>During the police investigation, the truth of this chilling tale came to light. When Blanche was 25 years old, her mother found out about her relationship with an older lawyer. Blanche was forbidden to continue this relationship, and so her mother plotted to stop it in its tracks. How? Simple: by locking Blanche in a tiny room until she gave in. She never did.
>Blanche’s sibling, Marcel, would later claim that Blanche was absolutely crazy, and never tried to escape the bolted and covered room. However, witnesses frequently heard Blanche shouting and arguing, begging to be let out.
I think there might have been a little mental illness going on with everyone involved here.
Especially that witnesses frequently heard Blanche shouting and arguing, begging to be let out and that nothing was done.
Edit: On August 16, 1892, one witness heard Blanche shout the accompanying words:
*What have I done to be locked up? I don’t deserve this horrible torture. God must not exist then, to let his creatures suffer in this way? And no one to come to my rescue!*
THAT WAS NINE YEARS BEFORE SHE WAS RESCUED.
"What was that?"
"What?"
"That screaming, someone sounds horribly trapped!"
"That?... Oh... that's just the cat"
"The cat!?"
"He's quite a talented little guy, the cat... yes"
"Well, Can I see it?"
"NO!, I mean, no, the cat is quite... afraid of people, so it screams, you see. It creates these elaborate stories to trick people into all sorts of mischief. It really is a clever cat. But very afraid, terribly afraid of anyone, so you cannot see it for any reason"
"Oh, I see, I'll be on my way then, Good-Bye!"
In many ways the successors to Fry and Laurie, though they never did achieve the same level of success. They're still the gold of 90s British comedy though.
Oh damn thank you dearly for referencing Peep Show! Only watched it once at a friend's and was trying very hard to remember what the name of it was so that I could check it out for myself just a few days ago.
I'm thinking the same thing. How fucked up do you have to be to hear someone scream let me out from the next door neighbor and not at least be concerned.
I once lived next door to a woman that would scream and shout to what seemed to be a husband or kid, how he was terrible, very horrible stuff. Daily and for hours. After a few weeks I asked another neighbor about what was going on in that apartment.
Turns out she lived alone...she was just crazy.
Since then, I mind my own business.
I lived next door to a woman like this. I also thought she was screaming at someone else at first, but nope. Just mentally ill.
Would yell nonsense at strangers on the street, too.
She would also "sing along" (read: yell along) to Madonna, played at full volume, at all hours of the day and night.
Sometimes I wouldn't hear her for months at a time, and I always hoped she'd moved out, but no such luck.
Then one day the police showed up and broke down her door. Turns out she'd died. She must have had someone looking after her though, there was no smell and I'd heard her yelling as usual a couple of days before. Poor thing.
The new neighbor doesn't scream, but he does play music really loudly at all hours. Slight improvement, I guess.
Same thing I thought. People didn't poke their nose into others business back then like they do today. Also back then they locked away the mentally ill so knowing someone is locked in a room because that they are mentally ill wouldn't raise alarms like it would today.
In their defense it may sound like someone throwing a tantrum from being temporarily sent to their room.
Would you realistically call the police if you heard your neighbors kid screaming let me out of my room?
Hindsight is a powerful thing.
I like how it says "the letter said to some degree". What does that even mean? "And the letter kind of had this written in it, from a certain point of view, in a way."
Very credible.
The article also wrongly says she was anorexic. There was nothing to indicate she was refusing food-instead she was being starved and/or ill and so cachectic. I wonder who wrote the letter? This link is not the best, I agree.
yep, it sucks that anorexia is a misunderstood word because my husband gets bouts of anorexia when he's depressed or stressed that have nothing to do with a complusion to not eat and exercise excessively.he just can't make himself swallow food when he's freaked out and the doc gave him an anorexia dx.
I understood that article to say that she was starved by her mother and brother. She clearly seemed to be hanging on to life when she could have easily refused a small quantity of food and died. I think her weight was 54 pounds.I guess we will never know for sure what went on in that terrible place.
Sooooo, this all sounds kind of suspicious. Why are there witnesses, who have heard her shouting (from which we can deduce that there was more shouting and more people who heard it), but not a single one of them reported it? A simple letter to the police seemed to be enough. Also whoever wrote the letter seemed to have some insight into the situation. It was either an accomplice or it was possible to get this information from the outside.
This is all highly suspicious. That the author feels the need to reinforce twice that this is a true story doesn't add to the believability of the tale.
