Stock Photography Models Describe The Most Unexpected Place They've Seen Their Photos Used
As someone who creates online content daily, and has worked in social media for the last decade or so, I've seen a LOT of stock photography.
I work with it every day.
Honestly I've wondered more than once how the model would react to knowing how their picture was being used.
Stock photography models kind of know their images are out there for whatever, but sometimes that "whatever" gets really interesting.
One Reddit user asked:
"Stock Photography Models: What is the Strangest/Most Unexpected Place You've Seen Your Photos Used?"
R.I.P. to the college brochure guy's social life. It's going to take him decades to live it down.
But Can I Get Hired?
I ended up finding myself on one of those "Now Hiring" posts on Facebook... for a company I was trying to get hired at.
- Pandrome
You should tell them that means they have to hire you, or it's false advertising.
"Have you previously worked as an employee for [company]?"
"Well, it's complicated..."
Also Used
One of my friends did a shoot for a university showing him sitting with an advisor looking confused/concerned.
It was to be used for the financial/debt advice brochure - and it was used there. But it was also used in the sexual health brochure!
It's a good one to roll out on special occasions!
- djaw1
Similar thing happened to a guy I worked with.
He was an older, very put together attorney. One day I was watching TV and saw him sitting with his head in his hands looking terribly distraught.
It was a commercial for ED medication.
I asked him about it the next morning and he said he had done some stock video shots for commercials years back and often pops up in all kinds of ads.
I'm A Painting
When I was 17 a friend of mine asked me if I could help him model in some pictures he was working on for a project for college. We used our other friend's attic and he took a couple of pictures of me in a suit in front of a typewriter.
He really liked one of the pictures and he ended up asking me if I would be okay with him having it be part of a small gallery show he was doing at the local coffee shop.
Imgur
They often had a small show and then put up the work to decorate the place and if people were interested they could buy them. I told him that I didn't mind and it was cool seeing my picture up at a place we went to so often.
Well, my picture ended up actually being bought ... which we did not expect at all.
So, there is someone out there that has a framed picture of me possibly decorating their wall or mantle, which is strange for me to think about.
- -eDgAr-
In Every Wal-Mart
Not me but my best friend: He did a photo shoot in some construction-worker garb and a hard hat.
We live in North Carolina USA. I'm on a business trip in Chicago, and I stop by a Walmart for some supplies.
I'm in the men's work clothes isle and there's my buddy prominently on the wrapping of 50ish packages of work shirts.
It was a weird "wait, where am I?" moment. I knew he did some modeling, but not specifics.
I sent him a pic, he had no idea it had been used. The guy is in every Walmart in the country and had no idea.
Homeless Youth
Not me, but a friend of mine.
Her boyfriend was a photographer, and he took several pictures of her standing against a wall wearing a blue windbreaker. I should mention, this woman was in her late 20s/early 30s, but she could easily pass as a teenager.
One of her boyfriend's pictures of her ended up on a billboard in Russia somewhere advertising a charity for homeless youth.
Keep The Contract
This question reminds me of the guy who sat for a picture, and then forgot about it.
Years later, he recognized his picture on a jar of freeze dried coffee, which was not in the terms of use for the picture.
He ended up suing after the company tried to lowball him and winning a crazy amount of money.
Holy sh*t! I looked it up! That's a lot of money. And f*ck nestle for trying to lowball him!
"A legal dispute with Nestle USA ensued, during which Christoff, 58, declined the company's $100,000 settlement offer, and Nestle USA turned down his offer to settle for $8.5 million. "I never gave my consent," he said to Chen. "We had a contract that spelled out the terms of the agreement, but there was just no follow-up on it. "I filed it away, and the contract sat there for 18, 19 years and -- I save things, which I guess is obvious. And no. They never had the permission." Last week, a Los Angeles County Superior Court jury ordered Nestle USA to pay Christoff $15.6 million for using his likeness without his permission and profiting from it. The award includes 5 percent of the Glendale-based company's profit from Taster's Choice sales from 1997 to 2003."
A Smoky Eye
I had a girlfriend who modelled part time.
Most of her work was for specific things and I only seen it because she showed me. But she did have a few model release generic headshots so when I was travelling Asia I saw a few makeup ads with her face on it.
It was just a picture of her with smokey eyes and I seen it before so I had a pretty big wtf moment seeing an at least 6 year old photo of my girlfriend on makeup ads on the other side of the world
fashion makeup GIFGiphyHad They Contacted Me In The First Place
Not a stock photo (as I didn't upload it to my account, only on my website) but years ago a shot I took of my nails ended up being lifted off my site and used in a manicure brochure from China. I'm still wondering why... it was professionally shot and edited, but the nail art was hardly that!
Another time, a model I shot for a girly site (think suicide girls but more on the burlesque side) found our photo on a designer t-shirt, sold in stores internationally... we both sued separately, myself for the image rights and herself for personal damage due to what was written on the shirt. Don't know about her but I ended up getting a decent amount -definitely more than I would have asked if they had contacted me in the first place.
Action!
A coworker of mine was a firefighter in his earlier life (I worked with him after he was retired).
At one point the station he worked at did a photoshoot for something (he doesn't remember what, I've always hoped it was a calendar but can't find proof). Years later a friend of his was in a toy store and found his photo on the packaging of a firefighter toy.
He posed for a photo shoot, and years later ended up being an action figure!
- dbdew
Slack Party!
Not the same, but as a remote teacher (long before quarantines), all of our teaching material includes stock photos.
One teacher pointed out that the same girl appears in many of the stock photos. Here she's a scientist. Here she's at the beach. Here she's riding a bike in a park.
It became a game to find her in our materials and we'd have a little celebration on Slack every time she was discovered.
