."

- mrsrosieparker

"I'm absolutely not shocked. The person who told me jumps through so many mental hoops to try to disprove science. She thinks that the government is secretly working for Satan to convert people, too."

"Oh and of course Disney. She's crazy overall. Not just with religious stuff. I could tell so many stories of her crossing lines and saying off-the-wall things. I try to not associate with her as much as possible."

- River_7890

The Worst Kind of Waiting Room

"The USS Philadelphia Experiment and the US army soldier who claimed he was in an interdimensional waiting room as a greeter for eternity until he was suddenly transported back onto the ship."

"People claimed it was a cloaking device gone wrong and left men's bodies trapped within the steel of the boat upon reentry."

"I never looked into it but read about it in a book that had a statement like, 'Nothing in this book is true but it's exactly the way things are,' or something similar. Always thought it was the wildest conspiracy theory ever when I was a stoned teenager reading it."

- Hereforthecake

Phantom Time Conspiracy Theory

"There’s a whole podcast with hundreds of episodes dedicated to this subject. Worth a listen. One of the wildest ones is that Charlemagne’s grandson moved the calendar forward ~300 years and thus the Dark Ages never happened."

- seandowling73

Gives the Shortcut a Whole New Meaning

"Met a dude at the gym who believed that the CIA had built tunnels throughout the Earth's core, connecting all the major cities. Was some kind of global takeover scheme."

- Latham74

Infathomly Large Trees

"Mountains are all the stumps of ancient fossilized enormous trees."

"I'm absolutely obsessed with this theory. It's connected to flat earth, but flat earth isn't a requirement for this theory nor do most flat earthers believe it."

- inkstainedgoblin

Under Control

"We're all infected by parasites that feed on our stress hormones released by negative emotions like guilt, sadness, anger, fear, and so on. They control our minds and, thereby, us to an extent. The only way to combat them is by being aware and questioning if your thoughts and actions are truly your own thoughts and actions."

- 42clickslater

Enough Said

"The one about JFK Jr. coming back to help Trump win the 2020 election is still tops in my book."

- pinkyknee

Big Pharma Chickens

"That owning chickens is the gateway drug to believing conspiracy theories."

- sarcasawm

"As someone who has owned chickens, the only thing they're a gateway drug to is getting more farm animals."

- CelticArche

"That’s what Big Goat wants you to believe."

- MissRockNerd

"Big Farm-A."

- cannedcream

As wild as some of these conspiracy theories were, there's no denying that they're fascinating, some for the simple fact that they're almost plausible.

They at least get you thinking in a new way, and perhaps that isn't such a bad thing every now and then.

Two guys hi-fiving each other
Tyler Nix/Unsplash

A good friend is not always the one with whom you share laughs and fun experiences.

The friendships you want to keep include those who won't abandon you in a time of need or someone who supports you in a variety of complicated situations where not even a family member can be relied upon.

Unfortunately, many of us have experienced a time when a person's true colors revealed to us that the so-called "friend" we've always trusted wasn't one at all.

Curious to hear examples of this, Redditor Aesthetik_1 asked:

"What made you instantly realize This 'friend' is not a real friend?"

These Redditors didn't realized at the time that they were being used.

Recurring Favor

"When he only called me when he needed something. It didn't hit me until much later."

– Queasy-Location-9303

"I have one of those 'friends'. She always gushes about how we're friends but she never initiates contact unless she wants me to do something for her."

– StiffAssedBrit

The Errand Girl

"Several years back, I had a friend who introduced me to this new boy she was seeing. Maybe a year later, their relationship blew up in a fury of bs (whole other story), but by the time they split, I was equally friends with both of them. He and I were both photographers at the time, so the friendship was instantaneous."

"One day we started talking about her, neither positively nor in poor taste, just kind of in general."

"He then asked me 'when she texts to hang out, what does she usually want to do?'"

"I paused. I thought. Holy sh*t, she'd either be asking for a favour or for help with some kind of errand. I was her f'king errand girl."

"She texted me a month or two later, just a 'hey'. I never responded. She never texted again."

"I'm still friends with her ex, though. That dude is genuine as heck."

– ChamomileBrownies

Testing The Friendship

"When you decide to let them be the one to reach out. And you never hear from them again."

– plzdontgetmad

"Yup. Made plans with a friend three times, she cancelled each time. I finally told her to let me know when she was free, we haven’t hung out since."

"She was a good friend for the season, but not a lifetime."

