You see the light at the end of the tunnel. It's glow calls, beckons, for you to come towards it. It'll be easy, you might think, to simply walk into it. But suddenly, your metal-loving neighbor yanks you up, gives you the Heimlich, and forces you to spit out the candy lodged in your throat.
Near-death experiences are unique for everyone unfortunate enough to experience them, but thankfully, that's what we have the internet for.
Reddit user, u/th0nx, wanted to know what it was like when they asked:
When was your "Oh sh-t I'm going to die" moment but you didn't actually die?
Not. The. Bees.
GiphyI'm alergic to bees.
One time I got stung while sitting at a red light. It was a rental and I forgot my bag. No epipen. I turned into a car dealership and yelled to them to call 911. Within 4 minutes (which felt like an eternity) my throat completely closed. Last thing I remember is the guy who was with me yelling that I was blue. I don't know how long I was out, but as soon as the EMTs pushed the epinephrine I sprung back to life. Thank goodness they got there so quickly.
The next day I brought the dealership and the EMTs baskets with cookies.
Seeing The Point Of Impact
It happened when I was a teenager. Two of my cousins, my mother, and I were on the way to San Francisco. I was sitting in the backseat playing on my Nintendo DS. As my cousin was making a left turn (light was green), from my peripheral vision I could see a SUV speeding towards our vehicle. I'm not sure if SUV was running a red light, the driver was distracted, or if just hitting another car for some reason was the driver's intent.
It really felt like time slowed down in the few seconds prior to the accident. I remember thinking I would feel the biggest impact and would probably die because of it since it was coming directly towards my side of the vehicle.
I braced myself, said a quick prayer, thought of my father and grandmother and everyone else we would leave behind. I remember glancing up at the point of impact and watching my DS fall from my hands. The SUV sped away.
Thankfully none of us were injured, just very shocked. Hearing my mom wailing out my name thinking I was hurt or dead right after we got hit was the worst.
Bad Puppy
Mauled by a dog.
I have no memory of most of the bites, but at one point the dog lunged & latched on to my abdomen, a bit up & to the left of my belly button. It was so terrifying & excruciatingly painful I was convinced that the dog was going to rip my guts out. When it was over & I was being escorted to the ambulance I kept my hand pressed over the bite on my gut because I thought I must be bleeding out. The funny thing was that bite was actually nbd & pretty shallow, it was the bites I didn't feel that were severe & caused lasting damage.
Never Trust A Lake
I had a stupid tradition where I'd swim to an island by a camp site I go to every year, it's about a 40 minute swim. I'm a good swimmer and never really bothered taking a life jacket or floating device. One year, I got a massive leg cramp in my left leg when I was 15 minutes from shore. I thought I was done but luckily it went away.
When Death Is Better Than The Alternative
I had the flu pretty bad. It got to the point that I couldn't keep anything down and I could barely walk into the urgent care. It kept up nearly a week, I felt like I was drunk the whole time. I'd wake up and think "if I died, that'd be fine." I didn't want to, but I thought if I did, it would be preferable.
Dangerous Undercurrents
When I was little my family went to Mexico for a holiday vacation. I was playing in the ocean when I felt myself being pulled out to sea. My parents were distracted, but I remember looking up at my sister screaming just as my head went under the water. I'm not sure how long i was underwater, but two guys came out of nowhere, dragged me out of the water, and as quickly as they appeared they were gone.
My parents looked all over the beach and never found them.
See? This Is Why We Have Life Alert.
GiphyHeart attack.
Alone.
Out of town on business.
Hotel booked for a week.
Do Not Disturb on the door.
Passed out from pain and exhaustion.
As I blacked out, I thought 'this is it.'
I wished I could tell my wife, I love her.
Woke up the next day...
Was truly surprised I was alive.
Roughly Uber'ed to hospital, ASAP.
Out of work on leave for 3 months.
Completely changed lifestyle and food.
Doing better, right arm, 50% numb.
Just glad to be here.
🙂👌🏻
A Slippery Slide Of Doom
Okay so, about 2 years ago I was on my way to a friends birthday party, and keep in mind it was the middle of winter in Michigan. On the way there my mom hit some black ice, sliding off the road and the car hit some dirt, making it standing standing on both right tires.
Almost flipped and while it was I said "oh sh-t" but then the car flipped back onto all four. I still joke about it with my mom every winter. Good times.