Clearance
There was also this guy in Germany or somewhere in Europe, who ended up on packs of cigarettes. Like they have the smoking kills and rotten lungs etc. on the packs. So this guy was lying in a hospital bed, passed out with tubes in his mouth and I think he posted this pic of himself on facebook or something. Some designer stole that photo and put it on the packs. The guy himself said he had never smoked in his life and it was some unrelated medical operation. I think he sued and got paid.
Tailspin
My dad was a professional photographer back in the '80s & '90s and would do a small amount of commercial work. He would sometimes get me and my sister to 'model' in some of these pics. He did a job for a new small video game store called GAME that just opened in SE England back in the early '90s. He used me and my sister in a bunch of pics for their original advertising which at the time was just for this small shop. Obviously, the company hit it big time and opened up all over the country. A few years later while at Uni, me and my mates are in shopping in our local store. Low and behold there was a picture of a younger me playing Sonic the Hedgehog on the in-store display. I'd completely forgot about the pics and was slightly in shock, while my friends thought it was the greatest photo ever.
Hairy situation
My nephew did some stock modelling when he was younger and ended up in an ad for a drug that delays early-onset puberty. That was certainly a surprise when I came across his face in a magazine.
Muddy morals
A plumbing company used a picture of my muddy boots on their website. It was a picture I posted on Facebook years ago. The company is half a country away and never contacted me. They just found my picture online and used it. Huh.
Pop(off)corn
I once was offered free popcorn and movies for a year if I did a shoot for a movie theatre in Maryland. I was 16, so I thought "heck yeah!". The theatre closed down three months after that, so I never did get to use my year of popcorn and movies.
BUT I did move to Florida for college and a few years in went to the local movie theatre..... and there I was. Passionately munching on some popcorn, pretending to laugh at a movie. I guess one movie theatre company bought the other theatre out, which included image rights.
Thrifty gifty
Early last year (pre-serious COVID) I was at my local thrift store and found a picture frame with a picture of my sister and brother in law. Apparently, they had donated it without removing the picture.
Naturally, I bought it and gave it back to them as a gift.
I'll ketchup later
not me, but my dad is a photographer who spent quite a bit of time in stock photography. I remember one day we were taking a walk around the village together when he just stopped and whipped out his camera. There was a big splodge of ketchup on the floor, and apparently, that required photographing. He told me a few years later that that photo had sold quite often, become one of his most popular. Of course, being an indescribable splodge of ketchup, we've not managed to actually identify it in use anywhere yet.
Where would you not want your photos used?
People Describe The Creepiest Encounter They've Ever Had With A Stranger
Reddit user SilentBaker8893 asked: '"People of Reddit, what's the creepiest encounter you've had with a complete stranger that still gives you chills?"'
Depending on where you live, It's hard to be friendly with strangers because you really don't know about a person.
Gone are the days when you struck up a conversation with a random stranger just to pass the time.
Nowadays, you never know whom you're dealing with, and it's better to stay vigilant and be discerning about a person's character when you're out in public.
It's a sad way to be, but it's the way people are socialized in a very divided and bonkers climate.
Those who had unsettling interactions in public with people they hardly know shared their experiences when Redditor SilentBaker8893Baker8893 asked:
"People of Reddit, what's the creepiest encounter you've had with a complete stranger that still gives you chills?"
Keep an eye out behind you.
You never know if you have a new friend.
Give Me Your Number
"I was in a grocery store doing my weekly shop, and was approached by a man who said I was pretty and asked for my number. No intros, no asking me how I’m doing, just getting straight to it. I politely declined and said I wasn’t interested. He became persistent, so I ended up telling him to just give me his number so I could end the interaction."
"After he gives me his number, I go back to shopping without incident (or so I think). It turns out that this man was keeping an eye on me from the dairy section as i was walking up and down the aisles. As I’m getting ready to head to checkout, he decides to approach me again. This time, he’s super agitated and raises his voice while asking why I won’t just give him my number. I decide to be direct, and tell him that I said I wasn’t interested and I will not be giving my number to a stranger. He really had an issue with it, became irate, and had to be removed from the store. I was walked to my car, and he ended up following me out of the parking lot."
"I was on my street when I noticed I was being followed, drove past my house, and started driving towards the police station in my city. He followed me until he realized I was turning into that driveway and then sped off. Luckily I haven’t seen him since."
– Dismal_Ingenuity2247
The Homophobe
"I was walking home from work around 11 pm from Wrigley Field in Chicago. I walked home every night for years through these parts and never had any issue. I had my music in but never listened loud just in case. For about a mile I could hear someone yelling behind me, but they weren’t close and I couldn’t make out anything they were saying. I started to get a really bad vibe and decided to mute my music for a bit."
"I started to hear the voice getting closer but still couldn’t make anything out until I heard a distinct 'I just really really DONT like gay people.' I turned around and saw an old janky dude just sprinting at me full force from behind, I remember his arms were flailing in the air uncontrollably. I decided quickly to just cross the street and see if he would follow me. I turned to stare at him as he slowed to a walk and stayed on his side of the street. Once he was parallel to me, without even glancing over, he calmly said 'That’s exactly what I would have done.' And continued on, turning left into the train station about a block ahead. Gave me the creepiest feeling. I definitely was ready to fight if I needed, but dude had the most whacked out posture and vibe I’d ever seen."
– jaaaayy13
The Face Changes
"When my son was a toddler, I made a late night run to a 24 hour Walgreens to pick up a prescription for him. We lived in an urban area where that Walgreens was actually busy at that time of night. It was also right next to a Metro stop and was not a place where most people drove, so parking was super limited. I ended up parking at a curb a bit away from the store. When I got back to my car a youngish, very normal (by my estimation) guy came up to my window. I rolled it down a bit and he said 'I think I know you from xyz place.' I had actually been to xyz place before (xyz place was also a very popular place), so I tried to remember him."
