A scorned lover chasing down his ex-girlfriend with an ax, or a jealous classmate enacting revenge by offing those closest to them one by one until the climactic confrontation, are all elements torturous moviegoers are used to seeing out of pure entertainment.
But anyone witnessing acts of violence in real life can tell you, it's a lot more traumatic than anything that was ever depicted on the screen–especially when it involves someone they know really well.
Redditors shared their accounts of horrific incidences close to them when frog_without_a_cause asked:
"What's the most horrific act committed by someone you know personally?"
You think you know someone...
The Violent Co-Worker
"Worked with a guy who got done for manslaughter, he bashed someone's head in with a table in a pub, this was after he stabbed a guy in the chest with darts, this was over a darts game. He also served time for beating a policeman into a coma with the policeman's own truncheon after the policeman caught him breaking into a car."
– godca_grema
The Friend With The Rifle
"Guy I considered a close personal friend hunted down his ex, shot her with a rifle and then turned the gun on himself."
"Neighbors reported hearing him say 'You knew this was going to happen.'”
– hurrydeath
Brought To Justice
"A former coworker murdered his friend when the friend agreed to work with the police to bring down my coworker for stealing a shipment of human growth hormone. Apparently it was a vicious murder. They burned the body, iirc, but it's been a while."
"My coworker ended up being on the run for many years, and was eventually turned in after his story ran on America's Most Wanted, his fiancee saw it, and he confessed who he was to her. She waited until he was asleep and went to a pay phone to turn him in."
– -aged-like-wine-
You never know the things people are capable of until they snap.
Targeted For Wealth
"I had an acquaintance who owned a iron working shop."
"Some employee of his thought he was fabulously wealthy because he was well off."
"The Dirtball employee went to their house and tortured four of them to death to get their fabulous wealth ( $40,000) Unfortunately the housekeeper was there as well and they tortured her too."
"The junkies ordered pizza and left their DNA to be found. Burned the house. Really very sad, this guy was known to hire guys who had criminal records and give them a second chance. His son was 10 years old."
– KaiserSozes-brother
Why Mum Was Terrified
"I only met him once as a kid, but my grandads brother in law. He approached me and my mum in a cafe, I was 8, and tried starting normal conversational small talk. My mum panicked and asked him what the hell he was doing out of prison, he brushed her question off and he knelt down to talk to me, which made my mum pick me up, sling me over her shoulder, and run back to the car. I just remember being so scared by her sudden moves I quietly burst into tears in the car and we drove half way home. Mum then stopped in a supermarket car park, got in the back, unbuckled me, and we cuddled in the back for what felt like days (most likely an hour tops) whilst we both cried. I had no clue what was happening but mum calmed me down and she kept saying "youre safe. I love you" over and over."
"I found out years later he slit my Grandad's Sister (his wifes) throat and brutally beat her to death. Hence my mums fear."
– Mikatsurie
Gentle Classmate
"Guy I went to school with was real calm, very smart, and everyone loved him. He was a gentle person from what I remember. He had lost his mom a couple years before this, she was a nurse and they found her dead in a hospital room during her shift. Unknown causes."
"Our senior year of highschool, dude is a championship wrestler, dominating his grades, and just doing good. He lived with his dad who was a police officer for years and years. At lunch one day he left school and came back. Everything was normal and the day was finished out. His dad did not show up for work that evening, and the police dept sent someone to go knock on his door. They found the house ransacked and his dad lying in bed with a single gun shot wound to the head, deceased."
"Later that night they called my grandmother in for questioning because she cleaned their house once a week. Not much later than that, the guy I went to school with broke down and confessed they he had come home on lunch to ask for money, and he and his dad got in an argument, his dad laid down like normal for his shift, and he took his dad's service pistol, and shot him, and after realizing what he'd done, he'd freaked out and turned the house upside down to make it look like a robbery, then went and finished the day at school to try to make it seem like he had no clue what had happened. Shocked everyone."
– optiplexiss
Family dysfunction ran deep with these disturbing cases.
Attacking Mother
"Someone I sorta knew from school hid behind his front door, waited for his mother to come home and hit her on the head with an axe when he was around 14. He probably instantly regretted it and called an ambulance. Luckily, she survived and suffered no permanent damage. I think he went to a mental facility after."
– heyguysitsjustin
The Drownings
"Her 2 year old daughter drowned under suspicious circumstances, nothing could be proved. About 3 years or so later, she had another kid. Also drowned under suspicious circumstances. She was investigated but found nothing, attributed to sh*tty coincidence. Couple more years later, she had a 3rd kid with her man. Father came home early to find that she wasn't in the house, but his son was left alone in the bath tub. He was dead by that point."
"She got slapped with 3 murder charges and life."
– halosos
False Prophet
"Burn a baby alive."
