In 2009, Slenderman was born from a simple Photoshop contest. But within a few years, this internet creation would inspire terrifying real-life acts, leaving behind a trail of fear and fascination. What makes this modern myth so dangerous?
Don’t go into the woods at night.
Actually, don’t even look at the woods.
Slenderman just might be there waiting for you behind the trees…waiting to take you away into oblivion.
When it comes to myths and legends, Slenderman is a modern-day urban legend. Bloody Mary, the Woman in White, The Man with the Hook, Crybaby Bridge are all urban legends that are made of nightmares. Slenderman has good company. He has even made an appearance in media and art, If you play Minecraft, you might be familiar with the Enderman characters, which are long, tall, block characters. People assume Slenderman was their inspiration because of how they look.
Even though he’s fictional, the stories about him are so realistic that many think he’s a god. Slenderman has even become one of the most popular characters for Halloween. In 2018, the movie, “Slender Man” came out. A documentary was created in 2016 called, “Beware the Slenderman”. Movies and documentaries have been made with Slenderman in the starring role. Throughout this time, Slenderman has truly garnered a cult following.
In order to fully understand the Slenderman legend, we have to understand exactly where it all started.
From Art to Reality
Slenderman is a modern urban legend that has been creeping us all out since 2009. He became popular on the online forum, Something Awful. The original artist’s name is Eric Knudson, who created Slenderman while competing in an online contest. The contest was issued by Something Awful. The rules were that participants had to create a photo that looked paranormal. Participants had to use an average, everyday photo. Using the pen name Victor Surge, Eric took two black and white photos of children and inserted Slenderman into the background. From there, a legend was born.
The Great Creator
Eric Knudsen is a pretty normal guy. He lives with his wife in Florida and he’s a family man. He found inspiration from HP Lovecraft and Stephen King while creating Slenderman.
Slenderman’s tall, thin, faceless look came from by “The Mist”, written by Stephen King. There are tentacles that sprout out of Slenderman’s back, he is known to stalk the woods at night, and he can cause amnesia. What is even more interesting is that it seems that Knudsen just planted the seed and then left the story up for others to adapt as they saw fit.
He hasn’t been involved much when it comes to the art and video game incarnations of his creepy character. Why? He says he’s too busy with real-life stuff. It’s also possible that the crimes that were inspired by Slenderman might have made Eric want to stay behind the scenes and to back off his involvement with the character.
It can be said that because Slenderman really has no official creator, he doesn’t have an official canon. There are hundreds of people who have written their own stories about Slenderman. You could say that his story is still being written as we speak. Parsec Productions created their own version of Slenderman for a video game where it plays a starring role.
Is There a Chance Slenderman Could Be Real?
Of course, Slenderman is fiction, right? And there is no way that he could ever be real. Well, that’s what we think.
But, there is also a theory that one can manifest an entity if enough brain power is engaged. Don’t believe us? Let us tell you about the Philip Experiment. In the 1970’s in Canada, a group of people managed to create their own ghost with his own back story and everything. Philip was able to think for himself and had his own free will. Philip became so strong that he was able to move tables around the room and eventually outgrew his creators. This has also been a practice for centuries by Buddhist monks, where they create entities called “tulpas.”
Could something like this happen with Slenderman? If enough people around the world have a specific image in mind, and they treat him like an existing being, they could very well bring him into this world.
Inspiring Crimes
While Slenderman is fictional, he has inspired not only art, comics, and movies, but also some real-life horror stories that have ruined many lives. Let’s just say we need to teach our children the difference between reality and pretend.
Crime #1
Two girls by the name of Anissa Weier and Morgan Geyser thought Slenderman was real. They truly wanted to be his followers, like Slenderman was some sort of deity. The girls were just twelve years old at the time. Anissa and Morgan believed that they had to become servants of Slenderman, and had to appease him to protect their families. So they decided to attack their young friend, Payton Leutner. They stabbed her 19 times and left her severely wounded in the forest. Luckily, Peyton survived the attack.
Police arrested Anissa and Morgan, and they were put on trial. Morgan was sentenced to 40 years in a psychiatric facility. Anissa was sentenced to 25 years. Morgan was the one who allegedly did most of the dirty work while Annisa looked on, which is why she received a more severe punishment. Both girls were clearly mentally ill.
Crime #2
In the same year that Anissa and Morgan committed their crime, a thirteen-year-old Ohio girl also attacked her mother with a knife. According to the mother, her daughter was waiting for her in the kitchen with the knife. She was wearing a white mask. During the incident, the mother thought her daughter was acting like a completely different person. Luckily, mom survived the attack with minor injuries. The girl obsessed over Slenderman and even created a whole world for him in the video game Minecraft. She was tried as a juvenile and confessed that she had attacked her mom in an attempt to please Slenderman.
Crime #3
In 2014, a fourteen-year-old girl was inspired to set her house on fire. Yep. Slenderman inspired her to burn her house down. While the home was destroyed, the family survived.
In Conclusion
Slenderman is nothing more than a creative entity created by the human mind. Had Eric Knudson lived centuries ago and came up with this idea, there’s a good chance that Slenderman would have become a mainstream legend. Considering he has inspired crimes and heinous acts, maybe it’s better that we’ve only all become acquainted with Slenderman today and not decades ago.
All it takes is for a seed of inspiration to be planted, and the story will grow by itself. Slenderman was truly a collaborative effort from thousands, if not millions of people.
Whether you believe Slenderman to be pure fiction, or if you believe in the possibility that he could manifest thanks to the power of the mind, let’s hope it stays in a fictional place. It seems that once Slenderman crosses over to the real world, that is when true chaos ensues.
Sources
https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-27776894
The newest “Slender Man” (2018) movie was released last night. I don’t normally write reviews unless I feel inspired to do so. Sometimes this is a good thing. In this case, it wasn’t. I have been fascinated by the Slenderman (Slender Man?) phenomenon for quite a while. I’m not even talking about the subsequent crimes that took place by mentally ill teenagers. I’ve been fascinated by the idea of how legends can be created so quickly and go viral thanks to the innovation of the internet.