"In that spilt second that I hesitated trying to remember him, his eyes went completely black, his whole face changed, and he grabbed the door handle of my car and tried to open it. I put the car in drive and peeled out of there, looking straight ahead. Only when I got to a red light a few streets away did I realize that the overhead light was on. He had actually opened my door a bit, and I hadn’t realized. I never forgot his face. How it changed. I remember one of Ted Bundy’s victims (survivor obviously) described how his face went from normal, attractive, friendly to black-eyed, unrecognizable, and frenzied. That’s how this man transformed. There were some missing women in our city, and I always wondered if this guy did it."
– teeshirtandundies
These are reminders to stay vigilant when traveling.
Stalker
"Driving across the country with my wife and dog, we stopped at a gas station around midnight. I was coming out of the bathroom, and I saw the guy mopping the floor had stopped, and was just staring out the window at my wife, who had finished letting the dog pee and was slowly walking back to the car."
"There was a super creepy guy slowly sneaking up behind her. He was like 20 feet back, but quietly getting closer, and my wife had no idea. So I got out of the gas station real quick, and loudly went over to them, hugged the dog said let's get going, etc. The second I walked over to them the guy turned around and ran away."
"My wife never knew there was a guy sneaking up behind her until I told her once we got back in the road."
– Veritas3333
Cadillac In The Rear View
"I was driving on a back road at night heading to my parents house when a Cadillac started following me. It was a one lane road at night, dizzling on and off and this guy I notice has been following me for a little over 2 miles. At first I thought it was paranoia, so I used my blinker and they copied me. Every time I did it. A sole blue light then went off on their hood behind me I guess trying to get me to pull over. I called 911 and stayed on the line until the police intercepted me. Lst: the guy ended up being wanted on warrants for skipping bail on an SA charge. Definitely came way too close that night."
– Successful_Arm_7509
A Beautiful Distraction
"I was in Vienna during Christmas break. There is a large open air market in the middle of the city and thousands of people were milling about, eating, drinking, and shopping in the evening."
"A very attractive blonde woman with light blue eyes bumps into me, and in accented English apologizes. I said ‘No worries’ and we started chatting. She says she’s from Poland and she’s here for New Years visiting a friend. I mentioned I’m American but Polish in heritage and we continue to talk for several minutes. She says that she’s hungry and wants to get food. I offered to buy her a slice of pizza at a booth. I get one for both of us and she takes a bite and says she doesn’t like it and wants to go to a place away from the town center."
"Something about how quickly she rejected the pizza, which was quite good, set off alarms and I wished her a pleasant evening and walked away. I looped around the town center and coincidentally saw her walking down an alley with two large men, one on each side of her…very quickly I realized that she was bait to draw me into an alley so they could mug me."
"I definitely dodged a bullet that day."
– LaximumEffort
Listen To Your Gut
"I had a similar thing happen to me."
"Years ago I was in Edinburgh for the fringe festival. I was drunk walking back to my hotel when I passed by a bar and I hear an American voice say 'Hug me, it's my birthday'. She was cute and she sounded sad so I gave her a hug a cigarette and we started talking."
"We chatted for a few minutes, I can't remember many of the small details but I remember a few things that big red flags for me. The first was the she said she was in the UK doing an internship in becoming a pharmacist and every so often a word just wouldn't come out right. It just hit my ears wrong."
"My sister-in-law is a pharmacist and I remembered her talking about how hard it was to get her program to sign off on an internship in another state, let alone another country. And I got lost in that thought for a second when the girl said she just wanted to ditch her friends, and go anywhere else. And that's when it hit me why her words weren't hitting my ear right... she was trying to hide an accent. Sounded Irish to me but it didn't matter. At this point I had decided that I wanted to keep my kidneys so I gave her another cigarette and a hug, wished her a happy birthday and walked away.
"I don't know that I dodged a bullet but I'm pretty sure I was going to end up robbed or worse."
– NicktheEvil
These Redditors saw the red flags and avoided disaster.
Daughter Whisperer
"My wife and I stopped at a park with our then 7 year old daughter. My wife went off on her own for a few to look at some trees while I took my daughter over to the bank of the lake. Seemingly of nowhere this really creepy guy walked up and started addressing my daughter while ignoring me. He was going on about how to attract the ducks and was positioning himself in a way to get in between us. I did a quick calculation where I had a base set up to kick his @ss into the ropes along the edge of the lake which would trip him at his knees and send him into the water. I had my daughter by the hand and just interrupted the guy and pulled her away, the guy turned around and went right to his car, and left immediately. My insticts were strongly indicating that this man intended to abduct my daughter, and the chills from that experience still haunt me many years later."
– NorthernH3misphere
Item Was Not For Sale
"When I was 9, I was in K-mart with my uncle in the television section (remember when k-mart had those separate rooms for the tv's and big electronics?) It was Saturday morning and he sat me and my little sister down and told us to watch the cartoons on the tv's while he hunted down a sales person. Not 2 minutes after he was gone, we approached my 2 men and they tried everything to lure us out. We were petrified and didn't say a word. They finally lifted my sister to carry her out and was reaching for me when my sister peed on the one guy. He dropped her and she started crying. My uncle heard her and came running. The guys bolted. I still think about that all the time. We were so lucky that day."
– TheLastMo-Freakin
Wrong Signal
"When I was about 6 years old (this would have been around 1990), I was riding my big wheel bike down my block in a DC suburb. The way our street was situated, at the end of the block was the entrance to an alleyway that took you behind all the houses. I would frequently turn down the alley and go behind our house and enter through our back gate."
"As I got towards the end of the block, a car was coming and I stopped and waved my hand indicating that they could go ahead and I would wait for them to pass. The driver in the car refused to go and motioned for me to turn instead. So I went ahead and entered the alley."
