I've never been shaken by something so real and so true. It sounds like a creepypasta, honestly. It does. It's that fucking scary, dude.
I've been through some rough shit in my life, my parents were like, abusive and stuff and I got bullied... but shit, at the end of the day I had my friends on Steam and Skype to talk to and ignored just about everything that bothered me. I'm on my own now and I drink and laugh with friends and game on my spare time, but... This is just... There are no words for how unbelievable this is. All the pressure of that would've made me fucking crack. It sounds like some sick god damn game that you were forced to play in, not breaking character like that. There are very few things that can stir such fear within me at 2 in the afternoon, but this... It's not like anything I've ever heard. It's frightening. I can't imagine the hell it must've been.
Stuff like this shakes me to the core. I've never been so disturbed by something on the internet before, let alone, not even tales that are real stories.
On the other hand, you sound like a brilliant person, OP. I personally think the way you write is very, very interesting. I hate walls of text so it was a nice pace and it was spaced out so that I actually wanted to read it.
I still cannot believe this. I would expect anyone with this kind of background to be a total dick/psycho/fanatical, but even regardless of all that you're still a well-spoken person.
Thanks for sharing. I've probably never taken the time to read such a lengthy post on Facepunch, seeing as how most just bore me to death before I read them.
Woah.
That guy's fucked up.
I've got two things for you.
One;
[img]http://i.imgur.com/IvgG6nE.png[/img]
Two of those "6 others" I sent messages to. Smith prrrrobably knows what I'm up to by now.
A friend of mine finished her write-up. Here's what she had to say about it all.
[quote] I started drama my eighth grade year, which happened to be my first day at a public school to say I was terrified would not be an exaggeration. I went from class sizes of ten kids to twenty, I signed up for drama and on the first day of class there was a man standing outside shaking kids hands, I came up he shook my hand introduced himself and it made an impact, "this teacher wants to get to know me" I thought to myself. He came out with powerful statements, such as "the day is today and the time is now" and "I am alive" It was all very moving. He informed us that we were now in the business of changing lives, and that the group of people around us were our family. It was all very cool, I immediately found my two best friends in that class, I automatically belonged and at 13 isn't that all anybody wants? Is to belong to something? It was all I wanted.
A couple weeks had passed by and he invited myself and two other girls to an invent to hang out with the advanced drama kids. My mind was blown, I was special, I was one of three selected, what an honor. And that was how he treated it, it was an honor. The kids welcomed us with open arms and he all assigned us to a person to be our mentor. I loved my mentor, she became a sister to me, and honestly to this day we have a relationship very similar to that today. He then began to treat me like an elite and would have me show examples in class, and I have never worked so hard in my life. I needed this mans approval, for what reason I did not know, but I did. I was then invited to watch play practices and my bond with these people grew deeper as we shared our feelings, hardships, and life experiences. I felt so included, I had a family. Second semester we did a play called imaginary, while I did not have a leading role, I was an extra and was informed that I was a necessity and that I had to attend every practice, school days 3-9 (maybe later) and Saturdays we would pull twelve hour days. I had a full time job and it was to be an actress.
One day we were eating dinner a friend had brought and he said to us " If you are not in your seats in Five seconds you all have failed. We scrambled to get to our seats, although we had not much time to eat, but no one made it. We had failed and he made us very aware of it. He threw his sandwich down at the ground and began to yell at us, his booming voice was captivating, we were frozen with fear, he had never really yelled at us before, and from this moment on, I remember he yelled a lot. He had to keep us in our place, remind us constantly that he was in control. Doing a play in junior high is supposed to be fun it should be filled with laughter and memories that will last a life time. While he nailed half of the statement he fell short of the other half, our days were filled with tears and never being able to quite get out of character. He taught us method acting which means you fully become your character, you are no longer you, you are now this character you are playing, and at thirteen being in a dramatic play, that was heavy.