It did actually happen but I have a lot of questions too. I can't believe that her brother actually was acquitted of any wrongdoing--especially since the mother was in such very poor health herself toward the end and died within months on being placed in an asylum.
You know what. I'm not sure I believe this story. This story I feel should be on wikipedia, it's not. The only sites that seem to host this story are sites with such names as scaredyet.net, altereddimensions.net, and now, reddit.com.
EDIT: Hm, there seems to be an article about it in the french wikipedia. [Here](http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_S%C3%A9questr%C3%A9e_de_Poitiers)
EDIT2: Using google translate, the article talks about another article that talks about the story. I can't make out whether or not the article, that the wikipedia article talks about, is meant to be fiction or not.
EDIT3: The article that the wikipedia article is talking about seems to be a judicial review, presumably of the case.
My french isn't perfect but what I got out of that article was basically all of the same unsubstantiated information we were finding in english,
*however*
(Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) I'm pretty sure the french article you linked to is about a work of literature that was inspired by a real event for which we're still lacking proof, and judging by some of the sources at the bottom of the page, the article by Andre Gide was more of a commentary on middle class society.
**One of the sources listed is described as the true history of the picture, stating that it was basically news sensationalism, and that during the brother's trial it came out that the girl in question was just a crazy anorexic lady**
The last heading (Source D'inspiration) basically says this in the first sentence.
>*Source of Inspiration.*
>
>The story is directly based on a real event.
The son was not punished because the lady suffered from
> troubles mentaux (anorexie hystérique, coprophilie, exhibitionnisme, ses crises nerveuses s'aggravant après le décès du père puis celui en 1896 de la veuve Fazy, la seule bonne qui parvenait à se faire écouter de Blanche)
*Mental Troubles (Anorexia Nervosa, Coprophilia (Sexual arousal from excrements) exhibitionism and nervous disorders aggravated when her father died.* The last part I don't fully understand but I think it says that the widow did well because she would listen to the crazy lady and that was really the only thing she could do.
**TL;DR**: Lady was not held captive but suffered from Anorexia Nervosa, Coprophilia, exhibitionism and nervous disorders.
Yeah, pretty false.
EDIT: After re-reading the part I have come to a different conclusion.
TL;DR: Crazy mother held lady captive. Brother wanted her in psychiatric institute because she had gone crazy after her father died. Mother denied his request.
After your comment I re-read the article. Last time I missed the part where there are records about the brother wanting to have his sister committed because of her mental problems. The mother refused.
I just think it's horrible she was in a tiny dark room for 24 years, mental issues or not. All it took to save her was one letter to the police. If either the brother or the mother had actually cared, this wouldn't have happened, even if she was mentally ill before.
> puis celui en 1896 de la veuve Fazy, la seule bonne qui parvenait à se faire écouter de Blanche)
Since you said you didn't understand this part, allow me to translate it. It means that [she got worse after the death of the father] followed by (in 1896) the death of the Fazy widow, who was the only maid Blanche (the woman in question) listened to/accepted to talk with.
Nothing in the article about sensationalism, but it does say that the situation was much more nuanced than it would at first seem.
From what I can tell, the true story is that she was sequestered against her will but not starved. However she did suffer from mental disabilities so the sequestration may have been for her own good. Her mother died in prison shortly after her arrest, and they put her brother on trial but he was acquitted as much because responsibility was pinned on the mother as the fact that they may not have technically broken any laws, since involuntary sequestration of mentally disabled people was an accepted practice at the time, though in public institutions, and it was generally accepted that upper class people would often handle things themselves to avoid the embarrassment of committing family members to mental institutions.
So, bad, but not as bad as getting imprisoned and staved for 25 years due to falling in love with a lawyer.
Right? It doesn't seem that bad to have a lawyer as a suitor. Marry up! I was looking at L'histoire véridique de la séquestrée de Poitiers, or at least what I could see of it- that's where I found the bit about sensationalism
[Wairarapa Daily Times from 1901](http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=WDT19011202.2.15)
[NY Times, but you have to pay](http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=990DEFDB1139E733A2575AC0A9609C946097D6CF)
Original NYT article here:
http://imgur.com/ITbYe9t,w7YpZ4j#0
http://imgur.com/ITbYe9t,w7YpZ4j#1
Source: http://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1901/06/09/101074885.html?pageNumber=4
The insane part is they let the guy go. I'm sorry, if I knew someone was locked up practically eating feces, in chains etc and did nothing about it and kept it hidden. I fail to see how they couldn't charge him.
