25 Of The Creepiest Rabbit Holes People Found Themselves Obsessed With

We could be innocently scrolling online when something random grabs our attention. It sparks our curiosity, and before we know it, we’re searching the web for more info and down the rabbit hole we go.  While most of these obsessive searches yield interesting results, some are downright unsettling. Recently, a question posted online inspired Redditors to share the creepiest online rabbit holes they got sucked into that left them feeling slightly perturbed afterwards. 

#1 I forget the subreddit, but it shook me to my deepest fiber. It’s a Reddit where they ask you if you can ID where a photo was taken. At first I thought, oh cool, this sounds fun…

Image source: asian-jeff, Czapp Árpád Some of the photos clearly had a small child edited out, they were f*****g trafficked and trying to find where the perp is who is committing the heinous act(s). I looked thru every single post to see if I could help/recognize a landmark/indicator. Not every photo has a person edited out, but, you can just tell. Realizing there’s people/children *right now* needing to be saved breaks my heart. Edit: thanks Filiberto, the page is r/TraceAnObject, if you’d like to see for yourself.

#2 The Nuremberg Trial documentary. Not a modern documentary. The actual documentary made back after WW2 when they took the National Socialists to trial. Actual footage used in court. It's absolutely rough. Yet free in wikipedia where it's been out in HD. Amazon has it in the original pixilated form. IDK which is worse.

Image source: heartcitybarber, cottonbro studio

#3 One of the most disturbing rabbit holes I stumbled into was reading about abandoned, haunted amusement parks around the world. What started as an innocent curiosity turned into hours of looking at eerie photos, creepy backstories, and even watching videos of people exploring these decaying, forgotten places. It left me with chills, but I couldn't stop digging deeper!

Image source: CatherineM1267, Pryscila Colasso

#4 Stumbled upon an antivaxxer group once …. the sheer tin foil hat stupidity was utterly astounding.

Image source: kip707

#5 The logistics of crowd crushes.

Image source: bagginshieldz, Manuel Joseph

#6 Japan's SOS sign incident. Everything about it is weird and disturbing.

Image source: Milo022012, Unknown FrankSonata: For those who haven't heard of this one: In 1989, some hikers got lost in Northern Japan. A search quickly began of the mountains in the area where they'd been, and helicopters found a huge "SOS" sign made from logs on a mountainside, visible from the air. The missing hikers were found 2-3km away, and were successfully rescued. But when asked, they knew nothing about the SOS sign. They didn't make it. It appeared another hiker also happened to be lost in the same area, so another search was conducted. Near the sign they found human skeletal remains, as well as a backpack containing personal items, including ID. It was Kenji Iwamura, a 25-year-old man who had gone missing 5 years earlier, and was a known hiker. Records of aerial photos showed that the SOS had been there for at least two years, but no-one had seen it until other hikers happened to get lost in the area. And clearly it was too late for Kenji by then. But analysis of the bones indicated a woman, so they weren't Kenji's. Yet there were no matching records of missing women in the area. Who was the mysterious woman who'd died, what happened to Kenji, and why did she have all his stuff? The backpack also contained a cassette tape player, with the music of one of the tapes partially recoded over. It was a man saying he was lost on the mountain, unable to climb through the thick vegetation, and asking for help from anyone who listened. He didn't mention his name. Kenji's parents listened to it, but due to the poor quality (it had been lying in a backpack on a mountain for years) they couldn't say for sure if it was Kenji or not. Kenji's friend did confirm the tape was likely his, since it was music he had liked. There are conspiracy theories that Kenji is still alive, that he was abducted, kidnapped, that the taped voice is an impersonator, that the woman is a spy, etc. Analysis years later showed the bones were actually male, as far as can be ascertained. Weather damage and poor forensic work caused the initial error. (Of course, some people maintain that this is a coverup) In all likelihood, Kenji died on the mountain, and the bones, belongings, and voice recording are all him. By coincidence, his SOS sign was only found years after he'd died, when other people got lost in a nearby area. Just a sad story of someone who died alone in the wilderness. But people love all the uncertainties, and get carried away, when really it's just tragic.

#7 I used to follow high fashion models in the late 2000s/early 2010s. Frida Gustavsson, Sasha Pivovarova, Vlada Roslyakova, Olga Sherer, Snejana Onopka (as you can see, I gravitated toward the Slavic models, mainly)--those were my favorites. I was looking up runway photos of either Roslyakova or Sherer and stumbled upon a blog "congratulating" one of the models in a candid photo for enjoying a breakfast of black coffee and a cigarette. The caption was, "We approve."