Irresponsible Choices
After a party one night I made the 45 minute drive back to my house at around 4 or 5 in the morning, may have been less than sober, and when I got home I realized that I had driven with my knees the whole time and was sitting with my arms crossed.
I thought "wow, I should've died"
By The Skin Of Your Neck
This happened when I was about 18/19. Coworker shot a power washer at my neck from point blank range. In that split instant, I thought "I'm dead."
It had only recently been turned off (we were stripping paint from a large barn/shed) and although it hurt on impact, when I reached up to my neck, there was no blood. The relief I felt didn't counteract the feeling of nearly dying. I took off from work that day and cried on the lawn for like an hour, just trying to calm down.
There's A Pun In That Name...
According to my mom, when I was 2 years old I got a candy stuck in my throat. Thankfully my mom was a doctor so she poked her finger inside my throat and fished it out.
I now rarely eat candy other than life savers.
A Water Park...OF DOOM
Back in the day, there was what I considered to be the best water park in the US - Six Flags Atlantis in Hollywood, FL. They had once of the best wave pools in the country. I was 6 at the time - my parents recently divorced. I was with my father in the wave pool. It was so crowded that I lost him and I didn't think he could see me. I barely knew how to swim. On top of that, even at the age of 6, I thought I was pretty smart. I thought my father was just taking me to the water park because that's what father's do - not out of love (turns out I was right and this was the case as 2 years later he completely gave up his own visitation rights).
So here I am, drowning in the wave pool and thinking the only person who's looking for me is a dude that doesn't even really want to be with me (but needs to because it's court mandated). So, my thought process was: what incentive does he have to go bat shit crazy and look for me instead of just casually looking for me? I was under water for a good 30 seconds and couldn't hold on any longer. JUST as I needed a breathe, my father drags me to the surface and saves me. I was shocked. I couldn't believe it. On the drive home, it hit me: if I would have died, my mother would have murdered my father...so his incentive to save me was pretty fucking big.
Car. Surfing.
When I was 16 I was the dumbest kid you've ever met. I was trying to "surf" my car while my friend drove it down a back road, and after a few minutes I tried to crawl back in. I was drinking, and I couldn't quite get in the small windows, so my dumbass put my foot down trying to jump into it and it pulled me down.
Had some pretty serious road rash and cracked my head open. Probably would have died if my friend wasnt terrified that I was doing it and slowed down when I tried to climb in.
Stairway To Death
I was being stupid, and I fell down a flight of stairs, hit my head on the hard wall, and if I wasn't lucky, a ladder would've fallen on me. Lucky me though, I walked out with a sprained elbow, could have been worse, but when I was falling, it felt like my life was flashing right before my eyes.
You've Reached Your Final Destination
I was driving home from my girlfriends place in the city. I was driving home on the highway and out of no way a large pvc pipe comes rolling out in front of my car and I'm doing 70mph. It rolled to the point it seemed it was gonna strike my two left tires and somehow I turned just enough to avoid it. Needless to say a heart attack almost occurred.
Slowly Fading
Stepped on a stingray at the beach and the stinger went almost all the way through my foot like stepping on a nail. I got out and laid down near my family (last day of family vacation) and got my foot wrapped tight in a towel. It only took a few minutes for the poison to set in and my whole leg felt like it was on fire. Everything in my body started going numb, I had a hard time breathing, my fingers and toes curled up and my lips were tightening up. I told my wife I loved her and thought that might be it.
One of my brothers was bawling like crazy thinking I was done for. Somehow I pulled out of it and was able to get to ER and get treated. Hot hot water is the only thing that neutralizes stingray venom/poison. Worst pain I ever felt in my life but so glad I pulled through. Only time I've ever been convinced I wasn't going to make it. And it was a couple months after Steve Irwin's death.
LPT: do the stingray shuffle whenever you are in the water at the beach. Shuffle your feet so you are never taking a big up/down step with your foot. This scares away the stingrays and they don't sting you this way.
When You Want Something To Happen, But It Doesn't
This is gross, but about a year ago I woke up in the middle of the night with stomach pain. This isn't unusual since I have colitis, so I got up, grabbed a Calvin and Hobbes anthology, and prepared to spend some time in the bathroom. Normally the pain comes and goes and I can handle it. Unfortunately, this particular night I was horrifically backed up from nausea medication and couldn't go. I'd never had this happen before and suddenly the pain went from a manageable if unpleasant 5 to 'oh sh-t I might actually be calling 911.'