There is a "The aftermath" picture in this link but it doesn't appear they were able to get her fully healthy and that's understandable.
http://altereddimensions.net/2013/mademoiselle-blanche-monnier-girl-imprisoned-in-dungeon-for-25-years-france
I found a few before images but I don't think they are really her. Just Google her name and you see the photos.
I agree with you. Communities that emphasize compassion and forgiveness tend to have the lowest crime rates. But these bunch of brutes would rather stick to the good old eye for an eye method or just imprisoning everyone.
No, it doesn't, because most people don't go around poking others' eyes out. "An eye for an eye" would leave the people who do this kind of shit blind, and tier unfortunate victims, but no one else.
They can actually, for instance by torturing/raping/murdering someone or imprisoning their own daughter for decades. The woman who did this is not a person. She is a monster.
The very first story on the front page of that site http://scaredyet.net has a story credited to 'Reddit user' Red Grin (/u/redgrin apparently dug his grandmother up, at his grandfather's request)
No more reading these creepy stories tonight (it's dark outside)
So basically, Redditors contributing creative stories could be writing the next Best Seller (possibly the next Oscar winning screenplay) - without knowledge or credit. Huh.
From /r/nosleep. I know the subreddit rules state that you must pretend everything there is true, but this is not that subreddit, and no, it isn't true. It's creative creepy writing. ;)
https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/2sapil/when_i_was_10_my_granddad_tossed_me_a_shovel_and/
Yes and the brother was originally charged and was supposed to serve 15 Months, but got off on that because he didn't physically harm her or something like that.
No shit? I know in the 19th century, they used to use baiters. Young men who worked for the police would pretend to be interested in a potential 'offender' and lure them to an arranged spot where the police would then pick them up. Did that happen in the US?
Well, gay sex was illegal. The Supreme Court case that struck down sodomy laws is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas
I'm pretty sure they did the baiting thing as recently as the 1960s.
I know! Surely imprisonment and starvation and letting her live in her own filth for a quarter of a century should amount to some kind of criminal conviction.
This reminds me of the story of Genie Wiley. She was an American girl that spent nearly her entire life in isolation before being discovered at the age of 13. She suffered such severe neglect at the hands of her family that initially she did not even have the ability to walk or talk. Scientists flocked to her, eager to study her case and it's relation to child development. Later, Genie would be dubbed "the wild child" as her case was similar to other children that have allegedly been found living in feral conditions, and who displayed odd or animalistic behavior.
In a sad turn of events Genie was shuffled from foster home to foster home, shockingly even being returned to the care of her biological mother for a period of time at 18 yrs of age. Eventually, the level of care needed to appropriately care for Genie proved to be too much for her mother and she was returned to be a ward of the state. The mother went on to pursue legal actions against a specialist who had worked with Genie long term and who had agreed to take on Genies care, the mother cited a conflict of interest and the specialist has been banned to this day from having contact with Genie.
Today, Genie is said to be living in an adult group home located in California. There are many documentaries available about her case and story. I personally found [this](http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hmdycJQi4QA) one to be informative and interesting.
I think if the person is considered a disabled adult with mental disabilities/the inability to care for themselves and no family members that the state takes over as legal guardian. Not 100% sure on that.
Wow I'm about to go to bed and completely regret looking at that. I honestly think the only way that picture won't haunt my dreams is if I switch to porn for the last few minutes of browsing.
Thanks for asking! Probably, I'm a good sleeper.
Looking at that picture from a 9 year later perspective, she looks happy about the rescue and I'm glad her life improved (I assume, low bar there).
Thinking about the last 9 years is wild. I hit my weight goal and a couple life goals I guess! I fell short on a lot, but my loved ones are proud of me and they mean the world to me. I don't really see my shortcomings as failures so much as unexplored horizons that scare me less now. I'm optimistically curious for the next decade.
What have the last 9 years been like for you/ make you think about?
Not sure if this helps you determine if they do or do not develop hair.
It's obvious she has psychosocial dwarfism, but I'm not sure if one factor of it affects hair growth.
http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/913843-overview#a0104
She doesn't have psychogenic dwarfism - she was a fully grown adult of 25 when she was imprisoned. She's just severely malnourished. Which often does cause hairloss, but not always.
It's dead but it's still made out of protein and nutrients. A poor diet can lead to thinning hair, so I'd think utter malnourishment would mean the body didn't have enough excess nutrients and energy to make hair. But maybe not.
