Jon Solo Sebastian 06/22/2025:

Throughout time, we’ve had creatures or scary figures used as devices to keep children out of trouble or from straying too far from home. Some of the popular ones include the Boogeyman, the Big Bad Wolf, the monsters under your bed, and as of 2009—the Slenderman.

The Slenderman is a paranormal figure (that someone made up) who has allegedly existed for centuries. Before we dive too deep into this hole, I want to point out that this is a completely made up figure, but it holds some characteristics of other cryptids and figures from various folktales, and from movies and TV shows.

“The character almost seems to be an amalgam of knowing winks to both internet and pre-internet culture. Like folk villains over the centuries, from the Big Bad Wolf to the Headless Horseman, Slender Man is often depicted standing in the woods. His tentacles conjure up fleeting hints of HP Lovecraft’s world of interdimensional monsters in ordinary settings. The black suit nods at the Matrix villains, Jack Skellington from The Nightmare Before Christmas, and even the Hitman video game series.”

The Origin of the Slender Man

In 2009, a web forum called Something Awful posted a contest inviting its members to edit regular photos by adding paranormal elements to them. Artist Eric Knudsen, who used the nom de plume Victor Surge on the forum, submitted a couple of photographs with the character he dubbed as the Slenderman in the backgrounds of the photos. The altered pictures caused the internet to go bananas and “sightings” of the Slenderman began popping up all over the country. Is it possible folks were actually seeing something similar to the Slenderman, or is it possible they thought they were actually seeing him?

If you’ve ever heard of Tulpa’s, then you might suspect that could be the case here. If you haven’t heard of Tulpa’s, please take a quick break to go read one of my first blogs I published titled: Tulpas and Thought Forms. With the story and images of the Slenderman going viral, it’s quite possible the internet manifested its first thought-form or Tulpa. The manifestation typically occurs when one’s mind is unknowingly dwelling on something, or in this case, when millions of people are talking about it to the point where people start seeing it everywhere.

Another example of recent times would be all of the drone sightings in New Jersey. People reported seeing them there, then as the media and social media got wind of it, people in several states and cities began reporting drones in their areas. While I’m aware some drone sightings were legit, I think you see my point—get enough people talking about it and they’ll start seeing and believing it to be real.

What does the Slender Man look like?

Slenderman is a tall male human-like being with very long arms and legs. Some claim him to have tentacles protruding from his back similar to Marvel’s Doctor Octopus. He is extremely thin, hence the name. He wears a black suit and tie, and a fedora in most photos. His skin is pale white, and his face is missing all human facial features; it’s as if his face is blurred out, which some speculate as him being an interdimensional being and he somehow disguises his face. Again, this is an entirely made up creature, and his descriptions vary. He is believed to mainly focus on terrorizing children with some people stating he kidnaps them, or hypnotizes them causing them to do his bidding. There is actually a case of this from many years ago where he was being blamed for a stabbing in Wisconsin.

On May 31, 2014 in Wisconsin, two twelve year old girls who were playing hide and seek in the woods pushed down and pinned down another girl, and stabbed her nineteen times. The victim survived but as you can imagine, she suffers from PTSD. The girls were apprehended and showed no signs of empathy or guilt. They told authorities they needed to attack the girl to appease the Slenderman. While the Slenderman wasn’t directly responsible considering he’s fake, one of the girls believed she was having conversations with him.

There are other instances like these, but this is the most well-known case of the Slenderman being blamed for a brutal attack. This is the scary end of cryptids and other mythological creatures. I like to stick to the fun side of things, but I’ve always found the story of his creation to be interesting and wanted to share it with you all.