I'll also post the full text in here so you don't have to go to reddit. Here it is.
AITA for making over 40+ fake posts on reddit?
This is my confession, and at the end of this post, you will find a list of 40+ fake post I wrote on Reddit. But first, let me introduce myself, so you might have a little insight on what was happening on my mind.
My name is Valentine. For almost a year I posted over 40 fake posts on Reddit. There are a lot more, but these are the ones I've been able to find and recover.
Let me tell you about me. I'm 24 years old, I was introduced to Reddit by my nephew, and for the following years, I've been hooked to the platform.
I started listening to many Reddit story time podcasts. Started with the Pewdiepie reaction videos, then people reading answers from AskReddit, and then Relationships and AITA. It was always entertaining, and sometimes educational. I even got my boyfriend hooked into them.
Sometimes I asked Reddit for advice on things that happened IRL to me, but they always died in new with one or 2 comments. Then I had an Idea. I created another Reddit account, and posted a Fake Story. The engagement was immediate and most people believed the story, until mods deleted it.
But then something had grown inside me. Some days later I made another story, from another throwaway account. A little time later, another one.
Before I knew it, it became a habit. Something would pop inside my head, then I would create another account and write it down to post it on Reddit. I became more methodical, I used character counters, LanguageTool, Deepl Write to fix my grammar, I would research a topic to make it more believable. I created these characters, and started roleplaying as them, while I wrote it and interacted with commenters, I became my own characters for a short period of time. I would let ideas for stories rest on draft to make them better and fix mistakes.
It turned into a unhealthy habit, constantly my stories would get deleted by mods, someone would catch a little mistake to call out the fake, it would turn time-consuming, stress inducing, anxiety triggering. I didn't care about receiving hate on a character that was written to be a jerk, but the effort started to take a toll on my mental health.
This was never about Karma, awards, or followers. I gained nothing from this. I need to talk to a psychologist to try and understand my real motives since I don't really understand it myself, but I guess the engagement was addicting, my ultimate goal was to have my story read on my favorite reddit podcasts, and I did it a few times. A few times I said "just one more, this can be a hit" but you know how that ends, it's never just "one more".
My writing skills improved, a lot, you might not notice from this post alone because I'm not really taking care of my grammar alone, but I'm from Venezuela, english is my second language, and it really helped me to improve my english. I have so many ideas for books and stories to write, but I always freeze, still have many doubts about my storytelling, such as: Are my characters bland and boring? Are my descriptions good enough? Am I describing too much or too little? Is my story engaging? Do I know enough about this topic to write a story about it? Is my language too formal or too casual?
On Reddit none of that matters, I can write a complete story in minutes and people will find it engaging. I can make mistakes on my writing and grammar and nobody will care. Writing the stories I actually wanna write as full books is intimidating, and I feel bad for not trusting my skills enough to start actually writing.
But of course, now I feel as a psychopath, some people after reading my stories feel upset, emotionally distressed, I might have triggered some previous real trauma on someone, I'm playing with these strangers emotions for no real reason. And yes, I sleep well at night, I'm a heavy sleeper actually. I feel bad, and guilty.
I was hesitating making my list of fake posts public because the people that engaged on them might feel betrayed, played, and used. I spoke to many of them as if OP was a real person, some has told me their personal real stories, they trusted me. This is the most psychotic thing I've done, and is hunting me now. But maybe some people might feel better knowing these are fake since the OPs don't exist, and none of these fake people are actually going through an abusive or dangerous situation. I don't really know, the ideal situation is that the posts had never been written and posted in the first place, but is too late for that.
I tried to stop but I relapsed. I need coping mechanisms to stop me from the urge to create yet another reddit account and write another distressing story. Contrary to how Reddit makes it look, getting help for mental health is not easy, and BTW, not all mental health professionals are Therapists, psychologists exists too.
I might end up leaving Reddit entirely, the API fiasco certainly helped with that, I've used reddit a lot less since then, and I've been on Lemmy ever since.
BTW, I never posted a fake story on this, my main account, I posted here about my relationship and my crazy Mother in Law, that is 100% true, I'm not stupid enough to make fakes posts on my main. I'm not a liar IRL. I'm actually very honest, brutally honest actually, and yes, that many times makes me an asshole.
This is my confession, feel free to ask questions. I wanna turn some of these stories into actual books, maybe you can help me to choose which ones. I really wish other fake posters come out, that might be another stone thrown at Reddit's castle of glass.
And finally, I'm sorry. And please don't think anything on Reddit is fake, real life is sometimes crazier than fiction, I have real family stories that sound crazier than the fakest fake posts, and that's why I never tell them.
Me too ..but that might be because when I called out an AITA story and got a 3 day ban I made u/aita_mods_are_all_incels they really really didn't like that....turns out I might have hit too close to home accidentally.
I mean, it kinda sounds like you got hooked on the dopamine rush of social media and that you enjoy creative writing. I'd say all you need to do is channel that into more productive storytelling and you'll be well on your way to being a good writer. I'm certain there's creative writing communities out there that include roleplaying as part of it too. Creepypastas are all about that, albeit with a horror twist.
Maybe the throwaway nature made it safe to exercise your creative muscles so-to-speak ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You can usually tell it's fake when the characters feel engineered to generate maximum outrage or sympathy.
It's possible you replied, but I only ever saw these posts when they would get enough traction to appear in r/all—so usually my comments came pretty late and never got more than a handful of votes. The few times OP did reply it was nonspecific stuff like "Fine, don't believe me."
I'd check but all my reddit comments are gone now.
I'm honestly impressed. Like, yeah, it isn't cool to mislead people and whatnot but you know that. I hope you can find a creative writing outlet on Lemmy because I'd love to read your stories. Also, just because your stories aren't in a book format doesn't make them less real, if writing books is your goal then please seek it, but there are other formats that are no less "real".
Web serials, for example, tend to be first draft work so people are about as chill about grammar as they are on reddit. Or you could take a bunch of stories you made on the internet (like you have here) and make them into a collection someday if you really want to have a book. Point is, you are actually writing, and its good writing at that. Please keep doing it, and I hope you find a place where you feel good about what you're making, whatever that looks like to you.
They could write a 300 page book of these short stories and it would sell like hit cakes if brought to a publisher with a brain. This stuff is popular on reddit because it is popular content. Content creators just have not been making money on their work.
A man in a dimly lit room sits on the corner of a desk, speaking to the camera in a slow manner
"Do you think this story is true, or do you think that our writers just made it all up? Let's take a look at our next story first."
Kinda reminds me of this mystery show I can't recall the name of :))
I'd love to see a book or even just a "small" web series though. You probably amassed quite some experience on how to write characters to make them feel close to reality.
Well there is no easy way to tell that other posts on reddit aren't fake so I think there is not much harm being done here. Just your little addiction, I think. And if that makes you happy, isn't that good enough?