Unable to force anything out that way, I started vomiting uncontrollably. It honestly felt like my guts were being crushed by something. The only pain I can compare it to is like a Charley horse but in your entire colon. I've got a high pain tolerance but at one point the pain kept getting worse and worse until I was pouring sweat and I had a real moment where I thought my guts might rupture or something.
I panicked and things got real weird for a few minutes. My vision started going and I got really shocky. Dry mouth, more vomiting. I almost passed out in the tub when the spasms got worse because I couldn't keep myself upright. I couldn't push to get my guts moving because even the slightest amount of force was enough to make me shriek in pain. Eventually, with a concentrated effort, I was able to get things moving and I unleashed hell on our toilet. It sounds ridiculous, but I have NEVER been in that much pain. I was absolutely terrified, and that is the closest I have ever come to being like "man, I might die here."
What's the closest you've come to dying? Share it with us!
- Are Near-Death Experiences Just Hallucinations? Scientists Weigh ... ›
- Brain Surgeon Recalls His Near-Death Experience, Says He's Been ... ›
- 17 Near-Death Experience Accounts from "Beyond the Light" ›
- How Near-death Experiences Work | HowStuffWorks ›
- About Near-Death Experiences ›
- The Science of Near-Death Experiences - The Atlantic ›
- Near-Death Experiences and the Afterlife ›
- Near-death experience - Wikipedia ›
- NEAR DEATH EXPERIENCES best of 2018 [FailForceOne] - YouTube ›
The Foods People Won't Eat Even If They Were Offered For Free
Reddit user Judgemental_Squirrel asked: 'What food aren't you eating even if it was free?'
Over the years, I've gotten a little more adventurous with my menu options.
I recently added pepper a decade ago.
I've also been dabbling in hot sauces as of late.
But I am bias against a lot of food.
My stomach is a coward.
And I'm ok with that.
Redditor Judgemental_Squirrel wanted to hear about the foods that turn many people's stomachs, so they asked:
"What food aren't you eating even if it was free?"
Cow. Cow tongue. Cow stomach.
Why in the world?
Not that I don't eat steak but... I can't even think about it.
Not even with a free tank...
Sushi Ew GIF by Sealed With A GIFGiphy"Gas station sushi."
kirinmay
"For sushi use the 200-mile rule. If there isn't a body of water where the fish could have been caught recently, it's probably a bad idea. I wouldn't even get fresh sushi in Kansas unless I caught the fish myself."
Bahnd
Just Bland
"Shark fin."
Podzilla07
"I attended a wedding and the family paid for the food at an after-wedding dinner. I didn't know what it was, I didn't learn of the immorality behind it until after, that being said, it wasn't remarkable in any way and is in no way worth what they do to the sharks."
xfocalinx
"Not defending shark fin's soup, it's pretty bad the way it's prepared but where have you been eating it that it's bland? I'm Asian so I've eaten it at a bunch of weddings, its standout feature is how rich it is both in taste and texture."
LoreCriticizer
WHAT?!?!
"I’ve lived in New York my whole life and came to South Carolina for vacation ended up moving down here because I loved the weather. I learned that they apparently LOVE Mayonnaise and BANANA SANDWICHES!!"
"Miss me with that friggin' crap WHAT!?"
Yunloveme
"This is a dying sandwich down here, too. I grew up with them and enjoy them, but it's becoming less common. I think it must have started as a poverty food or something. They are good, though. Sweet and tangy." ~ Ritz527
"Banana and mayonnaise sandwiches came about during the times when food was more scarce (WWII). My grandmother loved them!"
Excusemytootie
Spoiled
"Suspiciously lukewarm milk. I am extremely paranoid about spoiled milk."
Melomius
"The smell of warm/hot milk is disgusting. When I have to make a huge batch of Mac and cheese at the school I work at, I have to wear a mask during the heating up of the milk/butter."
"Nothing like filling up a kitchen with the odor of vomit. Ugh. I refuse to eat Alfredo sauce and NE clam chowder for the same reason."
KitchenWitch021
Sorry Danes
fish GIFGiphy"Lutefisk. No offense to the wonderful people of Sweden/Norway and I genuinely like most other Swedish/Norwegian cuisine but not that."
