Why do we obsess over Slender Man so much?

[Garrsus]

probably because of the fact that no matter what, in the stories he will find you, there is no avoiding him and he goes so far as to mess with the people he stalks.
not to mention he is based off of a HUGE amount of stories from local folklores: England's branch-man, Germany's der Großman, there's also a Scottish, welsh, american and dutch one, i just cant remember their names.
if it wasn't evident i love creepypasta.
Also the fact that, he works on belief, meaning if you want to know about him, he will be close, and use you as a method to spread his chaos.

I chalk up the popularity of him as "one of those Internet things." Sometimes, certain subjects on the Internet strike just the right chord with just the right people at just the right time. That's when things go viral.

For me, what makes it such a great story is that he (in most cases) doesn't have any clear goal. He just follows people for no apparant reason, until the stalkee either goes insane or mysteriously vanishes. And that unknown factor can be pretty scary when applied right in whatever story is using him.

yea, i agree, but i think its kinda more that he wishes to observe, to allow himself to be seen so as to drive your mind to the brink kind of thing in most stories.
though weirdly i enough, i think that after i found out all that i have now, im no longer scared because i know of any/all of his implausibilities and flaws, not to mention i have watched countless creepypasta, im probably immune to them now DX anyone got a good one?

 

[Garrsus]

Slenderman is homosexual. He was a real scare for me when I first learned about him. Then I thought that if he's watching me, he probably watches me fap. So I hit the assumption that slenderman is homosexual. Aaaaaannnnd that's how I got rid of my fear of him.

OT: Because nobody really knows who the slenderman really is. Knowing about him means you're the next target. But not knowing him will make you fear him even more...

im sorry but this will cure that fear but start a new one, and adds to your idea kind of
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atdhk44k0B4 (sorry i forgot how to embed.)

 

[SlaveNumber23]

Meh, I don't get Slender Man at all, I find him extremely boring and not scary at all. No idea why people obsess over him so much, seems extremely overrated. This is coming from a huge horror fan by the way.

 

[Sir Pootis]

He's a nice guy.

 

[Sir Pootis]

Double post, sorry.

 

[Vicarious Reality]

Spoiler: Fuuuuuuuuuuu

Can someone post that video of a playground slide and slendermans shadow coming out from behind a pole?
I can not seem to find it.

 

[quantumsoul]

I think it's the feeling of helpless he brings. It's when you're running away and not looking at his is when he gets you. No matter how far and fast you run, he will get you. Also his unsettling appearance of being somewhat human but not human enough.

I have to say that made up paranormal creature for some internet comedy site to generate this much horror and popularity is very impressive.

 

[DugMachine]

I absolutely hate when things don't have faces, it's one of the most disturbing things. Slender man is a manifestation of all our fears of the unknown and being watched balled up into one. So while his featureless face disturbs me personally, I would say overall it's not his physical appearance that scares people. It's that knowing if you just think of him he will be there. And even if you're not he's watching, waiting, ever silent and without a motive.

Fuck me, just typing this I can just imagine him standing right behind me.

 

[Anti Nudist Cupcake]

This one I can understand being scary. A very tall, faceless man with a dark suit and paranormal like features such as tall arms, standing in a dark room with the darkness obscuring some of him so as to give the impression that he is an entity of the shadows itself, standing in a well lit doorway so as to give the idea that he suddenly popped up into the room from outside and may have been lurking outside for some time, perfect horror stuff.

Reminds me of yathzee's own thought up "Tall man".

Spoiler

The reason he is so frightening is because he is so tall that he towers over you and he has a tint of paranormal features about him to make him "unknown" to us. This speaks to our instincts to fear that which is larger than us and that which is a mystery to us.

For some reason I can't be very afraid of just a normal pic of himself, he has to be in the shadows. He has to almost be hard to see. Not just the monster, but the area the monster finds itself in must induce fear to be effective.

 

[Techno Squidgy]

Also, if your not scared of the guy, tell us why.