We did a funeral scene for the play that was a video shot that would be inserted in, in the scene one of our school mates had been shot. He walked up to me in the funeral scene and said "Your emotion is not genuine, remember what it was like when your brother died, remember him in that casket in front of you." and I broke down, and he said "There it is!" we cried for hours tears soaking up our faces he called an intermission but none of us could calm down, I followed my friend into the bathroom, sobbing, choking, gasping for air, we could just not shake it off. I threw up and went outside, though I was still far from being collected. A girl I knew dashed into four lanes of traffic, barely being missed. She could not shake it either. I remember he told my friend that her character was a butterfly and to this day she still loves them. We all took away something from him that will forever be a part of us something you cannot change, and something that still unifies us.
It was around these times that the rumors began, I remember we had a meeting because they wanted to cancel the play because it was inappropriate, but we could not let our hard work go to waste, we had to change these people lives, open their eyes to the unity and right way of living which was our way. With some minor changes we were still allowed to do our performance, but the rumors did not stop. People referred to our beloved leader as the devil and we would laugh it off, this man is not the devil he was sacred to us, the person we looked up to, the person who acceptance we begged for, but it was never enough. We even coined a name for ourselves, The Smithities. But we did not care we belonged, we were unified and there was no changing that. Our teachers complained as we would contiually show up to our classes after drama an emotional mess, but we didn't care it was all for our business, all for his work, all for him. The end of the year quickly came upon us. My beloved mentor had to leave and more tears ensued. We were being broken up. I could not believe it, half of my family was leaving and our group was shrinking.
The next year came and I was now at the top of the food chain. Advanced drama was a mess and to top it off I was his TA (Editors note: Teachers Assistant) for a beginning drama class, I was the example, I had to convert these seventh graders to my way of life, which was to worship the ground this man walked on. It was also around this time we began prayer requests, which was just a shitty excuse to cry some more, "My mom has cancer, my dad died, I have cancer, I was raped, my boyfriend hits me, my teachers judge me.." The list was endless, and who knows how much truth each request held, we would often spend entire class periods doing these and crying. I had to sit through this two hours a day and in the class I was the TA for I often had to lead in these requests, make these kids trust this man, let them know that he was here to guide us. I remember once, in the class I was his TA he pulled me up on to stage and said "who are you?" here I was standing in front of 20 plus kids and I came out with, "I'm Kassie" "NO," he hollered back at me, "Who ARE you?" I searched inside for the answer he was looking for, I could not let him down, I couldn't I began to cry searching for the answer inside that he wanted...
"Well if you are going to cry," he said, "Tell the class how it feels to have a drug addict for a father."
I fell to my knees in sobs. And this was how he seized control he would break you down and build you back up, the cycle continued with every child in the class until he had our full control, till he had power over us. My relationship with him was not unique, no matter how much I thought it was. We were all the same, all just chess pieces in his game of control. We had a play coming up called The Room, based on the work of fiction called 12 angry men. We had to change the name though, because we had a female class. I played Juror 7, a women who was abused by her husband, and I had to make this character who I was, which was this broken down helpless woman, who he told me was part of who I was and I needed this character to grow. Why would I argue? Whatever this man said was true, I took it to heart and embodied it. The character work was never ending, he would call one gentlemen a Nigger to get him into character, he would shout at me so I could embody this helpless excuse for a woman. I had to improve scenes with my character outside of the play perform them for my peers and show that my emotion was raw and real. Another boy in the class would walk me home after practice because the practices ran late and it was dark. This was forbidden, he had a talk with me told me I had betrayed his trust and kicked me out of the play, that I could not hang out with these people until I earned his trust back.
He then treated me different from the rest, and told me I could not hang out with this family he built for me outside of class. I was broken and he used his own form of verbal battery to keep me this way. I struggled, I was not whole without these people, without this mans approval, I felt myself sinking drowning, climbing to get my way back to the top. This family of mine had ostracized me because his word was God and they were told to. I talked to my old mentor, the girl who was now at the high school, she explained to me her experiences and how he made her stop talking to her boyfriend and how when she continued to, she was out of the group. I could not believe it, how could this man I adored so much want to hurt us. I searched for answers but came up with nothing, I wanted to be done, but I couldn't I needed his approval, to know he accepted me and most importantly I needed to belong to that group again. I had another chance though, Operation Now. There was a skit involved called everything, where we had kids playing Jesus and the Devil, and the kid who played the Devil was never the same, but how could you be, when you are supposed to embody the Devil and become him.