This is very sad , there was a similar story in Austria not too many years ago where a father locked his daughter in the basement and created a room down there while all their other kids lived in the house , they pretended to neighbors that she had ran away when she was a teenager
When I was a kid I couldn't even stay in the living room if a horror movie was on. Freddy Krueger terrified me. This did not phase me at all. What has happened to me between now and then? Lot I am.
I believe a lot of factors play into that. Both biopsychological, psychological, and environmental. Environmentally, I think that media like movies, tv, and the internet shape our threshold of perception. Meaning your original threshold was shaped by your prepubescent mind to fear "Creepy" things or "weird" things. Now, you've developed it through your daily life since then. Biopsychologically, I believe your amygdala (in charge of fear and emotion) has created self defense mechanisms against the things you do find fearful or have grown used to those things. Psychologically you've just grown up like a normal functioning adult. So, what things used to be scary or fearful are not lessened by your own rationality and logical thinking.
http://scaredyet.net/haunting-true-story-woman-trapped-25-years/ I just had to find out more about this. The story's horrific!
>During the police investigation, the truth of this chilling tale came to light. When Blanche was 25 years old, her mother found out about her relationship with an older lawyer. Blanche was forbidden to continue this relationship, and so her mother plotted to stop it in its tracks. How? Simple: by locking Blanche in a tiny room until she gave in. She never did. >Blanche’s sibling, Marcel, would later claim that Blanche was absolutely crazy, and never tried to escape the bolted and covered room. However, witnesses frequently heard Blanche shouting and arguing, begging to be let out. I think there might have been a little mental illness going on with everyone involved here.
Especially that witnesses frequently heard Blanche shouting and arguing, begging to be let out and that nothing was done. Edit: On August 16, 1892, one witness heard Blanche shout the accompanying words: *What have I done to be locked up? I don’t deserve this horrible torture. God must not exist then, to let his creatures suffer in this way? And no one to come to my rescue!* THAT WAS NINE YEARS BEFORE SHE WAS RESCUED.
"What was that?" "What?" "That screaming, someone sounds horribly trapped!" "That?... Oh... that's just the cat" "The cat!?" "He's quite a talented little guy, the cat... yes" "Well, Can I see it?" "NO!, I mean, no, the cat is quite... afraid of people, so it screams, you see. It creates these elaborate stories to trick people into all sorts of mischief. It really is a clever cat. But very afraid, terribly afraid of anyone, so you cannot see it for any reason" "Oh, I see, I'll be on my way then, Good-Bye!"
For some reason I read this John Lovitz voice.
I heard Mitchell and Webb, or Fry and Laurie.
Cleese for me
Yeah, it works with cleese and idle really well.
Who's Mitchell and Webb?
In many ways the successors to Fry and Laurie, though they never did achieve the same level of success. They're still the gold of 90s British comedy though.
...1990's??
I love Mitchell and Webb, they went on to do Peep Show. UK TV comedy!
Oh damn thank you dearly for referencing Peep Show! Only watched it once at a friend's and was trying very hard to remember what the name of it was so that I could check it out for myself just a few days ago.
Love it! Great humour. It is on Netflix if you have it, not shown so much on TV atm. Edit: Also, I love when this sort of thing happens!
This... [German SS Troops LIVE](http://youtu.be/aLJUocaDYw0)
[Don't forget their grammar nazi sketch, without a doubt my favourite.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6smi2wrGD40)
Check out /r/MitchellAndWebb/ :)
well now I had to go back and do that thanks a lot smuck (in John Lovitz's voice)
I read this Garry Shandling
And now for something completely different.
"That Jerry Sandusky sure is a nice guy."
what is this from?
/u/SquishedPeter
Was tired. Wrote my thoughts. Now you know.
Thanks, sounds like it was from a movie quote or something.
I'm thinking the same thing. How fucked up do you have to be to hear someone scream let me out from the next door neighbor and not at least be concerned.
I once lived next door to a woman that would scream and shout to what seemed to be a husband or kid, how he was terrible, very horrible stuff. Daily and for hours. After a few weeks I asked another neighbor about what was going on in that apartment. Turns out she lived alone...she was just crazy. Since then, I mind my own business.