"The story:"
"I knew someone at a music school. She then left, and one day she showed up at the school again because she was stopping music and wanted to sell her instrument. She told me she was living in an isolated community in the middle of the mountains, and looked so happy and radiant that I felt jealous."
"A couple of months later I turn the TV on and there she was. The community was actually a sect commanded by a guy who claimed to be the reincarnation of Jesus. He had impregnated a woman from the sect and said the baby was the Antichrist and had to die. They burned the baby alive when he was only two days old."
– needtogetcreative
Abusive Dad
"My father beat the sh*t out of my mother and myself when I was a toddler. I have an uneven skull because of it. Until I found out, I thought it was a birth defect. I didn’t find this out from my mother until I was an adult when I had to take him to court because he had opened numerous credit cards with my social security number when I was a kid and had tanked my credit by the time I was 18."
– FutureMarcus
Water Under The Bridge
"A guy I knew killed his father in front of his mother and younger brother trying to protect his mum from severe abuse. After he served his sentence, the family accepted him back and they’ve been living a normal life to this day."
– HectorVK
These disturbing accounts really go to show that you really don't know what people are capable of when they're under pressure.
In the heat of a moment, most of us have made conscious decisions not to do something completely irrational.
But not everyone has the wherewithal to really think about the consequences of causing violence on another person when they have snapped.
And when that person who did something regrettable–or disturbingly, not at all remorseful–is someone you know, it's all the more tragic.
Reddit user tzhumanbean asked:
"What's your biggest flex?"
So listen, just for a minute, forget everything in you that wants to be humble. Toot your own horn. Brag about whatever seemingly-silly thing you're amazing at.
If you need some inspiration, Reddit will go first.
Balance Champ
"You know the game at the carnival where you climb the wobbly rope ladder and ring the bell?"
"I've won it twice"
- ThunderousBeats
"Nice, I watched a mark rober video about that, and it's supposed to be near impossible because physics."
- SnooCapers5361
"The trick is to only have 1 hand and 1 foot on the ropes at any given time and said hand and foot need to be opposites. Get that technique down and you will win everytime."
- Radicalkoopa
"Or just walk directly up the center of the ladder on only your feet. That's how the people that run the game do it, and it was the only way I could do it as well. I've won twice that way."
- JustABugReport
"What’s the secret?"
- lilfindawg
"I kept my feet and hands close to the edges. I moves opposite legs and hands as close to the same time as possible. Near the top its very hard to balance so I sprinted/jumped for the bell."
- ThunderousBeats
Grampa Flex
"My grandad used to build space shuttles/spaceships."
"The company he worked for would send the spaceships to nasa. The company was doing a private time capsule thing where the workers could send their name to the moon on a piece of paper."
"My grandad wrote my name down, so i’m now on the moon."
- dollsrot
"That is f*cking sweet!"
- Prestigious-Ring4978
"15/10 Grandpa!"
- randomPH1L
"Aw wow 🥺🥰"
- Catbug94
Moon Landing No GIF by Arrow AcademyGiphyRich In Stem
"When I donated bone marrow (stem cells) I had 6 times the normal amount."
"They ran the tests 3 times to confirm."
- Kharn0
"You got more stem than a sunflower"
- mechy84
"So, you're like a potent human being?"
- Cold-Account
"Damn, leave some stems cells for the rest of us."
- YellowCarNoHitBacks
"You’re probably Force-sensitive and should seek a mentor from the Jedi Council."
- AngularChelitis
Literal Flex
"I can flex some muscle in my neck and make myself look like a croaking frog. It scares kids"
- glossyballs69
"Upvoted for scaring kids"
- cephalicrush
"flex within a flex"
- Far-Classic-4637
"My 14 year old son does that to annoy me. Haha"
- jn29
Inflate Pbs Nature GIF by Nature on PBSGiphyFlick Some Cents
"I’m so good at flicking pennies (P E N N I E S) that I can flick them into peoples pockets without them knowing."
- Kitsune_sits
"Dude one of my friends is a phenom at flicking pennies. We worked together 18 years ago at my first professional job. He was the underachiever of underachievers, super capable guy but he was purposefully lazy and pretended to be incompetent so nobody would ask him to do anything."
"One day I caught him flicking pennies across the facility, hitting random people in the head from afar just to cause a stir. He could do it so stealthily that nobody else could tell where they were coming from, but I caught him. I wasn't technically in management at the time, but I was the designated engineer for that department, so I had to talk to him about it. For months leading up to me catching him, we had an ongoing phenomenon of "magic pennies" appearing randomly around the facility. Everywhere you looked, there was a random penny. Friggin' everywhere. This was a high tech facility in the medical field, so random pennies laying around isn't a good look... Management was getting aggravated by it."