"Edit- changed from Swedish to Scandinavian to Swedish/Norwegian thanks to the new knowledge about it from helpful Redditors. Apologies to Danes and anyone else who was offended by Lutefisk being labeled as Scandinavian."
HelenAngel
I go back and forth with fish in general, so a fish I can't pronounce... never!
Anything But This!
No No No GIFGiphy"Balut."
DesignerString6620
"On Today’s episode of 'F**k That!'"
"My friend said 'It’s great! Just pop the top off and sprinkle a little salt, drink the soup, and then eat the rest.' No."
omega_frog
"This. I could probably eat damn near everything, everyone else named, but hell no to this! And doing a quick skim, I’d actually probably tried half of the stuff, that’s been posted here."
Eupion
After Effects
"Pickled fish... tapeworms."
"Edit: I probably should have said 'Pickled fish because of tapeworms.' Buying them from a store is probably safe but buying/getting them from a bar or a person may not be. My uncle got tapeworm from pickled Walleye. One of two things need to be done beforehand, 1. bring the meat to 'a temp' (I don't remember) which sterilizes it but doesn't cook it, or 2. freeze for 2 days."
hatchetman208
Bad Harvest
"Edible Birds Nest. The high demand causes the nests to be harvested while still in use resulting in uncountable deaths of chicks and unborn swallows."
CaptainCloudyL
"Nearly all the edible bird's nest on the market is farmed, not harvested wild. Nesting houses are often built in urban areas for the swiftlets to settle in, while wild populations are left relatively untouched."
"The overharvesting you mention was a problem around 2 decades ago when immature nests in caves were destroyed to meet demand, but urban farming today has allowed populations to rebound and stabilize. After all, it's not in the farmers' interests to destroy swiftlet chicks which would become moneymakers for them next season."
LostTheGame42
LOATHING!!
"Liver, I cannot for the life of me get past the horrible taste and the horrible smell, I can't."
mikeyeli
"I tried eating liver before because I read that they’re a good source of iron. I then stopped and would rather take iron pills. I don’t eat any organs food like liver, gizzard, intestine, and all that. Those food are easily found in my country."
mznh
"Hell, yes. I LOATHE any kind of liver and have a special hatred for foie gras. Not only the method is horrible, but the texture is also even more revolting than regular liver."
"And yes, I've tried multiple times, from multiple animals and in every preparation under the sun because a lot of people go 'But you haven't tried it made THIS way.'"
Duochan_Maxwell
Bad Texture
"Gizzards. I'm not a gristle gal at all."
biggesttoot
"I love gizzards but I don't think I would ever call them gristly. Chewy as leather for sure though!"
orangestegosaurus
Lord No!
"Durian."
leafbaker
"Hot garbage fruit. When I was living in China, about 10 meters from my apartment’s entrance there was a durian stand and a stinky tofu stand side by side. Never needed coffee in the morning to wake up properly."
kuridono
Well, my stomach is unsettled.
I'll skip dinner for now.
Do you have anything to add to the list? Let us know in the comments below.
Some of us are more comfortable with advertisements, commercials, and sponsored content that we see on television and social media, but we can all agree that there is some truly cringey content out there.
But there have been some completely side-eye-worthy blunders that have happened at the corporate level that earned a company or product more attention than their marketing ever could, cringey or not.
Redditor LeatherFruitPF asked:
"What are some of the worst corporate blunders or PR (Public Relations) disasters in history?"
Gerard Ratner's Jewelry Woes
"Gerald Ratner called his own company’s (jeweler) products 'crap' and said that, 'a prawn sandwich would last longer' than their earrings at a conference."
"The company’s value fell by 500 million euros, and he had to resign."
- Onion_Heart
Bringing Back Spam
"Back in the 90s, Hormel Foods went on a Cease and Desist spree against anyone who was making jokes about Spam because they felt the brand had been damaged and needed to be rebuilt."
"The last straw was when they threatened to sue Jim Henson Studios over the character Spa'am in 'Muppet Treasure Island.' That turned people against them pretty quickly. It turns out that if you want to rebuild your brand in the public eye, suing one of the most beloved entertainment franchises of two generations was a bad way to go about it."
"Eventually, they dropped all the cease and desist stuff and changed their marketing strategy, instead deciding to lean into it and proclaiming that there are always going to be jokes about Spam, so they might as well be in on them."
- weirdoldhobo1978
Complacency Over Competitiveness
"Blackberry thinking that they are the top in the mobile market so they didn't need to innovate to compete with those new iPhone things from Apple."
