Your Friendly Neighborhood Slenderman

Maybe you've heard of him:

A tall, thin creature with no face, inexplicably wearing a nice suit in the deep woods, sometimes he has tentacles?

He kind of fits into my hobby of folklore, I've decided. Well, actually, he goes into a category known as fakelore. Fakelore includes things like the old Paul Bunyan, in case you were wondering. It's a legend presented as if it were classic folklore passed down through generations when in reality it was made up in more recent times. I think Slenderman sticks in our minds because he might be the first enduring mythological character invented on the internet. I may be wrong, of course, but that's my theory.

Are you afraid of the Dark?

Well, according to the Slender Man Wiki (no really, it exists), Slendy is anywhere from 6 to 15 feet tall, sometimes has tentacles, can either teleport or warp reality, and stalks people. I think the main scary thing about him is probably the fact that he somehow seems to tie in to people's fear of the dark. Fear of the dark is common in children, and sometimes continues into adulthood to some degree or another. It is not the darkness itself which is so frightening, but the idea that if there were something lurking in the darkness, you would not be able to see it.

I'm sure most of us have been in this situation before: you're home alone at night and almost all the lights are off in the house. Suddenly, the wall creaks, or the ice maker makes a noise, and immediately your brain jumps to the conclusion that there's probably an axe-murderer in your house. (Those poor axes, they never stood a chance).

I guess that's why we have nightlights when we're kids. (Actually, sometimes mine just made things worse when I was a little girl).

During the day, I had this nice little bookcase with a funny wavy shape.

Once the lights went off, however, it wasn't so nice. See, that curvy edge caught the edge of the nightlight, and the resulting shadow looked to us kindergartners like someone crouching next to our bookcase.

Mom and Dad had to come in multiple times to tell us, "No, that's a bookcase, not a person." So in my case, it was more of a fear of shadows than fear of the dark.

So, who's afraid of Slenderman?

Sometime you should watch a video of someone playing "Slender: the Eight Pages". It can be pretty hilarious. Mind you, you have to be careful because some of those videos will have a lot of inappropriate language in them. ("Teens React To.." is a safe one, if I remember correctly).

In the game, you play first-person-point-of-view, hiking through the woods for no reason. You aren't told where you are or why, you just have to find 8 pieces of paper with weird and creepy doodles on them. Oh, and if you aren't careful, your flashlight will die and you'll be stuck. You walk around and every now and again, you run into a random faceless dude in a suit with impossibly long arms.

That wouldn't be scary for most people, I'm guessing, so they do what they can to make it scary. In a mostly silent game, the sudden discordant shout of several piano keys being struck at once and the static across your screen serves to inform you that whatever you're looking at isn't supposed to be. Then, of course, the fact that they start playing the sound of an increasing heartbeat helps condition the player into a fear response.

Seriously though, I'm more worried about the abandoned oil tankers and the random public restroom with no toilets in the middle of the woods. I mean, yeah, Slendy tends to be in there, but why are there only wooden chairs in what is clearly a bathroom?! That's always bothered me more than Slendy.

I've played the game myself, but any shrieking I did was either because of the sudden jarring music, or because I was frustrated that I'd lost the game yet again after only finding 5 pages. Slenderman is kind of a terrible person.

Not that I can't see why he's supposed to be scary, of course,

As the legends build up around him, he's become a sort of modern-day bogeyman. He stands out to our eyes because something about him is just off. What was your first hint? the lack of face, or the fact that he's wearing a business suit in the woods?

He tends to appear around kids or fires for no specific reason, and he is often portrayed with these weird tentacle-y thingies coming from his back...which probably just ruins that suit. He apparently pops in and out of existence as he pleases, generally interferes with cameras, and can cause memory loss, paranoia, and eventual madness in anyone who sees him. (Side effects may include...) Also, he teleports, making running away a bit of a no-go. The guy hangs out in the woods and once he picks a victim, he stalks them until they either lose their minds and die, or lose their minds and become his personal Igors. Or something like that.

In short, he has no social life.

Am I creeped out by Slenderman? Nope, not really.

See, when I was a kid, somebody gave me an Amish doll. Ever seen an Amish doll? They don't have faces either. The way it was explained to me is that the Amish see giving a doll a face as an idol. Anyway, I don't remember how old I was, maybe six or seven? But I was given this doll, and I named it Sarah. I thought she was a little strange at first, all long arms and legs and no face, but I very quickly got attached to her. I can remember wandering around the property our old church was on, carrying my Amish doll and chasing peacocks and snakes...okay, maybe I actually ran screaming from the snakes.

So, I see Slenderman, and my first thought tends to be, "Giant Amish doll!"

What's so scary about that, eh? A big, scary Amish doll that goes from place to place without ever moving and hides in the dark. 

Never mind. That is creepy.

But then again, maybe he's not trying to be creepy. I mean, it's not like he could actually tell you what he wanted, he hasn't got a mouth! Seeing as he automatically induces a fight-or-flight response when someone sees him, no one is going to stick around long enough to play charades and figure out what he wants. Come on! Maybe all he wants is a hug! As someone on a Facebook thread I was part of said once, "All we need is to make him a happy face mask, and we can rename him Stick-Buddy!"

The guy doesn't talk, and makes no noise aside from camera static, so you pretty much have to be looking right at him to even know he's there. And since he messes up electrical equipment, he probably can't use the internet to get in touch with people either. Bummer.

Pass him in the dark, and you might not even know he's there.

A moment of Silence for our introverted Stick-Buddy.

Oh, did you catch the capital "S"? Yes, that was deliberate.

You see, the Silence from Doctor Who were based on Slenderman.