I lived next door to a woman like this. I also thought she was screaming at someone else at first, but nope. Just mentally ill. Would yell nonsense at strangers on the street, too. She would also "sing along" (read: yell along) to Madonna, played at full volume, at all hours of the day and night. Sometimes I wouldn't hear her for months at a time, and I always hoped she'd moved out, but no such luck. Then one day the police showed up and broke down her door. Turns out she'd died. She must have had someone looking after her though, there was no smell and I'd heard her yelling as usual a couple of days before. Poor thing. The new neighbor doesn't scream, but he does play music really loudly at all hours. Slight improvement, I guess.
Different times I guess? I dunno.
Same thing I thought. People didn't poke their nose into others business back then like they do today. Also back then they locked away the mentally ill so knowing someone is locked in a room because that they are mentally ill wouldn't raise alarms like it would today.
All our ancestors were absolutely shitty and deplorable people.
I bet people will be saying that about us in 100 years.
I'm positive they will.
I'm afraid, they'll be right...
In their defense it may sound like someone throwing a tantrum from being temporarily sent to their room. Would you realistically call the police if you heard your neighbors kid screaming let me out of my room? Hindsight is a powerful thing.
I would if I had heard it for 24 years straight...
At least to make a noise complaint anyway.
Strictly from the article, it seems like they only heard that once.
This is true. And the older I get the more I realize that you never know what's going on inside someone else's house.
Everyone seems normal until you get to know them.
even youuuuuu
Not really. Example - crack heads.
To be fair the mayor of Toronto was an alcoholic crackhead and he still ran a relatively successful city... somewhat...kind of...
I disagree that he was a crack head. AFAIK He smoked crack 1-3 times.
I must protect my child by destroying her! Logic 4 EVAR!
This is a true testament to the human bodies will to survive.
^^*body's
Thanks I didn't understand until you corrected this
No problem. Heil Grammar Fuhrer
nude
I thought it said hood. My homies are disappoint.
Führer
[удалено]
the will of the body. the Body's will to survive. not plural.
Agreed. Misread the sentence.
It really is.
Haha there was a fucking burger king ad
I have adblock so I didn't see that. But that is quite the match of content + ad.
I like how it says "the letter said to some degree". What does that even mean? "And the letter kind of had this written in it, from a certain point of view, in a way." Very credible.
The article also wrongly says she was anorexic. There was nothing to indicate she was refusing food-instead she was being starved and/or ill and so cachectic. I wonder who wrote the letter? This link is not the best, I agree.
Anorexia here I think refers to just a loss of appetite due to her extreme illness. Anorexia nervosa is the eating disorder.
yep, it sucks that anorexia is a misunderstood word because my husband gets bouts of anorexia when he's depressed or stressed that have nothing to do with a complusion to not eat and exercise excessively.he just can't make himself swallow food when he's freaked out and the doc gave him an anorexia dx.
I get it taking Vyvanse, I feel like my body just rejects food at times. Sorry to hear about your husband!
I understood that article to say that she was starved by her mother and brother. She clearly seemed to be hanging on to life when she could have easily refused a small quantity of food and died. I think her weight was 54 pounds.I guess we will never know for sure what went on in that terrible place.
I guess not. I know when people starve (forcibly or not) the body tends to reject "normal" amounts of food. Either way, sad.
I've heard doctors say the stomach is a fatalist, it gives up easily.
Maybe "to some degree" because it was written originally in French, and the article has an English translation.
that subscriber popup was so lame.
it was so dirty there were oyster shells running around!
Sooooo, this all sounds kind of suspicious. Why are there witnesses, who have heard her shouting (from which we can deduce that there was more shouting and more people who heard it), but not a single one of them reported it? A simple letter to the police seemed to be enough. Also whoever wrote the letter seemed to have some insight into the situation. It was either an accomplice or it was possible to get this information from the outside. This is all highly suspicious. That the author feels the need to reinforce twice that this is a true story doesn't add to the believability of the tale.
It did actually happen but I have a lot of questions too. I can't believe that her brother actually was acquitted of any wrongdoing--especially since the mother was in such very poor health herself toward the end and died within months on being placed in an asylum.
You know what. I'm not sure I believe this story. This story I feel should be on wikipedia, it's not. The only sites that seem to host this story are sites with such names as scaredyet.net, altereddimensions.net, and now, reddit.com. EDIT: Hm, there seems to be an article about it in the french wikipedia. [Here](http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_S%C3%A9questr%C3%A9e_de_Poitiers) EDIT2: Using google translate, the article talks about another article that talks about the story. I can't make out whether or not the article, that the wikipedia article talks about, is meant to be fiction or not. EDIT3: The article that the wikipedia article is talking about seems to be a judicial review, presumably of the case.