"I got about halfway up the alley not quite to my house when someone grabbed me from behind. It was the driver and she was pissed. She had turned into the alley after me , drove down, parked her car in the middle of the alley and gotten out. She yanked me up by the arm, and screamed in my face 'Don't you ever use police signals with me!' I immediately began sobbing, ran to my house and told my parents. By the time they ran out the back door, the driver was gone."
"I'm 38 now and still think about it."
– hoyahoyahoya
Offering A Ride Home
It doesn't give me chills but I do reflect and wonder what would have happened."
"We had just moved from Illinois to Florida. I had just turned 12, so this was '86. It was a weekend; I don't remember the specific day. I got up early and went to the basketball court in the apartment complex I lived in. Started playing and this hatchback pulls up. Guy gets out of the car and asks if he can shoot around with me. He's talking to me, don't remember the actual conversation. I do remember him telling me that he had a job interview and needed to borrow a comb. He asked me if I had one and I told him yeah. He asked to borrow it and I said sure, I just need to go grab it real quick. He said that he would drive me and I told him, 'no, that's ok. I live right over there and I could walk'. He was pretty insistent on giving me a ride. Finally I just told him that I'd be right back. Went towards my house through the courtyard, but never went there. Waited around the corner to see what he was doing. One of the older girls that I played ball with showed up. He left a couple minutes later."
"Coming from small town Illinois, I was pretty naive. But that whole thing felt off. The dude didn't bother me; just the insistence on him giving me a ride."
– ReapYerSole
The term "Stranger Danger" was used heavily in TV programs and public service announcements aimed at children during the 80s through the early 2000s.
It basically educated kids to be aware of possible dangers associated with adults they don't know.
The same could even apply for adults.
I once interacted with a guy at the Gap in Manhattan while I was shopping for a pair of shorts and I initially thought he was "normal." He was a really good-looking customer–with dark hair, blue eyes, 6'2–who told me that the pair of shorts I was holding at the time would look very attractive on me.
I was flattered, and we got to talking. I was impressed by how articulate and smart he was, and I was under the impression he might be flirting with me.
He wasn't.
Long story short, he gave me his number and insisted I call him for information about this group he was a part of and that I would be the perfect candidate for joining and making money and going on various retreats around the world attending seminars on how we could better ourselves.
Yup. He was too good to be true.
Knowing he was trying scam me into joining some pyramid scheme-y cult group (I still have no idea what it was), I said I'll call him only if he went out with me for coffee after shopping and if he let me passionately make out with him while I was wearing the shorts he thought would look hot on me.
I was kidding, of course.
But he didn't know that. Suddenly, his entire demeanor changed. He called me a homophobic slur and stormed out of the store.
He even left his bag of purchases, and I yelled out before he exited, "Sir, you left your bag!"
Turns out it was a prop.
Careful, everyone. Don't be fooled by a gorgeous smile.
There are despicable people in our midst who can hide their true colors until it's too late.
It's all unfortunate really, as I've generally lost trust in people.
My experience–along with separate mugging incidents–has left me acting socially awkward when out on my own in public.
When a co-worker or colleague gets fired, it naturally gets the rest of the office talking.
Namely, because everyone is immediately wondering why?
In some cases, the reason is no secret to anyone working there, and everyone knew it would only be a matter of time until this unfortunate individual got the sack.
Other times, someone's dismissal ends up taking everyone by surprise, and people begin speculating at the water cooler.
Most of the time, their gossip and conspiracy theories are way off, but in some rare occasions, they were spot on.
"Why was that one guy fired from your work?"
Sleeping On The Job Is One Thing...
"HVAC residential installer."
"Had a co-worker take a nap in the customer's house."
"In the customer's bed."
"Was confused why he was fired."- Wiggles349
That's Called Stealing...
"Work at a payroll company, we had an employee who Switched like 20 direct deposits to her own account."
"It was all very traceable and she was caught like later that day."- Familiar_Cow_5501
"Once worked at a big online retailer (Not amazon), we had 3 warehouses we shipped out of."
"One was smaller and only held one specific brand of item."
"The warehouse manager of that warehouse was fired and arrested at work."
"Turned out he was fulfilling orders printing labels with correct addresses, which would be emailed to the client."
"Then he would the next day do redirects through the Fedex system and assign new tracking numbers so the old ones wouldn't show final delivery address, just that it was changed."
"Everything got redirected to his house."
"He then was re-listing the same items on Ebay under a VERY similar company name to the one he actually worked for (not exact but changed the word World, to National)."- CoolHandRK1
Stealing Mike D GIF by Beastie BoysGiphyNOT Ready Player One...
"He spent the entire time playing a game on his own handheld console instead of testing the game we were doing overtime to actually test."
"Got very angry at being let go."- silverandstuffs
Violence Is Never The Answer
"He shouted, cursed at and invited the cleaning guy to 'meet him' outside to fight because he was denied access to the restroom until it was fully cleaned."
"The cleaning guy is known for being extremely calm, polite and nice to everyone."
"For someone to have a problem with him means that they have to be a certain kind of entitled a**hole."
"This happened in view of at least 10 co-wokers, me included."
"Everyone was confused, but our manager was proactive about it."
"He told the guy to meet him at the HR office, and was promptly fired."
"After the manager returned, he made a quick meeting."
"His words were: 'We're all grown adults here, well, some of us are'."
"'I just want to put it out there and say that I'll be considerably harsh to anyone that disrespects any coworker, specially when they're responsible for making sure that your a** cheeks sit on a clean toilet'."
"'Also, don't invite people to fight you if you're not willing to go through with it'."
"After the meeting was over, some of us asked him what he meant with that last sentence and he told us that the guy got violent in the HR office and invited him to fight in the parking lot when he was told he was getting terminated."- novato1995
Season 1 Fighting GIF by GaslitGiphyOh No He Didn't!