I was part of a thriller skit, I memorized the dance from the video and taught my group. We had to embody zombies this time around and it changed one of my peers, ever since he has been distant and things between us have never been the same. He wanted me to fall out of the sound booth window onto a thin mat, I have a scar on my knee to this day because of it, because I wanted to please him, if he would have asked me to fall out of a three story window I would have agreed, I needed him. I think that is why we could not have another male in our life, because he did not want us to love or need anyone else's approval but his. After school had ended, I was afraid of this family of mine coming to a close, this time in my life could not end, who was I without this group, I was nothing. They were who I was. We were driving in a car one day that summer, he pulled the car over on the freeway and told us that the drama teacher at the high school we were about to attend was speaking ill of him and we could not listen to her because our way of acting was supreme and our way of life was supreme. I never went back to him after this day. When I met this teacher she was the nicest woman I could have ever met, and she build a different kind of family for us, a healthy one, one that was truly based on love and guidance rather then power.
She pulled us out of our Smithite way of thinking, and I could never be more grateful. Some were not as fortunate though, some were still under his control and it broke my friendship with my very best friend, she did come out though and that friendship is being healed, and I am so thankful. I am still close to these people, but how we became close is an unspoken bond, we joke about it as a way of healing I believe, but to the people who were still sucked in, it was not a joke, it was life, and for us it used to be.
I do not really know how to end this, but he is now training to become a pastor, and honestly I am terrified for the people in his parish. [/quote]
If you have any words to share with the person who wrote this, I will relay them.
Oh man, I just read the whole thing and I feel really sorry for all of you (it isn't written that bad, it's actually nice to read). I hate it when people do fucked up things like that and nobody notices how wrong it actually is.
You wrote that some of the plays got canceled or changed (because of murder scenes and stuff like that). Wasn't there anybody getting suspicious about the whole thing? I mean, murder scenes, funerals and stuff played by and showed to 13 year olds.. what the hell? (you also wrote that in a similar way).
If someone would have suggested such plays in my old school there would have been tons of investigations about the class and the teacher and stuff. To test if he's psychically alright and also that his lessons match the "rules" how to treat students and so on. Just to prevent the things which happened to you.
Also, apart from the fact that Die Welle ("The Wave" - really good movie by the way) stands in direct relation to the Third Reich and that Hitler's ways of getting power still work in today's society, your teacher respectively class and the ones in the movie really were shockingly similar to each other. Above all, in the movie it was just an experiment and in your case, the teacher really meant it.
Good luck for your future life, dude.
[QUOTE=Hoboiam;42538812]
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/IvgG6nE.png[/IMG]
Two of those "6 others" I sent messages to. Smith prrrrobably knows what I'm up to by now.
[/QUOTE]
You know what he's up to? He's covering his ass or something ?
This man sounds incredibly dangerous, manipulative and needs to be stopped. Thank you for sharing OP, this has shaken me to the core and you sound like a great guy, you should definitely write a book about this and try and get those who were around you then to try stop this man.
If you made a movie out of this, it would be the most controversial jaw-droppingly scary movie I'd have ever seen.
And people would love it.
It makes me wanna go out and spend a couple thousand on a camera and equipment just to make it.
Mr. Smith would be a pretty haunting title.
Sounds like it's straight out of vice. In fact I'm pretty sure they'd cover this if they knew
This disturbed me. As someone who's on the path of becoming a teacher, this is especially harrowing. There are teachers we hated or found boring, sure, but some genuinely have gone to the dark side.
[QUOTE=Mr. Zombie;42546407]
Mr. Smith would be a pretty haunting title.[/QUOTE]
What about...