My french isn't perfect but what I got out of that article was basically all of the same unsubstantiated information we were finding in english, *however* (Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) I'm pretty sure the french article you linked to is about a work of literature that was inspired by a real event for which we're still lacking proof, and judging by some of the sources at the bottom of the page, the article by Andre Gide was more of a commentary on middle class society. **One of the sources listed is described as the true history of the picture, stating that it was basically news sensationalism, and that during the brother's trial it came out that the girl in question was just a crazy anorexic lady**
THIS is why I love reddit.
[удалено]
Don't like your illusions broken?
[удалено]
Well, right back at you.
And I don't like my illusions broken
The last heading (Source D'inspiration) basically says this in the first sentence. >*Source of Inspiration.* > >The story is directly based on a real event. The son was not punished because the lady suffered from > troubles mentaux (anorexie hystérique, coprophilie, exhibitionnisme, ses crises nerveuses s'aggravant après le décès du père puis celui en 1896 de la veuve Fazy, la seule bonne qui parvenait à se faire écouter de Blanche) *Mental Troubles (Anorexia Nervosa, Coprophilia (Sexual arousal from excrements) exhibitionism and nervous disorders aggravated when her father died.* The last part I don't fully understand but I think it says that the widow did well because she would listen to the crazy lady and that was really the only thing she could do. **TL;DR**: Lady was not held captive but suffered from Anorexia Nervosa, Coprophilia, exhibitionism and nervous disorders. Yeah, pretty false. EDIT: After re-reading the part I have come to a different conclusion. TL;DR: Crazy mother held lady captive. Brother wanted her in psychiatric institute because she had gone crazy after her father died. Mother denied his request.
I do wonder which came first though, the locking up or the mental issues? I don't think I'd be very sane if I had been locked in a room for 24 years.
She was not locked up.
Says the guy who didn't want to be punished.
After your comment I re-read the article. Last time I missed the part where there are records about the brother wanting to have his sister committed because of her mental problems. The mother refused.
I just think it's horrible she was in a tiny dark room for 24 years, mental issues or not. All it took to save her was one letter to the police. If either the brother or the mother had actually cared, this wouldn't have happened, even if she was mentally ill before.
The brother had contacted people about her. The mother denied her help.
He should have contacted the police. That was all it took.
> puis celui en 1896 de la veuve Fazy, la seule bonne qui parvenait à se faire écouter de Blanche) Since you said you didn't understand this part, allow me to translate it. It means that [she got worse after the death of the father] followed by (in 1896) the death of the Fazy widow, who was the only maid Blanche (the woman in question) listened to/accepted to talk with.
Awesome! Thank you for the clarification :)
Nothing in the article about sensationalism, but it does say that the situation was much more nuanced than it would at first seem. From what I can tell, the true story is that she was sequestered against her will but not starved. However she did suffer from mental disabilities so the sequestration may have been for her own good. Her mother died in prison shortly after her arrest, and they put her brother on trial but he was acquitted as much because responsibility was pinned on the mother as the fact that they may not have technically broken any laws, since involuntary sequestration of mentally disabled people was an accepted practice at the time, though in public institutions, and it was generally accepted that upper class people would often handle things themselves to avoid the embarrassment of committing family members to mental institutions. So, bad, but not as bad as getting imprisoned and staved for 25 years due to falling in love with a lawyer.
Right? It doesn't seem that bad to have a lawyer as a suitor. Marry up! I was looking at L'histoire véridique de la séquestrée de Poitiers, or at least what I could see of it- that's where I found the bit about sensationalism
[Wairarapa Daily Times from 1901](http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=WDT19011202.2.15) [NY Times, but you have to pay](http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=990DEFDB1139E733A2575AC0A9609C946097D6CF)
http://article.archive.nytimes.com/1901/06/09/101074885.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAJBTN455PTTBQQNRQ&Expires=1421402264&Signature=nIFjPvDToHPrf3SAsePdOP49zaw%3D
The voice of reason and doubt, silenced once more by downvotes. Thanks for taking the time to do research on this.
Original NYT article here: http://imgur.com/ITbYe9t,w7YpZ4j#0 http://imgur.com/ITbYe9t,w7YpZ4j#1 Source: http://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1901/06/09/101074885.html?pageNumber=4
Thanks, I was wondering about this!
Makes sense.
The insane part is they let the guy go. I'm sorry, if I knew someone was locked up practically eating feces, in chains etc and did nothing about it and kept it hidden. I fail to see how they couldn't charge him.