"Stealing the boss's Pop Tarts."- MGris24
If Your Going To Lie, Always Cover Your Tracks...
"He claimed he was in the national search and rescue brigade which is entirely volunteer-based."
"They are sorta like our troops, they get perks and can't be fired if they get called out and so on."
"He skipped work all the time claiming it was because he was called in."
"One day someone from the office decided to check if he was and turned out he lied about the whole thing."
"I'm pretty sure he got blacklisted by the entire city which would explain why I haven't heard anything about him for years."- Lizzy_Of_Galtar
You'd Think He Would Have At Least Used Incognito Mode...
"Well, there *was* the new CFO who was shown the door at lunchtime on his first day."
"Then the stock email about 'Do not use the corporate internet to visit inappropriate websites' was sent out."- OldBob10
She Wasn't Even Working From Home!
"She watched Netflix at her desk and took naps."
"With the volume up."
"Her desk was in the middle of the office, there was no hiding."
"She also f*cked up a lot."- SuperstitiousPigeon5
Truth Is Often Stranger Than Fiction
"Worked at a publication."
"Hired a new guy who was super nice and everybody liked him."
"Within a week, found he was plagiarizing everything he wrote."
"Immediately gone - no questions asked."- phznmshr
Could He Have Possibly Been Bird Watching?
"He was keeping sick and injured birds under his desk that he found on his lunch breaks and using binoculars to watch people in other offices."- seanofkelley
Bird Watching GIF by Team CocoGiphyIt's Not Private If It's On The Country's Dime...
"Using govt funds to see his mistress."- Acceptable-Result-47
Tragic On So Many Levels
"He was caught stealing cash from work, and spending it on sex workers."
"Turns out he had terminal cancer and wanted to go out with a bang."- Throwaway7219017
Up In The Air...
"Salesman addicted to frequent flier points."
"He'd book flights with four segments each way, meaning extra nights in hotels and basically doing almost no work two days a week."
"He was told repeatedly to book direct flights but just wouldn't."
"Two kids in college and the finally fired him."- mekonsrevenge
check in george clooney GIF by Paramount MoviesGiphyThere is often more behind someone's termination than what people hear.
Sometimes it's bad blood, sometimes it's criminal behavior, sometimes it's budget cuts.
Most of the time, though, people are just really, REALLY, bad at their jobs...
Love doesn't always mean forever.
That is the more concerning part about chasing the dream. It comes with no guarantees.
Anything and everything can change in an instant.
That person you look at so lovingly for hours on end can one day turn into a troll in your eyes.
They might stand in front of the fridge, wasting cool air while trying to figure out a snack.
(Like, how hard is that to decide?)
They may leave the toilet seat up or wet, or both.
They could have night terrors that shake the walls.
All grounds for dismissal for some folks.
You never know someone until you know.
Redditor xxarisx wanted to hear about the "silly" reasons people have dumped another person, so they asked:
"What’s the pettiest reason to break up with someone?"
I have to admit, I can be petty.
Anything can turn me off.
I can't even explain why.
Wake Up!
Tired Wake Up GIF by Veep HBOGiphy"Your significant other had a nightmare you cheated on them and because of the dream they break up with you."
Cheeky_Guy
How Messy!
"Sports rivalries. That's definitely happened, which is hilarious."
LongBongJohnSilver
"My date and I (not yet in a relationship but very close) stopped seeing each other because of our sports rivalries. She is a huge Messi fan and I am a Ronaldo fan. But the thing is, I don't hate Messi and she really hates Ronaldo. So during one of our dates, we got into a debate about Ronaldo's bad personality (most of our dates somehow will have football conversations, and most of our football conversations are about Ronaldo because she keeps bringing him up; I never say anything about Messi)."
"I was so tired of listening to her talk badly about my idol, so I said: 'No matter how bad you think Ronaldo is, I will always admire him because he is a person who never gives up, even after being defeated many times. Unlike your idol Messi, who failed once and decided to quit the national team. The Argentina president even had to apologize to him to get him to come back, even though he was the one who missed the important penalty.' She stood up and left, and I haven't texted her since then."
hoainamduong
'Can we have one of each please?'
"She said she didn’t want dessert but then ate half my slice of pie."
RealBowsHaveRecurves
"When my now-wife and I were on our second date, the restaurant didn’t have a printed dessert menu, so the server was telling us the options. I completely zoned out because I was so nervous and also I kinda needed to pee but there hadn’t been a reasonable break in the conversation so I just smiled, and nodded, then when everyone looked at me expectantly, I just said 'Can we have one of each please?' Turns out there had been only two options (a crème brûlée and a chocolate pie situation)."
savingewoks
Smothering Me
"Not replying to a text message quickly enough."
nordictouch
"I was in a brief relationship recently with a guy who insisted I turn read receipts on even though I never do for anyone. I told him I felt a little weird about doing it but did it anyway."
"A few weeks later I read one of his texts and didn’t respond for an hour because I was working. After not hearing from me immediately, he texted, 'There’s something very untrustworthy about you' and then told me he needed space. He ghosted me for a week and then dumped me."
wilderthurgro
Natural Gases
"The other person farts in their sleep."
"Everyone farts in their sleep."
It_Wasnt_Me79
Blatant. Serial Killer. Behavior.
"She eats her peas one at a time."
henfeathers
"I had a friend who took hours to eat just about anything. A Snickers bar would take about an hour. She'd eat all the chocolate off first, in little pieces, and then each layer. Spaghetti. One noodle at a time. Drove all her boyfriend's nuts."
Azuredreams25
Sorry Justin
"In fourth grade, my bf Justin was demanding I share my cheese puffs. I jokingly said no. He got serious and said do it or I’ll break up with you. I made sure I only ate half and threw the other half away out of pure spite."
Elesmira
"Not your cheesy poofs!????"