"Methodic"
"Imaginary"
"Smithite"
Though Mr. Smith sounds like the best choice
With the subtitle
"The day is today, and the time is now"
Wow, what an amazing read. Truly, a remarkable story. Although I must give my condolences for your harsh experiences, this has great potential. It's great that you're actively updating the thread as well because I'm curious about Mr. Smith's current whereabouts. Best of luck to you and your classmates.
Dude whoa.
I was wondering where you disappeared.
After this whole thing died down, and now that it's been years, are there any accounts of what happened to the people that never got Smith out of their head? Has there ever been a well remembered conversation with them later on?
[QUOTE=Incoming.;42567341]After this whole thing died down, and now that it's been years, are there any accounts of what happened to the people that never got Smith out of their head? Has there ever been a well remembered conversation with them later on?[/QUOTE]
You just brought a memory back from highschool drama.
Smith would spring up in conversation every so often. Kinda hard not to, considering it was pretty much all the same people. Well me and the guy who played Jesus in the Lifehouse-Everything skit were hanging out before a show. We were backstage walking to go grab some props, and somehow Smiths name came up, and my friend said something along the lines of "man, that guy was fucked up."
Suddenly, a smithite bounds around the corner like a fucking phantom. She says "Don't you dare talk about him like that."
My friend asks "Who, Smith?"
"Just. Don't."
"W-"
"Don't you DARE."
And then she just skirted off angrily somewhere. Me and my friend looked at each other and just started laughing our asses off. I never talked to smithites in highschool because there WAS no talking to them. They were too far gone to even hold a conversation with. The ones who knew I hated smith steered clear anyways.
That girl that got upset? She was one of the six that met with Mr. Smith two nights back.
Fucking amazingly harrowing read. That Satan bit had me away from the computer for half an hour before i could read the rest. I'm glad you made it out alive, cults are bad, bad, bad, bad, bad.
[QUOTE=Cheesedragon;42571318]Fucking amazingly harrowing read. That Satan bit had me away from the computer for half an hour before i could read the rest. I'm glad you made it out alive, cults are bad, bad, bad, bad, bad.[/QUOTE]
I imagine some of his hearing faded away from listening to music like that in such a small space, I imagine it'd be similar to having headphones on and blaring them.
[QUOTE=Hoboiam;42517058]I did theater all through highschool. Wrote/directed my own plays that won a few awards, and acted in two of the major productions. Those being Cash On Delivery and Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Both of those plays won best in state, allowing us to perform at a local Thespian Conference in front of 2000 other actors. There wasn't a time during curtain call that I didn't cry at Thespian, because it was 2000 of my peers, people who have the same passions I do, and every single one of them is standing on their feet screaming their fucking minds off.
I had groupies. A girl yelled her phone number at me. I'm not joking.
Joseph did so well that we actually sold out an ACTUAL theater. Not just our highschool theater, we took it to a legitimate, full-sized 1600 seat capacity theater, and sold out three nights in a row. It was a big deal.
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhltVtxiJyY&list=FLKFmQNo9j7STuYuykfh84LA&index=47[/media]
I chestbump a dude at 0:43.
Joseph, if I remember correctly, was in the top five for best plays nationally, but we did walk away with best Ensemble in the entire united states. I was actually voted best ensemble member by my peers, so I like to brag about that all the time to people who don't give a shit. (LIKE YOU)
In college I played The Wall in Midsummer Nights Dream, where I was one of only two students from that school selected by a judge to audition for scholarships at the KCACTF acting festival up in Ogden, Utah. I got knocked out the first round.
We also took a play up there for national judging, the play was called The Bald Soprano by Eugene Ionesco, and I played the fire chief, who has lines like:
I dropped out of college after that semester. Life just got in the way, and I haven't acted in anything or written a play since. I really, really want to get back on stage, though.[/QUOTE]
As an actor myself and someone very involved in the drama department, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat was our best selling play ever. We had to add shows because people were literally angry that they couldn't get a seat. (600~ people in a theater.)