I seem to have kind of missed this whole slender man thing, and I'm not really that interested in finding out, hence not scared of slender man.

As far as I'm aware, it's just some lanky bloke that shows up in pictures. Not that scary to be honest. I have a mate that could be slender man if my ignorant ramblings are correct!

 

[Kuroneko97]

He doesn't look scary, maybe he just wants a hug?

Actually he wants his twenty dollars.

He needs about tree fiddy.

OT:The thing that's scared me about him is how he's kind of a stalker. I'm not fond of being stared at or followed. Also his blank face, which makes him look emotionless. That adds to the creepy a little, IMO.

Plus some people know how to tell a good creepypasta, and how you tell the story can affect how scared someone gets.

 

[Mrsoupcup]

Googled him.

So, it's just some Creepypasta character some bloke thought up?

Meh, anything can be made into a horrifying figure if the story's told well.

He's some new mithos creature spawned on 4chan's /x/.

Shortly after the youtube channel marble hornets popped up and it went viral.

(Like most original content from 4chan, it is doomed for everyone to forget it's place of origin)

 

[RagTagBand]

Googled him.

So, it's just some Creepypasta character some bloke thought up?

Meh, anything can be made into a horrifying figure if the story's told well.

He's some new mithos creature spawned on 4chan's /x/.

(Like most original content from 4chan, it is doomed for everyone to forget it's place of origin)

Except that this is just plain wrong. It's *not* original content from 4chan, it was created on SomethingAwful's forums. Fuck, the thread where the slenderman was created still exists so you can go SEE the very first incarnation of the slenderman.

Hell I know you were already too lazy to google the origins of the slenderman so you're definitely too lazy to google them a second time, so HERE

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3150591&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=3

That's the original thread, and the original post (about halfway down), created by member Victor Surge As part of a "Create paranormal images" contest.

 

[GrizzlyLives]

I just want to add a little bit of knowledge to this thread but there's a film called Tall Man its about slender, its quite new and i don't know if its any good but i just thought it was funny that there's already a film about this guy

 

[FreebirdLegend]

All he wants is 20 dollars. But seriously that is a really good question to which all I can answer is he just is scary.

 

[Kermi]

I don't find Slender Man scary, but I do think he's a fascinating creation. I'm really amazed at how it's taken off and how it's fuelled some wonderful fiction like EveryManHybrid and Marble Hornets on youtube, not to mention the recent game - and being the inspiration for the Ender Men in Minecraft.

 

[Something Amyss]

I have literally never found Slender Man scary or creepy. I do appreciate the effort that's gone into the "lore," though.

 

[Don Savik]

Am I so sick of these internet tough guys who clearly aren't fans of horror. Its not hard to understand the fad of a new horror game on youtube bringing in popularity into a topic. Nobody "obsesses" over him, its just popular at the moment.

Its one of those creepy things that you have to be interested in for it to be scary. I could show it to my parents and they would be like "oh its just a guy with no face", but I know Slenderman is more than that, and I've seen him 'in action' (fan videos like Marble Hornets/EverymanHYBRID) so he's scarier to me. I like horror and it interests me, so I go out of my way to look into scary stories, videos, and creepypastas and the like. Someone who doesn't like that shit won't care, but should at least be able to understand why others like it. There's a difference between the kind of people that play Amnesia because they heard it was "super scary game" and the people that go out of their way to find horror game mods and custom games.

Have I made myself redundantly clear yet?

 

[Asuka Soryu]

Because he was awesome in Jack Slenderman.

 

[ThePS1Fan]

Played the game once, read into it a little bit, visited r/slenderman.
Can say this, the game was boring. You walk around the forest until he catches you and you get static. It does jump scares about as well as any modern action horror game, without the action part obviously. I've heard Marble Hornets is good. I haven't seen any of it. I guess it can be about as scary as anything else, when you suspend your disbelieve it's scary and then you get up walk into the forest and give no fucks because you know it isn't real.