– NoMrBond3

People were shocked to discover the moment they realized they didn't really know who their "friend" was anymore.

The Chaperon

"I had been giving rides to a girl I thought was my friend. To and from school in high school. She wasn’t really suppose to ride with other teens but due to her mothers work hours we could easily pull this off. I thought we were close."

"One day while on the way home my brakes went out. We were about 2 blocks from her gated neighborhood. I managed to roll in safely and parked at her house to call a tow truck."

"She flipped. Told me I couldn’t stay. She knew my brakes were not working as she had also been terrified when we couldn’t stop. She said she wanted to go to a movie that weekend with other friends and her mom would ground her if she saw me at the house. I offered to lie and say I only stopped there as my car malfunctioned on my way home. I had to pass her neighborhood on my way home anyways."

"She refused. Started to scream at me. She didn’t care what happened I had to go. Started to call the guard at the front gate to tell them I had broken in and was threatening her."

"I left her and that friendship that moment. I managed to roll my car slowly to a mechanic not too far away but never forgot the shi* feeling of knowing I could have been seriously hurt and she wouldn’t have cared. She wanted to see a movie. She had the nerve to sheepishly call and ask me a couple days later if I could give her a ride to school. Told her I was too busy and no longer had time… after all I wanted to help her obey her mom's rules. She rode the bus til she graduated."

– Duffarum

Unwilling Companion

"I had this friend in school. Each year there was a funfair in our city, all students received vouchers for a drink and something to eat. This friend complained the whole day that she had no one to accompany her to the funfair. So, stupid me offered to go with her."

"Once we arrived we met another friend of hers. And another, and another... until we were a group of 5 or 6 people. I didn't know anyone and was basically just walking behind them. This friend took me aside and said, 'My friends think you are annoying, and we would like you to leave.'"

"It was a pleasure to see that she failed her exams a year later."

– Auldale

There's the spirit of competition, but when it's taken seriously, we're no longer game for these friendships.

I Can Do It Better

"Constantly 'one ups' me. A real friend is happy for you."

– Complex-Half8338

"That one time I got a fake bag but she doesn’t know and then 2 weeks later messaged me that she also bought a luxury bag… Then when I got a bf, she also went to get a bf within 3 months which is TOTALLY fine but she constantly messages me for us to go on a double date. Anyways, sadly they didn’t last long :( I mentioned that I wanted to go to Cuba, she went ahead and bought herself a ticket to Cuba but I didn’t end up going lol"

– Hot-Coffee-8465

Never Steal The Spotlight

"When they loved the idea of me shining, but behind their shadow, I could never do or achieve anything above them, and when I did, they would get jealous."

– Jasssin23

"Yes! I recently ghosted a friend because of this kind of behavior. She was trying to compete about EVERYTHING. Like she bragged about how her mom’s car accident was more traumatic than my elderly MIL’s - which is not even an appropriate thing to compare. She would also try to 'outshine' celebrations of my milestones and was mean to several of my friends for no apparent reason. She was a loose cannon at best."

– thefifthtrilogy

All About Me

"ALL she talks about it herself and her problems. Granted she has a a lot but never asks about me or my life until she realizes she just bypassed my attempt to want to talk about something in my life bothering me and continued to talk about herself."

– PokemomOnTheGo

People can just be so rude.

"When I got really sick. Very few came to help."

– Tofflus1

"Same here. I got cancer and everyone I knew was over the top supportive for the first six months and then all but three of my friends just vanished. I saw one of them at a Halloween party while I was going through chemo and she told me that my bald head made people uncomfortable. I was dressed as Captain Picard, it was awesome and she ruined it."

– CatGoNoTail

Not Missing High School

"At lunch, she was sitting with her boyfriend, I was sitting with our friend circle. She came up to me, guilted me into sitting with her and her boyfriend, and then proceeded to ignore me for the rest of lunch."

"She didn't care about me, she just didn't want me talking to the friend circle that she had abandoned for her boyfriend. When I pointed this out to her, she called me a jealous b*tch."

"Ah, high school. How I don't miss thee."

– Symnestra

These examples actually served as a good reminder for me to take a moment and assess my friendships.

Not so much about how I've been treated but more about checking myself to see if I'm respecting the people I call my friends.

We've all been guilty of casually mentioning future plans to get together. I embarrassingly wait for people to initiate something, which is terrible.

Show up for your friends. Make them feel important like the individuals they are.