Fortunately enough I haven't experienced nearly the same amount of acting you have or have even gone around method acting as we're more of an upbeat drama department. Method acting is something that's always interested me and I've dug a little into it, but the shit you guys did were far from even slightly possible in our district. Anything to do with any sort of violence would be denied immediately. I can't lie, though; I haven't done as much as I should in acting seeing as I aspire to work in the theater art field whether it be movies or whatever comes to me. If you have any advice, let me know. I'm still getting into this after being that one kid who didn't really know if he wanted to participate in anything until it was almost too late.
Seems like he
needs to be removed
[QUOTE=The mouse;42492818]and I thought I had crazy Drama teachers...[/QUOTE]
You took the words right out of my mouth.
Met with two old friends last night. Talked in a coffee shop for five hours. They told me a story of a girl who was smiths student, who was afraid of dating boys because Smith would disapprove, and punish her (As was the case with many a female student in the past, as I would later find out)
Smith made an off comment about how this girl and a fellow student would make a good couple together. Five months later they got married.
Smith walked her down the fucking aisle.
I'm going to write a book. Thank you all SO much for giving me the inspiration to follow up on this. I never expected this reaction. I expected a ton of dumb ratings with a lot of questions, but what I got was really something else. The support, the compliments, you guys are just too dope. I'll try to keep you guys posted. This shit's getting made.
I wish you the best of luck with your book.
Hey if you become a big millionaire from your best selling book, at least mention us. Alright ?
Just joking, good luck man you're awesome.
Can't wait to read the book. The tale is more than worth reading a second time.
[QUOTE=Limed00d;42550513]What about...
"Methodic"
"Imaginary"
"Smithite"
Though Mr. Smith sounds like the best choice
With the subtitle
"The day is today, and the time is now"[/QUOTE]
I like "Imaginary"
Prefer Mr. Smith, but that might be too generic.
Are you sure you'd be able to use his name in your book without permission?
[QUOTE=A big fat ass;42652225]Are you sure you'd be able to use his name in your book without permission?[/QUOTE]
Simple solution: "Based on real events"
Mr. Schmidt
A year has passed since the last development. In that year I've spoken with former teachers at my old Junior High, sharing my story, gathering information. I've had teachers tell me that if any one of them spoke ill of Smith, they would be reprimanded almost immediately. They shared their own anecdotes, describing Smith as a tyrant.
A year has passed. I saw Smith respond to a Facebook post on a friends wall, and it sent me into a mini panic attack. The feeling that he was a click away from being able to contact me instilled in me a dread I hadn't felt in a long, long time.
A year has passed. I turned 22, and went back to school, focusing on becoming either an English or Drama teacher. To right the wrongs of Smith. To dismiss his philosophies, and give back to the community in ways he maliciously believed he could.
In my intro to education class, we were assigned to share a story about a teacher that impacted our lives in one way or another. I, of course, decided to do the obvious thing and share some of the details I shared with you all. My teacher let me speak beyond the time limit my classmates were bound to as I went into the details of method acting, about the girl that sprinted into traffic, and about prayer requests. About the people he hurt. My teacher, who's been involved in education for many years, knew exactly who I was talking about.
It turns out his wife is the tennis coach at my old junior high, and she was there while Smith was teaching. He said he didn't believe Smith was a "pseudo-cult leader," as I described it, but that he had definitely been doing stuff he shouldn't have. I told him I'd be sending him an email with a full write-up. The write-up I shared with all of you.
A year has passed, and time will never wipe away the events that transpired in that junior high classroom.
I was approached after that class period by a young woman. A class-mate I hadn't noticed, and a face I hadn't seen in over six years. The wedding ring and pregnant belly filled me in on her goings-on before she even spoke a word,
"Taylor?"
It was a smithite. The same one that Smith had walked down the Isle at her wedding.
"Oh heeeeeeeeey!" I was genuinely surprised to see her. I wonder if she would have ever approached me if I hadn't brought up Smith, and I suppose we'll never know considering I had just ousted him as a cult leader and all, causing my classmates to groan in disgust at his actions.
After the brief catching-up, she immediately lunged for the heart of the matter. About eight years have passed. But some things never change.
"So I know you had Smith for the plays, and all that, and I know he really respected you as a student, but...You don't know him like I do. And I really don't appreciate your harsh words in class today. I'm still close to Mr. Smith to this day, and hearing those negative things being said about a man I admire really hurts."