- TechyDad
Poor Translations
"Supposedly years ago, there was a Pepsi slogan, 'Come Alive with Pepsi,' that was mistranslated in Chinese as, 'Pepsi Brings Your Ancestors Back from the Dead.'"
- xain_the_id**t
Not Welcome in Canada
"Target's expansion into Canada. It collapsed in two years and cost seven billion dollars."
- USSMarauder
"I still remember how annoyed my town was when our Zellers (what Canada had before Target) was closed down because Target was rolling into Canada. In the time it took for them to renovate the two-story mall location and convert it to a Target, THEY PULLED OUT OF CANADA."
"So for about a year, we lost our only Zellers location and we didn't even get a chance to experience it as a Target because they went t*ts up before it had a chance to open."
- sillyslambo
The Thing That Could Have Given Them an Edge...
"Sears dominated the mail order industry for over a century with their catalog. In 1993, they decided that mail order was on the decline and discontinued the catalog. Less than a year later, Jeff Bezos would found Amazon."
- BlueRFR3100
The Osborne Effect
"Have you heard of the Osborne Effect?"
"The company in 1981 had one of the first home computers on the market, it sounded fantastic and everything. At the launch, CEO said the next version will be so much better... So everyone decided, Why buy this version if the next version will be better? We'll wait for V2."
"So V1 sold terribly, the company folded, and there was no V2."
- BIllyBrooks
If Kodak Could See the Internet Now...
"Kodak shunning digital photography... Yeah..."
- uvaspina1
Inappropriate Trends
"Digiorno trying to make the hashtag 'Why I Stayed' be about making pizza at home."
- Kira82
"Reminds me of the whole Bud Light 'Up For Whatever' fiasco."
- The_ChwatBot
The 349 Incident
"The Pepsi Number Fever promotion in the Philippines went really terribly! They basically never recovered in the market there. It’s really interesting actually!"
- Londonbreakdown
"'Pepsi Number Fever, also known as the 349 incident, was a promotion held by PepsiCo in the Philippines in 1992, which led to riots and the deaths of at least five people.'"
"That's the first sentence, oh my god, I don't know why this is so funny to me but I'm going to h**l."
- onaraynaafternoon
Who is Max?
"Here’s one happening right now: HBO is rebranding as 'Max.'"
"HBO is a premium brand with decades of quality programming behind it."
"Max is generic, vague, and makes me think of softcore."
- watchingsongsDL
"It makes me think of Cinemax more than HBO, which, what?"
- EverywhereINowhere
Hoover Flights
"I can't believe the Hoover flights to America promotion from the early '90s hasn't come up yet."
"They offered a pair of return flights to America worth £600 if you spent £100 or more on their stuff."
"As it turned out, people thought £100 for a return flight with a free vacuum cleaner was a h**l of a deal, and it was a disaster that cost the company millions."
- Tim6181
Empty Promises
"Celebrities singing 'Imagine' at the beginning of the pandemic."
- KickMinaj
"'We're all in this together,' said by some idiot celebrities in their multi-million dollar mansions."
- eddyathome
Wizards of the Coast
"'Wizards of the Coast' and the open gaming license earlier this year."
"Worst handling I've seen. Literally caused dozens if not hundreds of companies to pull away from creating content for the company to making new games that will directly compete with them while alienating their fans at the same time."
- Konocti
Embrace the Tech
"Nokia, once the biggest phone company in the world, failed to move with the times and switch to Android/smartphones."
- bent_eye
It's crazy to think of how successful and large some of these companies once were before serious corporate blunders, or how hard they've had to work to come back from those blunders.
It just goes to show that some mistakes have a way of sticking around and make it really hard for people to move on.
From latch-key life to knowing when someone's home based on their bike being thrown on the front lawn to the earliest, cringiest days of social media, 80s and 90s kids are full of stories from their childhoods.
But these stories are uniquely nostalgic as kids today will never quite experience this type of childhood ever again.
Redditor MediumRareTint asked:
"What was a typical 90s scenario that today's youth will never experience?"
Landline Etiquette
"Talking to someone's parent and asking for your friend, because it was the landline and no caller ID."
- MixedSyrup
"Answering the phone in the kitchen, then running back to your room to take it there, and yelling, 'MOM, HANG UP THE PHONE! MOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM, HANG UP THE PHONE!'"