RambleOnRose42
"And THAT is how you stave off people who want to get you into an abusive relationship. I'll remember that one. Damn, I love cheese puffs."
ElementalWorkshopII
Seeing Stars
"One time I broke up with someone because they were obsessed with Julia Roberts and I just thought she was meh, every time we hung out it was Julia Roberts this, Julia Roberts that. Sheeeeeeeesh."
TheRealOcsiban
"Same with my ex but with Pamela Anderson. And he says that he’s a big Pamela Anderson fan but he couldn’t name another movie she was in besides Baywatch which makes me wonder if he’s only into her because of her big jiggly boobs."
Dapper-Captain5261
Off Course
"I seriously considered calling off my wedding because he took the wrong exit off the highway. When I got irritated and pointed it out (we were in a rush), he got angry with me and claimed that a city street with stop signs every block was faster than the literal f**king highway going the same route."
"But it was just a symptom of the greater problem - he absolutely had to be the smartest person in the room, even if he had to lie or gaslight in order to make it happen."
"So yes, even though it would be ridiculous to call off a wedding the day before over a navigation mishap, I would have been better off (ignoring my gut cost me thousands in divorce fees, stolen cash, and therapy bills)."
SpookyBlackCat
Ok, Bye...
Bye Bye Goodbye GIF by Mickey MouseGiphy"I had a girl leave me after a week because her ex-boyfriend didn't like me. I gladly went home after hearing that."
Roostersnuggets
Wow. Some people really need to seek therapy before they start trying to date.
There is a lot to of mess to sift through in these brains.
Natural disasters, events gone terribly wrong, and legendary mistakes: The world is full of tragedies, and not just the kind you find in Shakespeare's plays. Here is a curated collection of facts about some of the greatest and most notable tragedies in history.
1. Drinking the Kool-Aid
In 1978, over 900 members of the People’s Temple Agricultural Project, led by Jim Jones, drank powdered soft-drink mix combined with cyanide and prescription sedatives. While many regard Jonestown as mass suicide, most people don't know that the survivors revealed a dark truth: Those that drank the poison actually did so under duress.
2. Don’t Mess With Texas
The worst natural disaster in U.S. history was the Galveston hurricane, also known as the Great Storm of 1900. This Category 4 storm hit land in Texas with winds measuring up to 145 miles per hour, resulting in an estimated 6,000 to 12,000 casualties.
3. What’s in a Name
typhoonPhoto by NASA on UnsplashRecent hurricanes to ravage the Caribbean went by the names Harvey, Irma, and Martha. But until 1947, hurricanes and tropical storms did not have official names. That year, the U.S. Air Force started naming them after the phonetic alphabet the military uses to spell out words over the radio. They weren’t consistently given people’s names until the 1950s.
4. No Hurricane Juniors
In the case of a particularly damaging storm, a hurricane’s name is retired indefinitely.
5. Trouble at Sea
The sinking of the USS Indianapolis in 1945 resulted in the largest loss of life at sea from a single ship in the history of the US Navy. The ship was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine during World War II and sank in twelve minutes. Only 317 of the 1,196 crewmen aboard survived.
6. Sugar Rush
beige concrete building under blue sky during daytimePhoto by chris robert on UnsplashThe “panic bar” is the device that allows you to open a door by pushing on a bar. It was invented after an incident at Victoria Hall concert venue in England in 1883. 183 children were lost in a stampede caused by boys and girls who rushed to get the gifts and treats being handed out by performers onstage.
The children who rushed to the door were unable to open the bolt, and many were crushed.
7. A Rough Night at the Theater
The worst incident in a theater, though, was the Iroquois Theatre fire in Chicago in 1903. More than 600 people lost their lives, in part because there were no exit signs and no emergency lighting. Other tragic factors that increased the casualties were ornamental doors that looked like exits (but weren’t), and stairways that were blocked with iron gates during performances to keep people with cheap tickets from taking more expensive seats.
8. Illegal in Ireland
Irish folk singer Christy Moore was found in contempt of court in 1985 for his song “They Never Came Home,” about the victims of a fire at the Stardust nightclub in Dublin. Because the song implied that the nightclub owners and the government were responsible, the song was banned and removed from Moore’s album. The song’s lyrics are still banned in Ireland as libelous.
9. (Un)Happy Land
white buildingPhoto by Matthew LeJune on UnsplashThe Happy Land fire might have the most ironic name in the history of mass casualties. This fire claimed 87 people at the unlicensed Bronx nightclub in 1990 when Julio González set the building on fire after a fight with his ex-girlfriend, who worked coat-check at the club.
10. It Went Over Like a Lead Balloon
The most people ever lost in a balloon accident was 19, when a hot air balloon caught fire over Luxor, Egypt in 2013. The passengers were all tourists on a sight-seeing trip. Along with the pilot, a single passenger survived the incident.
11. A Rough Couple of Years
The period between 1850 and 1873 in modern-day China saw some of the highest mortality ever recorded. Between imperialist expansion, the Opium Wars, and the Taiping Rebellion, the population dropped by more than 60 million.
12. You Thought the Snowpocalyspe Was Bad
File:Mount Tambora Volcano, Sumbawa Island, Indonesia.jpg ...commons.wikimedia.org1816 was known as the Year Without a Summer. The eruption of a volcano at Mount Tambora caused a volcanic winter, and snow fell in June. Severe weather across North America, Europe, and Asia caused famine and flooding, which resulted in food riots and disease outbreaks. Fatality rates were twice as high as in other years.
13. Bad Weather Makes Good Monsters
The Year Without a Summer, however, helped to invent some of our most significant modern monsters. A group of writers including Percy Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft (later Shelley), and Lord Byron had to stay inside during their trip to Lake Geneva because of the bad weather, and they passed the time with a story-telling contest. This was where Mary Shelley started her novel Frankenstein. Another staycationer, John Polidori, began work on The Vampyre, which eventually inspired Bram Stoker to write Dracula.