Image source: Schneetmacher, Annushka Ahuja That was the day I learned that there was such a thing as a "pro-ana" community, or "thinspo." This was the opposite of a support group--unless your understanding of a support group was supporting each other's addictions and unhealthy coping mechanisms. They exchanged "tips" like sprinkling black pepper on lettuce to make you think you were eating more than you actually were. It was... frightening. Edit: typo.

#8 Datura trip reports rank pretty high. I've had bad trips on psychedelics, but nothing even remotely as f****d up as what people experience on deliriants like datura.

Image source: paraworldblue, David Garrison On psychedelics, no matter how crazy it gets, you at least know you're tripping. The s**t you see is clearly just overlaid on reality - you know you're hallucinating. That's not the case with datura. From what I've read, the s**t you see doesn't look psychedelic at all - it looks real. You might not even realize you're tripping. Your dead grandpa is really in the room talking to you. Your friend is really getting brutally [attacked] in front of you. The giant spiders are really crawling all over you. It's all 100% real as far as you can tell. Since you have no connection to reality, you can get into serious trouble or even die. You might think you're fighting a demon and then get arrested for assaulting a random person in a park. All bets are off with that s**t. Oh and also it lasts several days.

#9 On Reddit there used to be yearly thread for a while talking about supernatural experiences of Sailors. It was such a fantastic read . Every couple of years if I am bored and travelling I love to re-read them.

Image source: mmIastro, Germannavyphotograph

#10 I spent one night reading all about staircases in woods stories and was thoroughly creeped out, only to discover the next day that the stories were all fake.

Image source: _dontjimthecamera, RainbowUnicorn0228

#11 My TikTok algorithm showed me a video of the worst motel in Georgia. I looked up the reviews and found one left by a young homeless guy clearly struggling with mental health / addiction that was living at the motel. It said the guy had left 200+ reviews. I clicked on his page and realized that he wrote reviews every day at every place he went to. Many were "they helped the homeless" or "they wouldn't give me food and I'm starving. F**k this place." I was basically able to see every place the guy stopped for almost two years. I went back to look further at the seedy motel reviews and the guys dad left one saying that he was grateful his son had a roof over his head. It crushed me. I don't remember the name of the motel but I was crying at 4 am.

Image source: thatduderalph, Hanawasthere

#12 Definitely the Russian scientist that sewed the top half of a dog to the back/neck area of another larger dog to see how long it would live. Like some human centipede [nonsense].

Image source: LadyThrashALot, Pavel Danilyuk

#13 Hisashi Ouchi.

Image source: Onautopilotsendhelp, ENERGY.GOV In 1999, the nuclear plant at Tokaimura had a radioactive accident, and Hisashi was the closest victim to the incident. It happened during the purification process of uranium oxide. There were 3 victims in total. Hisashi survived despite being exposed to the largest amount of radiation on record. And the Japanese kept him alive. Against his will. For 83 days. It is the most painful, extended death I have ever read. They could have humanely ended his life. But they kept bringing him back. To experiment. Despite all the injuries, skin loss, burns, and organ failure. Do not read about it if you are weak/sensitive to graphic details.

#14 Watching the new videos about the TitanSub that was destroyed last year.  While I have zero sympathy for the owner who was knowingly breaking the rules, dying in that sub, I feel bad for the crew that he conned into going.

Image source: Square_Ad8710, United States Coast Guard One video that I watched last night suggested the possibility that they knew they were in danger and was trying to raise up to safety when they imploded and it wasn't a quick thing, like they knew for approximately a minute that they were moments away from instant death, but the death was so sudden and so violent that no one knew it happened, human brains don't work fast enough to process an implosion at that speed.  .

#15 Diphenhydramine addiction. No part of it sounds enticing, yet it's still abused. I don't know that I've seen any other d**g related sub be so adamant about avoiding it at all costs.

Image source: White_Dynamite22, Alex Green glitteryvomit: diphenhydramine is what began my descent into drugs. I had insomnia veeeery young and my pediatrician suggested Benadryl to my mom. I began sneaking obscene amounts the older I got. I didn't think twice about it. eventually it got worse but you know life decisions xyz. sober from pills (it got to benzos/etc) for 7/8 years now. OTC pill abuse is an issue most day to day people don't see.

#16 Elisabeth Fritzl’s story.

to put it brief, her father imprisoned his own daughter in a self made bunker/prison, and kept her for over 24 years. In that time, she had 7 children, was r**ed nearly every single day, and Elisabeth’s dad was soon imprisoned for life, and caught because Elisabeth needed to take one of her kids to the hospital. yea. don’t look at the details, please. Image source: SeA1nternaL

#17 Definitely not the most outright disturbing but still incredibly disturbing and more inexplicable was the existence of the monkey hate community. And they’ll just sit around watching videos of baby monkeys commenting s**t like “next you gotta put that f****r in the microwave and watch him squeal”. The part that’s really confusing to me is how these people woke up one day and said “f**k monkeys in particular” Since it really does seem to be specific to monkey for them.