- manderifffic
The Dial-Up "Song"
"Dial-up internet. That tone is ingrained in my memory."
- Reeeeaper
Downloading Woes
"The experience of losing connection when you downloaded 99% of the file because your mom picked up the phone. Still hurts."
- Cute_Panda9
"Telling everyone in your family you're downloading a big file; don't pick up the phone."
"Reminding your family that you're downloading a big file; don't pick up the phone."
"Telling your family the file is almost done; don't pick up the phone."
"Then someone picks up the phone with ten seconds left... and you have to start the 14-hour download again tomorrow."
- Mustang46L
Internet Sounds in the Home
"The dial-up internet tone that was like nails on a chalkboard."
"'Welcome! You've got mail!'"
"The happy logging onto AIM sound."
"Someone yelling from another area of the house, 'Get offline so I can make a call!'"
"Starting a file download/upload... walking away to make a sandwich, brew coffee, fold laundry, start a new load of laundry, put the laundry away... and coming back and the download/upload is still not complete."
"Getting disconnected from the internet because someone picked up the phone to make a call while you were in the process of the aforementioned download/upload, and losing your everlovin' mind on that person."
"The best part: The original Oregon Trail game."
- Just_another_Sue
Renting Movies
"Getting a video to rent and watch at home made you feel like you were going 'out' to do something."
- ekimlive
"Oh God, movie rental, a pizza, some microwave popcorn, and some soda. It was such a fantastic night if those things were planned."
- GreenOnionCrusader
True Quiet and Disconnection
"The feeling of coming home free from school or work, and the outside world was very separate from you until the following day."
"You couldn’t easily find out what your friends were doing (they weren’t doing anything anyway), you couldn’t easily catch up on the news unless it happened to be on, and you couldn’t catch up on new movies or celebrity gossip unless you had a magazine lying around, which would come out monthly."
"It’s a level of relaxation that we took for granted, but we were likely the last generation to experience it."
- Own-Firefighter-2728
"Man, this is a really good one. We are so, so connected and it's so, so unhealthy for us."
"It was really nice when we were an entire phone call away. I didn't need to know anything about anybody, the focus was on the people you were with, and experiences outside of the home were more special."
- artemasfoul
The All-Important Meeting Place
"Making plans beforehand and having a meeting place since no one owned cell phones."
- MixedSyrup
Being Stood Up
"My youth and adulthood perfectly straddle cell phones. Last-minute cancellations became increasingly more common throughout my 20s but were rare in my teens."
"What really sucked was when a date didn’t show up and you had no way of knowing whether 1. they were ok, 2. they had a good reason, or 3. they just decided to stand you up. You generally assumed the worst, or at least I did."
- Dudley_Do_Wrong
"I never adjusted to this. I still hold true to my original plans and am confused with today's culture on this. Like, we made plans. If you didn't want to, don't say yes."
"And I am only 39."
- x-Mowens-x
No Cameras Rolling
"I grew up in the 70s and 80s, but this applies to the 90s as well…"
"You could do the absolute dumbest, craziest, most embarrassing s**t you could possibly imagine, and no one was recording it."
- FrankNStein
Safer Surroundings
"A parent saying, 'Here's $20, I'll pick you up at 8:00 when the mall closes. Don't talk to strangers.'"
- Nonsenseinabag
Airport Security
"Meeting people at the gate when you pick them up from the airport."
- Main_Maximum8963
"Romance movies have been ruined because of this."
- lifejustice
Cramming Commercial Time
"Making a dash through the house from the kitchen to the couch when someone yelled out, 'It’s back on!'"
- NicGyver
"This is how my mom used to get my sister and me to clean the house. One commercial at a time during a movie."
- reklawpuck
Live Television Programs
"Missing an episode on tv and never knowing when you can see that episode again unless some chance someone recorded it."
- Cute_Panda9
School Delays and Cancelations
"Waiting for your school district to be announced as on time, late, or canceled on the news when it snowed."
- SuitableNegotiation5
"Seeing your school scroll across the ticker was like winning the lottery."
- umanousti
Simpler Travel
"Stopping at a gas station and asking for directions."
"Or driving around aimlessly looking for a place to eat."
- Actuaryba
"Using an actual physical map. Then trying to fold it again."