I had to bite my lip to prevent myself from laughing. This is insane. At the time, I told myself that if I had known she was in that class, I wouldn't have gone so far. I would have left more to the imagination and use less harsh wordplay as I went. In retrospect, fuck all that. I said exactly what I meant to say, and nobody would change my mind on that.
Even so, I clasped my hands together and tried to choose my words carefully. "Well, I appreciate the fact that you didn't just, like...attack me, or anything." She laughed. "But I was in that classroom, I know what went on, and I went over everything I remember. I mean, you have to remember people like Jack, and Devin-"
"Well, Devin was...Devin..." She interjected. "Yeah, I know. he's weird. But I mean..."
I continued "Well that's not all, I mean I'm gonna be sending a write-up of everything I remember from that class. If you want, I could send it to you, as well."
She didn't seem interested. After a little small talk we parted ways. I sent the write-up to my teacher with an apology for the language, stating it was never intended to be read in an academic environment. He pulled me aside the next class period, and filled me in on what he thought.
I don't remember what he said verbatim, but he explained how he read it with his wife, and she could attest to a lot of the things that I had written. He said what Smith had done was clearly child abuse, and he was astounded that it had gone on for so long. I told him there was a theory that the principal at the time was his cousin.
And that's when he told me the truth.
No, the principal was not his cousin, they were just good friends. But the superintendent of the entire district was his uncle, and was a very good man. The reason teachers were reprimanded when bringing concerns with Smith to the forefront was for concern of his uncle. People were wary that the fallout would land on his shoulders, and they didn't want to see him in hot water. After Smith had left, and reports finally started to reach official ears, the superintendent apparently stated that if he had known the severity of the situation, he would have acted.
My teacher went on to explain that the principal was fired (or forced to resign, I can't remember the exact wording) shortly after the entire situation, for a reason I can't remember. I was too focused on the uncle realization to really hear much else. But he went on to say that as a man who's been in the education system for many years, as a former principal and board head, he had a responsibility to report the incidents that transpired.
He told me he sent a copy of my write-up to the current principal at the school, as well as other officials. I contemplated letting him in on the fact that there was a wolf among us, in the form of a smithite, but I decided against it. If he had any ill words towards that wicked man, I wanted it to be unfiltered.
This was last month, and I received more info today. After a student presentation on bullying in schools, my instructor got to the front of the class and began to speak. He went on to say he had no tolerance for bullying as a principal or a teacher, and he would nip it in the bud at any sign of escalation. Then he dropped the fuckin' bomb.
"Now, Taylor, I don't mean to pick on you..."
My eyes widened, I made a quick glance over to the smithite, who had immediately sat to attention.
"But you were bullied, of course, by a teacher. That story you told to us in class, I dunno how in detail you want to go here, but what happened in that classroom was inexcusable. And that email you sent me, of course I sent it to the proper officials, and I want you to know it's currently being escalated, and investigated."
I nodded, and smiled. The smithite took a big breath, a nervous swig of water, and I fully believe if cell phones were allowed in class, she would have been tapping away at her phone so hard that we could feel the vibrations of each impact. She didn't look back at me, she didn't say anythin she just stewed. I don't doubt Smith knows these facts. I hadn't expected that development to come out publicly like that, but it's not like his knowledge of the situation changes much. If any legal action is to be taken, I doubt Smith would skip town, dye his hair, and adapt a new persona. I hardly doubt anything will come of this, but only time will tell.
A year has passed since our last development. Not much has changed, but everything has. The book hasn't been started, only one student interview has taken place. I'm waiting until after college, when I can truly be proud of my writing style. Who knows what happens next?
If crazy cultists carve "Today is the day, and the time is now" into my chest, I promise to take pictures.
dude your life is just... I don't even know it's a strange mix of unfathomable, awesome, and terrifying.
Oh god some of those videos were scary how serious it was.
When you're younger, it's harder to make the differentiations between what different teachers say, because they're teachers.
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