"There are so many mysteries and dangers of the web or the dark web. It’s no wonder that we fear things that conspire deep within the internet that we don’t even know about."
--Joaquin Montes De Oca, 7th grader
We all know about urban legends, tales passed down for generations. As most urban legends come in the forms of stories with a moral or caution, it would seem that believers of these stories continue telling them and passing them on to confirm or validate their own opinions or fears. And now with the internet, these stories can spread faster and more indefinitely than ever.
These stories have been keeping plug-in night lights on the market for years and as times change, it’s no surprise that these stories would, too. As email antiquates to messenger pigeons, to be replaced by various other forms of direct messaging and MySpace becomes an ancient concept, replaced by Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, Tumblr, Youtube, etc—it’s no surprise that we see the same evolution with urban legends. So, let’s dive into some of the more contemporary examples of urban legends.
The first one, the infamous Slender Man. The peak of this first urban legend may have occurred in June of 2014. It began in Waukesha, Wisconsin when two twelve year old girls, Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier invited their classmate, Payton Leutner, nicknamed Bella, over to spend the night. They would later confirm to the police that the sleepover had been planned for months in advance. During the sleepover, Weier and Geyser led Leutner into the woods to play hide-and-seek. When the time presented itself, Geyser tackled Leutner, proceeding to stab her 19 times. The victim survived and Weier is facing a 25 year sentence in prison while Geyser faces 40 years.
Initially, Geyser had stated, “I thought about it, but then I decided that remorse would get me nowhere. It’s easier to live without regrets.” However, in a later court hearing, she apologized profusely to the victim and the victim’s family.
This is all very disturbing, but that’s not where it ends. When initially questioned, both girls said that they did it to prove themselves to a villainous man that resided in the woods, known to many as Slender Man
In truth, Slender Man was created in 2009 on the web forum, Something Awful by Eric Knudsen under the pseudonym Victor Surge as part of a photoshop contest. Apparently, the girls had read about this on a website called Creepypasta Wiki and thought it was real.
These stories have been keeping plug-in night lights on the market for years and as times change, it’s no surprise that these stories would, too. As email antiquates to messenger pigeons, to be replaced by various other forms of direct messaging and MySpace becomes an ancient concept, replaced by Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, Tumblr, Youtube, etc—it’s no surprise that we see the same evolution with urban legends. So, let’s dive into some of the more contemporary examples of urban legends.
The first one, the infamous Slender Man. The peak of this first urban legend may have occurred in June of 2014. It began in Waukesha, Wisconsin when two twelve year old girls, Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier invited their classmate, Payton Leutner, nicknamed Bella, over to spend the night. They would later confirm to the police that the sleepover had been planned for months in advance. During the sleepover, Weier and Geyser led Leutner into the woods to play hide-and-seek. When the time presented itself, Geyser tackled Leutner, proceeding to stab her 19 times. The victim survived and Weier is facing a 25 year sentence in prison while Geyser faces 40 years.
Initially, Geyser had stated, “I thought about it, but then I decided that remorse would get me nowhere. It’s easier to live without regrets.” However, in a later court hearing, she apologized profusely to the victim and the victim’s family.
This is all very disturbing, but that’s not where it ends. When initially questioned, both girls said that they did it to prove themselves to a villainous man that resided in the woods, known to many as Slender Man
In truth, Slender Man was created in 2009 on the web forum, Something Awful by Eric Knudsen under the pseudonym Victor Surge as part of a photoshop contest. Apparently, the girls had read about this on a website called Creepypasta Wiki and thought it was real.
The Slender Man murder raises the bigger question on what should or should not be put onto platforms available for children. And while these dates (2009, 2014), were more than five years ago, the story still has relevance in pop culture today with memes and retellings of urban legends.
Our second example is the legend of The Expressionless. As the story goes, in 1972, a woman walked into a hospital. Immediately, the people in the hospital began to scream and run. This was for two reasons. The first was that she didn’t seem exactly human, almost like a mannequin. The second was that she held a dead, bleeding kitten in her mouth. She spit it out and collapsed. The doctors rushed her into the operating room to sedate her. I’ll spare you the details but in short, people died.
Obviously, this story isn’t true. It was sparked up again when a photo of an expressionless woman being held down by doctors (below) surfaced on Facebook. Since then, a movie, titled The Expressionless, has been made about it.
Obviously, this story isn’t true. It was sparked up again when a photo of an expressionless woman being held down by doctors (below) surfaced on Facebook. Since then, a movie, titled The Expressionless, has been made about it.
Our third example is the legend of Annora Petrova. As the story goes, Annora Petrova was a highschool ice skater. One day, she happened upon a Wikipedia page of herself. Initially, she found this strange, as she had not created it herself, but eventually it grew on her, mentioning her many ice skating victories. After a while, she came to realize that the page could predict the future. One day, she found a part she didn’t like and tried to change it. Suffice to say, the creators of the site became less friendly, eventually killing her.
This fake story brings up a bigger discussion about cyber safety and other people’s access to private information. We see this again in the story of The Blind Maiden. Legend has it that if you go on the website blindmaiden.com at any particularly auspicious time, The Blind Maiden with crawl out of your computer and claw your eyes out.
While this final example might just seem like your average legend, perhaps there’s more to the story than that. Maybe, idea of somebody coming out of your computer or device represents people’s fear of the unknown when it comes to the internet. After all, we’ve only had access to this limitless and all-knowing creation that is the World Wide Web since circa 1990. There are so many mysteries and dangers of the web or the dark web. It’s no wonder that we fear things that conspire deep within the internet that we don’t even know about.
This fake story brings up a bigger discussion about cyber safety and other people’s access to private information. We see this again in the story of The Blind Maiden. Legend has it that if you go on the website blindmaiden.com at any particularly auspicious time, The Blind Maiden with crawl out of your computer and claw your eyes out.
While this final example might just seem like your average legend, perhaps there’s more to the story than that. Maybe, idea of somebody coming out of your computer or device represents people’s fear of the unknown when it comes to the internet. After all, we’ve only had access to this limitless and all-knowing creation that is the World Wide Web since circa 1990. There are so many mysteries and dangers of the web or the dark web. It’s no wonder that we fear things that conspire deep within the internet that we don’t even know about.