- he77bender
Anyone who was a kid or young adult in the 90s will surely get feelings of nostalgia from at least some of these memories, but with the way technology is rushing forward, it's unlikely that kids today will ever get to experience these.
People Divulge If They'd Still Use Social Media If They Had To Share Their Real Identity
Social media platforms like Reddit allow users to comment on strangers' posts under the convenience of anonymity.
While a majority of the comments people leave can be insightful or encouraging, there are unfortunately many trolls who recklessly leave hurtful comments and do so while being cognizant that there are no real consequences for such bullish behavior.
This led Redditor pretty_monotonous to ask an interesting hypothetical about what would happen if a certain Reddit feature became obsolete.
They asked:
"Would you still use reddit if it had the anonymity aspect taken away? Why or why not?"
Some come to be entertained.
The Wallflower
"I'd lurk and read, but I wouldn't post."
– Not_a_werecat
"Basically how I've been using reddit for years! I have a hard time even making the simplest comments without thinking somehow this sh*ts gonna backfire on me somehow."
– archeryfreak93
Not Alone
"I love this ! I’m currently on a social media detox and I thought I was stupid for still using Reddit but I need some exposure to social media I can’t just completely cut it out, but this made me feel better thanks stranger."
– KylieJennerHusband
Fully Transparent
"Same for me. When I come here I can be fully transparent, and read others stories without making comparisons and going down the rabbit hole that usually leaves me feeling anxious and not good enough."
– crayshesay
It's a hard no.
Mental Health
"Nope. I removed myself from every platform that had that because I was constantly comparing myself to other real people, wishing I had what they had, and it was not healthy for me. Here, I have no clue who any of you are, and it's been an incredibly healthy shift while still allowing some exposure to social media."
– dj92wa
Permission To Be Rude
"No. Not because anonymity gives me the opportunity to be rude to people (I try to be as polite here as in real life), but because anonymity gives me the opportunity to talk about things freely that I wouldn't talk about if my actual name was attached to it."
"I have no desire for family members or employers to search my name and stumble across me sharing an embarrassing story, or having a not-so-mainstream opinion, or fangirling over my favorite tv character or whatever other niche interests I might have. Not to mention the risk of being stalked by people you try to avoid."
– onesmilematters
Giving Up On The Internet
"Hell no, I'd immediately stop using nearly every website I frequent if the anonymity was gone."
– AGlitchedNPC
Unemployment Risk
"One reason amongst the multitude of reasons, is that I don’t want the sh*t I say on the internet interfering with my job. I don’t want to get fired over a controversial opinion or over the language I use, such as simple words like f'k or sh*t. I’d have to overly censor myself, and the point of being anonymous is that I don’t have to do that."
– falaladoo
Security Reasons
"Probably not. I don't want to broadcast my identity for security reasons. I think that is often forgotten about when people go rabid over online anonymity."
"If a criminal/hostile state actor can make connections of when/where/what you post, it opens up a lot of scary possibilities."
– Substantial_Double32
For some, it's just a space for casual interaction.
Difference With Facebook
"This is one of the things that I really enjoy reddit for vs. Facebook. I can have indepth discussions, arguments, and debates with people who have no clue who I am, nor do I know them. I've really limited what I'll comment on Facebook out of the realization that any one I'm friends with could see that."
– ronaldreaganlive
Some Limits
"I might possibly still use it."
"But I won't express myself honestly anymore."
"Anonymity is one of absolutely essential things to assure honest and open debate. When you can be hounded and publicly punished for having an opinion different than that of the majority, you can not have free and fair debate."
– dittybopper_05H
Staying Private
"The same reason I don't post or comment on FB or Insta etc, I don't want people I know to read my opinions on anything. I'm a private person and It's none of their business."
"I like to be argumentative and have various opinions on topics that many people on my 'friends list' wouldn't necessarily appreciate."
"I'm also dead against the 'look at me' type of posting you see on other platforms; e.g. 'okay this time I'm done' without any explanation."
"In closing: I don't want to live my online life under the lense of people I know IRL."
– Rab1227
I would have no problem continuing to use any social media platform to comment on a topic with my authentic take on the subject at hand.
Because why on earth would anyone willfully make the original poster feel bad while they know exactly who is making negative remarks?
Many say, "If you don't have anything nice to say, then don't say it."
Yet, that doesn't seem to stop people who have nothing better to do but elevate themselves by taking total strangers down.
Life's short, people. Let's be kind. It's not that hard.