Image source: thiccemotionalpapi, Pixabay

#18 The leg found at the OKC Bombing site.

Image source: Jack-of-Hearts-7, Isaac Taylor Nutshell: A random leg was found in the aftermath of the OKC bombing back in '95. They identified the leg, and exhumed the corpse it belonged to. Only problem? He was already buried with two legs. Except one wasn't his. They swapped his leg, and set to work trying to find the owner of the other leg. DNA testing failed to find out who it belonged to. ...So whose leg was it? Nearly 30 years later, we have no clue. Some say it was a widely believed *third* accomplice to the bombing.

#19 Artifacts from Spanish inquisition Era. A couple of Books supporting their beliefs was enough to make one puke. Then they brought out various "devices" and the explanation scarred me for life.

Image source: Practical_Airline_36, Angel Aroca Escáme Can't believe that humans came with such seriously effed up things to be used on someone. I used to hate humans in general but had a little faith in humanity. After watching the documentary in wayback machine i doubt nothing much has changed. There were also 77 pages fully filled with the names of the victims and the name of the priests who "handled" them. It was a french documentary from 90's and I was just curious about Spain's history, very dark stuff that almost nobody outside Europe/Spain knows about.

#20 I saw someone mention Junko Faruta so I looked her up.

Image source: Drachenfuer, MART PRODUCTION Edit: The worst part was, I had no context before looking. I can’t remeber the exact circumstances, but it was a Reddit post that someone casually mentioned her name but as a missing person or something far leas than what it was. Certainly not the horrors that poor women went through and what happened after. But it was almost a casual mention. The only reason I looked her up was because I thought the name was quite unusual and rather interesting. So I was just wondering if she was famous in Japan or something to look up while being bored and meandering around Reddit. Little did I know…. This was quite awhile ago. Her name comes up frequently now, but it was almost unknown (internationally, I am sure it was well known in Japan) at the time. VeryOddNaw: F***ed up thing is some of the guys who did that are still walking the streets without a care in the world, I have seen some people spam Junko’s image in there accounts though but still I want them dead or behind bars forever.

#21 Bots will downvote me into oblivion and I won't be believed, but up until around 2005, if you looked up 'Balfour accords' on Encyclopedia Brittanica's website, it was shocking how much it disclosed.

Image source: Omniwing, Encyclopædia Britannica Even at the time the Wikipedia article and the Encyclopedia Brittanica's article were very different. It described how the Ottoman Empire, and the whole Middle East was carved up, and their oil was largely given to the conquering powers, IE France, Britain, US. "BP" only exists because it was founded as a company that was taking Middle Eastern war spoils (oil) and selling it through England. The borders of the countries as they are now are because that's how the west decided them to be. And they were purposely carved out in a way to prevent Persia from ever re-uniting. The articles today hint at this and if you dig deep enough you'll find all this to be true, but back in the day the history was laid out in a very stark, obvious manner, and having read that and living today, I can see clearly the erasure of what really happened by way of framing.

#22 Fatal caving accidents. Nutty Putty, but also Floyd Collins too (don't Google these). Learned way more than I care to and it only ensured I will never go caving, at least not in caves tight enough to get trapped forever.

Image source: comeallwithme, Rainer Eck

#23 Ant walking alligators.

Image source: zed2point0, Gonichi Kimura - U.S. National Archives and Records Administration Survivors of nuclear bombings. Very NSFL stuff. The "alligator people" bit refers to their skin being so charred and cracked it looked like reptile skin, and their lips and eyes melted away, making them look like some sort of human-reptiles The "ant-walking" bit is separate, referring to how they aimlessly followed each other around, crawling on all fours due to their ruined limbs, all while making a neverending murmuring noise as they tried to scream but had too damaged vocal cords and throats The more detailed descriptions are probably worse than what you're imagining, but the veracity is also somewhat questioned. The book that describes all this was later withdrawn by the publisher for having several factual errors, exaggerations, using bad sources, etc.

#24 Deep diving into the toy box killer, the tape he plays to his newly kidnapped victims is pretty disturbing even just reading the transcript. .

Image source: ope_sorry_there, cottonbro studio

#25 I got sucked into the world of creepy pasta stories and ended up staying up nights reading about haunted websites and urban legends. It was eerie and I had to take a break to clear my mind!

Image source: GeneralMarkNaird