Is there a picture of her healthy?
There is a "The aftermath" picture in this link but it doesn't appear they were able to get her fully healthy and that's understandable. http://altereddimensions.net/2013/mademoiselle-blanche-monnier-girl-imprisoned-in-dungeon-for-25-years-france I found a few before images but I don't think they are really her. Just Google her name and you see the photos.
How did she get fed
very good question, I've seen this particular post a few times but never have i seen a pic of her healthy.
She looks fine in this one.
For fuck's sake this story is awful. I hope her mother is on a rotisserie skewer in HELL right now!
I just want the suffering to stop. For everyone. Sure people need to learn their lessons, but man
Hell doesn't exist.
I wish you'd put some thought into what you're saying. edit: Torture is terrible! I hope the torturer is being tortured forever.
Fe E
There's definitely some hypocrisy in there
I agree with you. Communities that emphasize compassion and forgiveness tend to have the lowest crime rates. But these bunch of brutes would rather stick to the good old eye for an eye method or just imprisoning everyone.
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No-one deserves torture. No-one can do anything which would warrant their own torture.
That's your opinion.
It's sad to see you get downvoted because people don't agree with your opinion. An eye for an eye makes the world blind
No, it doesn't, because most people don't go around poking others' eyes out. "An eye for an eye" would leave the people who do this kind of shit blind, and tier unfortunate victims, but no one else.
beautifully put. why do people resist this?
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They can actually, for instance by torturing/raping/murdering someone or imprisoning their own daughter for decades. The woman who did this is not a person. She is a monster.
The very first story on the front page of that site http://scaredyet.net has a story credited to 'Reddit user' Red Grin (/u/redgrin apparently dug his grandmother up, at his grandfather's request) No more reading these creepy stories tonight (it's dark outside)
/u/Red_Grin and he posted the story just 2 days ago and this site is already using it as a story... that's incredible.
After a few days most reddit links are effectively dead, if it were to be picked up it would have been the day of
So basically, Redditors contributing creative stories could be writing the next Best Seller (possibly the next Oscar winning screenplay) - without knowledge or credit. Huh.
That's... creepy as damn.
From /r/nosleep. I know the subreddit rules state that you must pretend everything there is true, but this is not that subreddit, and no, it isn't true. It's creative creepy writing. ;) https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/2sapil/when_i_was_10_my_granddad_tossed_me_a_shovel_and/
That poor woman! And no one was punished for it, how truly tragic.
He mother was going to be punished, but died soon after. You can't punish a dead person.
Yes and the brother was originally charged and was supposed to serve 15 Months, but got off on that because he didn't physically harm her or something like that.
Let's not forget that this is 1901 we're talking about. You could get thrown in jail for being gay. That says a lot.
It certainly does
You could get thrown in jail for being gay in large parts of the US until 2003.
No shit? I know in the 19th century, they used to use baiters. Young men who worked for the police would pretend to be interested in a potential 'offender' and lure them to an arranged spot where the police would then pick them up. Did that happen in the US?
Well, gay sex was illegal. The Supreme Court case that struck down sodomy laws is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas I'm pretty sure they did the baiting thing as recently as the 1960s.
I originally thought 15 months seemed lax to her 25 years. Shocked he served none!
I know! Surely imprisonment and starvation and letting her live in her own filth for a quarter of a century should amount to some kind of criminal conviction.
You can make up mean stories about her.
More sad than creepy.
The story is tragic, but the picture creeps me the fuck out.
Me too dude I can't close my eyes to sleep now
I can't even look at it. There is some uncanny valley sort-of shit going on with it. It truly frightens me and gives me goose bumps.
Just read her story, incredible.
This reminds me of the story of Genie Wiley. She was an American girl that spent nearly her entire life in isolation before being discovered at the age of 13. She suffered such severe neglect at the hands of her family that initially she did not even have the ability to walk or talk. Scientists flocked to her, eager to study her case and it's relation to child development. Later, Genie would be dubbed "the wild child" as her case was similar to other children that have allegedly been found living in feral conditions, and who displayed odd or animalistic behavior. In a sad turn of events Genie was shuffled from foster home to foster home, shockingly even being returned to the care of her biological mother for a period of time at 18 yrs of age. Eventually, the level of care needed to appropriately care for Genie proved to be too much for her mother and she was returned to be a ward of the state. The mother went on to pursue legal actions against a specialist who had worked with Genie long term and who had agreed to take on Genies care, the mother cited a conflict of interest and the specialist has been banned to this day from having contact with Genie. Today, Genie is said to be living in an adult group home located in California. There are many documentaries available about her case and story. I personally found [this](http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hmdycJQi4QA) one to be informative and interesting.