"Hey, that's a neat trick... How long you been doing it?"
" 'A long time' *Big Smile*"
"As a friend, I have to ask you to stop."
"Ok, ok, but I have one penny left and it's going to be a one in a million shot."
"Damnit... You need to promise it'll stop. The flicking and the random pennies everywhere, I don't want you getting fired over it and there's a lot of eyebrows getting raised right now."
"He flicked that penny through the air right as one of the warehouse guys was driving through on a tugger (it's like half golf cart, half fork truck). The penny popped the driver right above the ear with an audible WHACK. The driver jerked, turning the tugger and crashing it into three large material hoppers and busting a water line off the side of a machine. This caused 4 production lines to get halted and maintenance called in for about 4 hours of downtime."
"I wrestled with it but ultimately said nothing. The warehouse guy said a wasp must have got him and he did not get in trouble at all. My friend stopped flicking pennies after that."
"Sorry for the long story, I type super fast and it gets away from me at times..."
- crapgarbage
wwe congrats GIFGiphyDouble Flex
"In the 4th grade I won one if my countries biggest math competitions. I can also lick my elbow"
- FriendshipSad1623
"The duality of man"
- arkesko
"Congrats!!"
- itzhumanbean
"Not gonna lie I'm more impressed with the elbow licking. Like how the fuck? Do you have a really long tongue or weird ass ligaments or something?"
- Puluzu
"I’m more impressed by that too."
- SparklyRoniPony
"I actually tried. Could not lick my elbow. Impressive."
- L00k_Again
The Flex We Need
"I’m a marine biologist and my research has been used in the conservation of both sea turtles and whales."
- Myctophid
"That’s the nicest flex on this thread, solely because I have been obsessed with whales ever since I was born. I love talking to marine biologists and expanding my knowledge as well as knowing what I can do to keep whales safe and happy! Thank you for your work!"
- PoutineMaker
"I’m happy that I get to do this work. It’s not all unicorns and rainbows, but it’s pretty cool."
- Myctophid
"real life super hero! keep up the good work"
- christophersbooks
High Five Bro GIFGiphyKicking Some Serious Behind
"I kicked cancer’s ass"
- Quiet_Goat8086
"Now that's a flex that everyone is happy about"
- Narrow_Active5934
"So proud of you!💪 hope i can achieve this as well soon"
- nellako
"F*cking fair play mate, as we would say in my part of the world."
"well done mate."
- Quickbrownfoxjumper
"Lesssgooo"
- Lowgwano
"Long live you! 👑"
- param_T_extends_THOT
Hard Flex
"Throwaway here, I come from former meth addicts. I say "former" because my dad hasn't been using while in prison and my mother is disabled with a heart condition."
"I got a full tuition ride in undergrad, and I'm starting grad school @ Tufts this fall :)"
"Edit: Thank you all so much for your kindness! You guys made me cry. My acceptance was after some time working in human welfare, and being selected to assist in the creation of U.S. policy regarding health initiatives with the feds. I wish I could tell you all more, but I can't be too specific."
"But really, thank you. I'm doing the best I can with what I have, and I'm grateful for all the support. :)"
- Prize_Camp985
"Wow, well done! Just from an internet stranger to another, I felt proud of you while reading this comment and I'm genuinely excited for your future."
- moonlighttravel
"That’s awesome! you’ll enjoy Tufts, it’s a great school and fairly fun location."
- gregrainman314
"That’s where I go! Incredible school, great community, you’ll love it!"
- chartman21
Teacher Flex
"Going into my 17th year teaching high school physics."
"I would bet money that 75% of all students I've taught would put me in their top 3 favorite teachers of all time."
- cesarjulius
"What is it about physics teachers? They were always the coolest, in grade-school and in college..."
"My physics teacher in high school used to play Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, and stuff from Dr Demento while we were taking tests. He'd randomly quiz us on song names and lyrics for bonus points."
- crapgarbage
"We had an amazing physics teacher who is a legend, such a hard working dude, used to be very patient with us. After two years of teaching our class, we gifted him an Armani watch which costed like 2400$."
- praneshwar
"Did you bring in your collection of electric guitars, dismantled and have us reassemble the pickups while you lectured about electromagnetism and how strumming induced current?"
"That was an amazing day, thank you Mr. Holzwarth!"
- ThinkIGotHacked
"Thank you for your hardwork!!"
- itzhumanbean
Dab Reaction GIF by NETFLIXGiphyFeeling more inspired to jump in on the participation trophy tsunami? C'mon. You know you want to.
Can you play a dope rendition of Stairway to Heaven on a kazoo? Did you save the day by finding the stray red sock in the load of whites BEFORE you started the wash? What about the time you managed to get all your bra hooks into their holes behind your back on the first try without fidgeting?
Flex your flexiest flex, fam.