14. Armed Forces
White Arkansas men hanged up to 237 black sharecroppers in the 1919 Elaine massacre, the worst racial conflict in US history. U.S. troops claimed the lives anywhere from 60 to 200 Pomo men, women, and children at Bloody Island in 1850; and up to 300 Lakota at the Battle of Wounded Knee in 1890.
15. A Streetcar Named Disaster
File:Ninth Avenue station from Manhattan-bound platform, September ...commons.wikimedia.orgThe worst subway accident in New York City history happened in 1905, when an aboveground train turned too quickly, jumped the track, and fell onto Ninth Avenue. 13 people lost their lives. The accident happened, eerily, on September 11th.
16. Mother Nature’s Worst Day
The most lives ever lost in a natural disaster may be the Shaanxi earthquake in 1556, in modern-day China, which claimed approximately 830,000 people.
17. Can You Say La Grippe
The “Spanish Flu” was the name given to an 1918 influenza pandemic that cost 500 million people their lives around the world. The name comes from the fact that, while wartime censors suppressed news of the pandemic in the US, the UK, France, and Germany, the press in Spain was free to report on the tragedy. This gave the world a false impression that Spain was hardest hit by the flu—and the name stuck.
18. Smoke Gets in Your Eyes
Big Ben towerPhoto by Luke Stackpoole on UnsplashSince the 1200s, London has had problems with air quality, but in 1952, a severe air-pollution event called the Great Smog of London blanketed the city with yellow-black smoke for four days, making it hard to see more than a few feet. The city nearly shut down, and the smog resulted in up to 12,000 lost lives from lung and respiratory tract infections.
19. Not Just a Cherry Poppin’ Daddies Song
While the 1997 neo-swing single is a fun dance tune, the original Zoot Suit Riots were less light-hearted. The series of attacks on Mexican-American teenagers by white servicemen stationed in Los Angeles in 1943 was ostensibly sparked by the fact that the young men’s flashy suits flaunted wartime fabric rationing, but there were also racial motivations.
20. Just the Hali-Facts
The Halifax Explosion of 1917 occurred when a cargo ship carrying explosives collided with another ship in Halifax Harbour, killing 2,000 people and injuring 9,000. It was the largest man-made explosion prior to the development of nuclear weapons, and the standard by which large blasts were measured for many years.
21. Lucky Number Seven
trees beside brown concrete buildingPhoto by Rap Dela Rea on UnsplashTime magazine reported on the atomic bombing of Hiroshima in 1945 by saying that the bomb’s power was equivalent to seven times the Halifax Explosion.
22. Our Daily Bread
A famine in Malta in 1823 became even more tragic when 110 hungry boys who went to the Convent of the Minori Osservanti to get free bread on the last day of Carnival celebrations fell down a flight of stairs and were crushed.
23. The Luckiest Unlucky Man
Clifford Johnson was injured at the worst nightclub fire in history, at the famous Cocoanut Grove in 1942. He suffered third-degree burns over more than half his body but survived, and was seen as a medical marvel. After hundreds of operations and nearly two years in the hospital, he married his nurse. In an ironic twist of fate, he lost his life in a fiery car crash in 1958.
24. Flamin’ Hot Sportsball
cloud gate in city during daytimePhoto by Christopher Alvarenga on UnsplashSports teams at the University of Illinois at Chicago are nicknamed the Flames, to commemorate the infamous Great Chicago Fire.
25. Dam Unfortunate
The failure of the Banqiao and Shimantan Dams in China in 1975 caused 171,000 casualties—the largest dam-related disaster in history.
26. Whoops
In 1871, a lawyer named Clement Vallandigham accidentally shot himself while defending a murder suspect. He was trying to demonstrate that the murder victim could have accidentally shot himself. The client was acquitted, but the lawyer didn't survive.
27. The Beheaded Man’s Revenge
a close up of a man with a beard and blue eyesPhoto by shahin khalaji on UnsplashA ninth-century Norse earl named Sigurd the Mighty was slain by an enemy he had beheaded hours earlier. He tied the severed head to his horse’s saddle, but on the ride home the man’s tooth scratched his leg, and the succumbed to the resulting infection.
28. But Not the Last
The robot fatality was Robert Williams, in 1979. The Ford assembly-line worker was hit in the head by a robot’s arm.
29. Dancing in the Dark
400 people in Strasbourg, France were struck by dance madness in the summer of 1518. They were compelled to dance for about a month for no clear reason. Several danced themselves until their hearts stopped.
30. Hands Off
Queen Sunanda Kumariratana of Siam (now Thailand) drowned when her boat capsized in 1880. Many witnesses stood by, unable to help, because it was a capital offense to touch the queen. Some boatmen did eventually jump in to try and save her, but it was too late.
31. Lager Than Life
Eight people drowned in the London Beer Flood of 1814 when a massive vat of fermenting beer burst, filling the streets with over 1,000,000 imperial pints’ worth of beer.
32. High Expectations
An Austrian named Franz Reichelt invented a parachute in 1912 and tested it himself by jumping off the Eiffel Tower. The invention didn’t work. He didn't get the chance to go back to the drawing board.
33. White Light White Heat
Basilica San Nazaro in Brolo @ Milan | Guilhem Vellut | Flickrwww.flickr.comIn 1769, lighting struck the tower of the Church of the San Nazaro in Italy, where 207,000 pounds of gunpowder had been stored. The resulting fire claimed 3,000 people and destroyed one-sixth of the city.
34. The Fall of the King
King Albert of Belgium disappeared while rock climbing in 1934. His body was found, but it wasn’t until 2016 that DNA evidence proved that his injuries were caused by a fall, putting to bed the conspiracy theories that had existed for decades.