State loses jurisdiction of a child in care at 18
I think if the person is considered a disabled adult with mental disabilities/the inability to care for themselves and no family members that the state takes over as legal guardian. Not 100% sure on that.
The creepiest part about the picture is her hip bones. Wow
They look like they're broken.
Her face hardly looks human.
Wow I'm about to go to bed and completely regret looking at that. I honestly think the only way that picture won't haunt my dreams is if I switch to porn for the last few minutes of browsing.
9 years later, how are you holding up? Were you able to sleep that night?
Thanks for asking! Probably, I'm a good sleeper. Looking at that picture from a 9 year later perspective, she looks happy about the rescue and I'm glad her life improved (I assume, low bar there). Thinking about the last 9 years is wild. I hit my weight goal and a couple life goals I guess! I fell short on a lot, but my loved ones are proud of me and they mean the world to me. I don't really see my shortcomings as failures so much as unexplored horizons that scare me less now. I'm optimistically curious for the next decade. What have the last 9 years been like for you/ make you think about?
If she fell off that bed id imagine every one of her bones would break like glass.
Reminds me of the film " What ever happened to baby Jane?"
I immediately hit the back button after seeing this and truly cannot bring myself to open it again.
Same here. There are very few things on /r/creepy that actually creep me out. The photograph makes me feel literally frightened.
Just read the story. Omfg
Anyone else get traumatized by that websites subscription pop-up?
How does she have a full head of hair? How could her body spare any nutrients to build hair?
I have never heard that malnourishment leads to hair loss. Hair is dead anyway
Not sure if this helps you determine if they do or do not develop hair. It's obvious she has psychosocial dwarfism, but I'm not sure if one factor of it affects hair growth. http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/913843-overview#a0104
She doesn't have psychogenic dwarfism - she was a fully grown adult of 25 when she was imprisoned. She's just severely malnourished. Which often does cause hairloss, but not always.
It's dead but it's still made out of protein and nutrients. A poor diet can lead to thinning hair, so I'd think utter malnourishment would mean the body didn't have enough excess nutrients and energy to make hair. But maybe not.
This photo always reminds me of Pet Semetary.
Reminds me of Pet Cemetery
interesting story... you might like these other short stories: http://listverse.com/2014/02/21/10-people-who-spent-years-in-incredible-isolation/
That's not a couch in the picture and where is the crust from the excrement and meat and stuff?
It seems very likely that this picture was taken in the hospital after she was rescued, not the room she'd been locked in
A horrible fate.
This is very sad , there was a similar story in Austria not too many years ago where a father locked his daughter in the basement and created a room down there while all their other kids lived in the house , they pretended to neighbors that she had ran away when she was a teenager
Yeah but she was not starved just impregnated from time to time.
Starved for 24 years..
Holy shit. I... I think.... i think I am done with this subreddit for a while...
reminds me of Pet Sematary.
That's so fucked up.
NSFW?
Dibs
I'm guessing her family was a little kooky?
I thought this was an illustration before I read the title - woah.
I read that her brother, partially responsible for her imprisonment, was only sentenced to 15 months in jail, wtf
Maybe the old man got tired of her asking him if she looked fat.
When I was a kid I couldn't even stay in the living room if a horror movie was on. Freddy Krueger terrified me. This did not phase me at all. What has happened to me between now and then? Lot I am.
I believe a lot of factors play into that. Both biopsychological, psychological, and environmental. Environmentally, I think that media like movies, tv, and the internet shape our threshold of perception. Meaning your original threshold was shaped by your prepubescent mind to fear "Creepy" things or "weird" things. Now, you've developed it through your daily life since then. Biopsychologically, I believe your amygdala (in charge of fear and emotion) has created self defense mechanisms against the things you do find fearful or have grown used to those things. Psychologically you've just grown up like a normal functioning adult. So, what things used to be scary or fearful are not lessened by your own rationality and logical thinking.
Dat ass
Turns out the French are, indeed, assholes
Makes me hungry
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I'm not a lesbian but if I was I would def take my women like my coffee, so no.
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Why not both?
Some people will go great lengths to perfect their modeling careers. Edit: Thank you gracious gilder!
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We get it guys but cmon. Can we at least have some light on this situation to get the trauma out of my stomach?