To Fear or Not to Fear: The Coronavirus

Time to look over something scary.

Conspiracy: The 2003 Papillion Incident

An aerial photo of Papillion, Nebraska.

A disclaimer some time later: this story was made up by me. I wrote it as an experiment to test on friends. I apologize if you fell for this. Should you be upset: I promise it won't happen again. Still, I'm leaving this up for posterity's sake.

Ever read or hear a story so bizarre, it defies all explanation? Such a thing is subjective, but I’m sure we all know of at least one story that really nags at us in some capacity. I know of a fair few: the Somerton Man, the murder of Blair Adams, and The 3X Killer  are but three of them. Though one I’ve never spoken of is one called the 2003 Papillion Incident. This little story I’ve never seen talked about on the Internet, but it’s one I encountered in my time researching. Today, I’m going to share it with you guys. So let’s dive in.

Mystery: The Self-Immolator From Hiper-Bompreço

A photo of the Hiper-Bompreço mall.

There were two things I wanted to do this month in the way of the stories I picked. The first was that I wanted a fair bit of diversity in the locations we went to to discuss the mysteries. I've never quite liked how little I've focused on cryptids and enigmas from continents like Asia and Australia (which I'll say right now: it got the short end of the stick badly this time around). I've primarily focused on stories in North America and Europe. As such, I made sure to get a fair number of stories from South America, Africa, and Asia. The second thing I wanted was for the stories to be really, really weird. I wanted stories I could really cut loose on and be less restrained by the chains of professionalism.

Doing that wasn't difficult whatsoever. The Obscurban Legend wiki was there to help me pick out a fair number of the entries. The first of them is short, sweet, and really weird. It's called the Self-Immolator of Hiper-Bompreço. To call this any other than the epitome of what I wanted this month to primarily be would be a federal crime. So let's dive in!

Mystery: The Tennessee Wildman

Oh baby it's a wild world.

Have you ever had this weird feeling inside of you when you want to do something, yet you know that doing it is a bad idea? In my case, I wanted to take a brief break after writing the megalist since I’d spent several days on end writing it without so much as a few hours to recuperate. Yet, once I was done, all I wanted to do was resume writing something—anything really. The projects I have lined up though are not the wisest to pursue on account of them being fairly sizable (especially the one on Crawlers).

As such, I found myself lounging around, feeling rather saddened and restless. I tried to take my mind off of things, but then I realized that I have no friends who live locally and I’m also a NEET. Therefore, I am more or less stuck either doing crossword puzzles or hoping nobody throws a water bottle at me to do something.

Golly gee willikers, it sure is good I don’t live in the 1950s. Otherwise, I may be kicked out of the house.

If that were to happen, I’m confident I’d become like the creature in today’s story. Known as the Tennessee Wildman, this story is... quite wild. So let’s begin!

Mystery: QAnon

I want to take a brief digression from the standard mystery setup that I’ve created to take a more rambling approach. This is because the story I want to discuss today is one that I’ve been trying to write about for well over a year now, but haven’t been able to because researching it is a nightmare. It’s an ever evolving, ever changing story that isn’t likely to stop until after the 2020 United States Presidential Election cycle has ended. Even then, there’s a very good chance it will continue to evolve even after it’s ended regardless of the victor.

The story today is known as QAnon and there are few—if any—few stories that have ever come close to being as fascinating as it. If you’re somehow unfamiliar with the legendary 4chan, 8chan, and 8kun poster, then I encourage you to read this post. While both Q and the movement that surrounds Q are ever changing, my desire has never quite been to debunk or verify/legitimize him (or, more likely, them). Rather, it’s been to figure out exactly who’s behind the moniker. That still remains true with what this write-up will be focusing on. So if you’re looking for confirmation bias, I must say that you’ll be disappointed. One thing I’ve always hated about researching Q is that there’s an obscene amount of bias that goes into every write-up, so I’d rather refrain from contributing to that toxic pile. Why that is is very simple to explain: Q, whether you believe what they say to be legitimate, has changed the face of American politics on both sides of the spectrum. Some see Q as a hero. Others, a villain. What’s the truth though? Well, let’s find out.

Mystery: The Sabinche Tomatovic Tape

A man standing in front of a giant web. I was going to use a rendition of the J'ba Fofi, but I figured it'd be best if nobody got night terrors from seeing one.

I mentioned this tape on my megalist from just under a week ago. I had no intention of writing about it yet, but I’ve decided that in order to bridge the gap between now and March, I should go ahead and share with you all the oh so lovely story of the Sabinche Tomatovic Tape. I hope you’re not arachnophobic.

Megalist: An Introduction and Summary of 500 Conspiracy Theories

The All Seeing Eye.

I ended up starting this when I was going through a really bad bout of stomach trouble. As such, my time was spent on /x/. Then an idea sprang to mind: why not try to summarize as many of the theories on the various Conspiracy Iceberg as I can? I saw no reason not to try, so I listed off 100 of them.

Then 200.

Then 250.

Then 300.

Then 400.

Finally, I got to 500 and settled there. While not every single one is from the Iceberg, I tried to stick to it as best I could. 

Also, on one final note, I feel it’s necessary to stress that just because I don't work to actively disprove all of these, that does not mean I believe they're legitimate. Simply put: I don’t wish to discourage anyone from looking into them if they’re open minded or even believe in them. Rather, I encourage you—no matter how much I may disagree with you—to do your own research. We have free will and I don’t have any control over the decisions you make. The only thing I ask from you is that—should you decide to comment (which would make my day!)—to please not be inflammatory or mean. I know how volatile conspiracies can be and I’d like things to be civil (should anyone opt to debate).