35. A Disarming Crew
Among the people who wrestled the gun away from presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy’s assassin in 1968 were writer George Plimpton, Olympic gold medal decathlete Rafer Johnson, and former New York Giant Rosey Grier.
36. Aftermath in Ohio
Kent State University - May 4th Memorial: Prentice Parking… | Flickrwww.flickr.comImmediately following the shootings at Kent State University in 1970, when the National Guard fired and slew four anti-war protestors, 900 university campuses had to be closed due to protests. 100,000 people rioted in Washington, DC, President Nixon was evacuated to Camp David, and the 82nd Airborne was deployed to protect the White House.
37. Unlikely Advocate
When the British soldiers who shot colonists in the Boston Massacre during the American Revolution were tried in court, their lawyer was none other than John Adams, founding father and future president. After being convinced by the court to take the case, Adams persuaded the jury that the soldiers had feared for their lives, reducing the charge to manslaughter.
38. In Your Heeeeeead
The Cranberries song “Zombie” was written in memoriam for two young boys who lost their lives in a 1993 bombing by the Irish Republican Army in Warrington, England.
39. It Actually Is Rocket Science
January 28, 1986 – Space Shuttle Challengerwww.history.navy.milDesigners of the parts for the Challenger space shuttle, which exploded in 1986, warned that the shuttle shouldn’t have been launched because a seal could come loose in cold weather. NASA officials disregarded the warning, with one asking, "When do you want me to launch—next April?"
40. Survivor
Imagine the odds of being struck by lightning twice. Pretty rare. I'm sure if that happened to you, you'd think you must have been cursed by some sort of vindictive witch.
So imagine the confusion and suffering of Tsutomu Yamaguchi, a Japanese man who survived the bombing of Hiroshima...only to move to Nagasaki immediately after.
The torment he must have experienced is beyond belief.
41. Situation Twenty-One
At the Munich Olympic Games in 1972, a group of armed Palestinians broke into the apartment of Israeli athletes, killing two and taking the rest hostage. The Palestinians then demanded the release of 236 prisoners and a plane to fly them to Cairo.
Nearly every detail of this scenario had been foreseen by police psychologist Georg Sieber, who the German government had tasked with coming up with possible Olympic disaster scenarios. Sieber had 26 scenarios; the 1972 events were Situation Twenty-One.
42. He Should Have Accepted the Offer
Google signPhoto by Pawel Czerwinski on UnsplashIn 1999, the founders of Google approached Excite CEO George Bell, offering to sell him the search engine for $1 million. When Bell refused, they lowered the price to $750,000, which he also rejected. Today, Google is valued at $365 billion.
43. We’ll Pass
In 2009, Facebook turned down a pair of programmers for jobs. No big deal, right? Must happen all the time at FB HQ....
A few years later, though, the pair developed WhatsApp. Facebook subsequently purchased that venture for a cool $19 billion.
44. Trains Were Too Wide
The French state railway SNCF spent $15 billion on a new fleet of trains, but unfortunately, they were the wrong size, and were too wide for their 1300 platforms. The mistake cost them an estimated $50 million to correct.
45. A Case of Bad Timing
File:Napoleon at Fontainebleau, 31 March 1814 (by Hippolyte Paul ...commons.wikimedia.orgJust over 200 years ago, Napoleon’s army attempted to invade Russia.
Whoops.
A combination of factors spelled doom for the invasion. There wasn't nearly enough food for the soldiers and horses. Poor discipline was rampant in the ranks. And, of course, none of the men were prepared for the unimaginable brutality of a full Russian winter.
It was a devastating failure. Napoleon lost 500,000 troops.
46. A Flaw in the Design
On 26th April 1986, engineers at the V.I. Lenin Nuclear Power Station, a Soviet facility, were testing a new cooling system designed to reduce the risk of a meltdown. Their test caused a meltdown, and the resulting explosion destroyed Chernobyl’s reactor 4.
The Chernobyl Forum predicts that the eventual toll could reach 4,000 among those exposed to the highest levels of radiation. That said, what many people don't know is that the plant actually remained a fully-functioning power plant for years after the disaster.
The disaster destroyed reactor 4, but reactors 1-3 remained open for business. Due to high levels of radiation, plant employees could no longer live beside the facility, but many continued to commute to work to supply power in Europe. The final reactor only ceased operating in 2000.
47. Gambled and Lost
The Spanish telecom company Terra took a gamble when they purchased the search engine Lycos in 2000 for almost $12 billion. At the time, Lycos was the third most visited site in America... but that was before dot.com bubble burst. In just about a year, most internet companies in America lost millions in value. And Lycos was perhaps the biggest loser.
Terra would eventually sell the search engine in 2004 for just $95.4 million. That's an astonishing loss of $11.6 billion dollars on their investment.
48. Don’t Drink and Steer
The Exxon Valdez, 25 Years After — FBIwww.fbi.govIn 1989, an Exxon oil tanker was headed to California when it ran aground on the Bligh Reef off the Alaskan coast. The tanker spilled around 760,000 barrels of oil into the water, and the captain was later accused of being drunk at the time of the accident. He was convicted of negligent discharge of oil.
49. The Worst Nuclear Accident in U.S. History
The nuclear meltdown at Three Mile Island in March of 1979 was the result of mechanical failures that were made worse by poor training and oversights in the human-computer interaction design. It was the most significant nuclear disaster in U.S. commercial nuclear power plant history.
There are conflicting reports on the cost of the disaster, with some sources stating that the radiation exposure wasn't significant enough to result in additional cancer fatalities, while others insist that thousands more have been observed.
50. Loss of Cultural Knowledge
The Great Library of Alexandria was one of the largest and most significant libraries of the ancient world, and was dedicated to the Muses—the 9 goddesses of the Arts.
The burning of the library resulted in an irreplaceable loss of knowledge and literature.