50 Anonymously Shared Secrets That People Wouldn’t Dare To Confess In Real Life (New Posts)
Interview
Keeping secrets is easier for some than it is for others; so is revealing them. Be that as it may, sharing something you’ve kept to yourself for a while might come as a relief. That’s why people tend to turn to a friend willing to lend an ear, for example, or confess their sins to a member of their church. A number of people nowadays choose to open up to no other than their trusty device and the almighty internet as well.
Received via a Google form, their confessions are then shared on the renowned ‘Fesshole’ Twitter account, which has become an internet sensation over the past five years. Created in June, 2018, the account has already amassed over 988k followers, as well as an abundance of submissions from people in need to lift the load weighing on their chest. If you’re interested to learn what it is they’ve managed to keep a secret until now, scroll down to find some of ‘Fesshole’s’ latest posts on the list below.
In order to learn more about ‘Fesshole’ and how sharing secrets affects a person, Bored Panda turned to the founder of the Twitter account, Rob Manuel, and Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Associate Professor of Leadership and Ethics at Columbia Business School, Michael Slepian, who were kind enough to answer some of our questions. You will find both of their thoughts in the text below.
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I, a 50yo queer who has to work at it to pass, texted a new employee to confirm she was good to start the following Friday. From my work mobile, which was on several documents she was given and which was pointed out to her. “Hey Kehlani. It’s Marco from ********. Are you good to go this Friday?” She replied with, “F**k off, I got a boyfriend.” When she called the Monday after to find out when she was to begin, she was told she was a no show and we’ve rescinded the offer. Mostly because I’m not obligated to explain myself once someone speaks to me that way. Period.
Recognized by internet users all over the world, the Twitter page was founded by Rob Manuel, a marketing specialist who’s also spent the last couple of decades building interactive web projects, such as the b3ta.com message board. The Mirror revealed that Rob started it all with an open invitation from his personal account, encouraging people to anonymously confess their sins via an online form. Upon receiving the first hundred of them, Manuel laid them out on the newly-created ‘Fesshole’ account.
In a recent interview with Bored Panda, Rob remembered the very beginning of the project: “I was bored one afternoon and I thought it would be fun to open a google form and ask people to confess stuff anonymously. I figured at best maybe 500 people would care. Now there's nearly a million followers,” he said, jokingly adding “Please make them go away.”
YOU DISGRACE OF A HUMAN BEING YOU LET YOUR DOG TAKE THE BLAME. I HOPE BOTH SIDES OF YOUR PILLOW ARE WARM TONIGHT
Indeed, Rob’s account has already reached nearly 990k followers, who have revealed secrets ranging from shocking to odd, and everything in between. He told Bored Panda what was one of the most bizarre confessions he’s ever received. The anonymous person wrote: “About a year ago, the company I worked for switched to a four-day week. Never told my wife. Each Friday, I hire out a small office where I play Football Manager. I like to pretend it's my Manager's office. I have 'conversations' with players about disciplinary matters and contracts.”
“I quite fancy living my life like this, although I actually hate football,” the founder of ‘Fesshole’ recounted the anonymous story.
I know some very intelligent people who have no interest in correct spelling or grammar, their minds do not work linguistically. If the job involves communication, you are perhaps right to reject them. If not you may have rejected many very intelligent, capable people. We have a strange fixation on spelling and grammar as an indicator of intelligence.
While not per se an indication of intelligence, spelling and grammar on applications are an indication of care taken, thoughtfulness, clarity, and good manners. Sometimes the latter qualities are better and more useful in certain roles.
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So things like "could of course..." are instantly binned? They probably dodged a you-shaped bullet!
could, of course, etc etc. Commas are important here.
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I agree with this, particularly if the job requires writing reports. I used to be the Training Manager at a juvenile detention center. I trained the staff in all aspects of their jobs. One of my standard trainings and a component of new hire orientation was a grammar refresher. The proper use of "could've" and "could have" was one of the grammatical constructions in my lesson. For the record: "could've" is an acceptable contraction for "could have", "could of" is not.
I wonder how this person treats bilingual, trilingual, multilingual, and other applicants, who either may not use English as their native language or may have concerns like learning disabilities.
I throw away half the applications I get because I don't like working with unlucky people
Lazy people who won't even use a free grammar checker.
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To those saying spelling and grammar are directly related to IQ / Intelligence - sorry but there are plenty of studies that disprove that. Go have a little squizz. Also being book smart (memory and recalling info) and being intelligent (''defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving.'') are very different things!
They could, of course, have used it correctly and you are just a shortsighted elitist.
I would put in a filter for people who don't use the Oxford comma. I wouldn't automatically disqualify them, but I want to know who they are.
I was on this train of thought because it was how I was taught to measure intelligence. Now that I have a dyslexic daughter I know better. She is incredibly intelligent and capable. The letters are just crawling all over the page. Drawing conclusions from one's character and abilities to perform the job requirements seems like a more intelligent choice.
If someone has a disability like dyslexia or dysgraphia, then they can make that clear on the application, so allowances can be made. Just plain incorrect grammar suggests someone who didn't pay attention in school.
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This is just a digital update on the old idea of rejecting applications written in blue pen when the form said to use black ink. It works if you've got a high volume of applications to whittle down, but can result in the rejection of someone who would might have been perfectly suited to the role.
Seems a bit arbitrary to pick one grammatical pet peeve and deny employment based on that. You could of had a lot of great employes you blew off. (Or you could have had, it you prefer.) I hope you have a lot of candidates to burn through, as this would be a crazy waste of resources in my career field.
On the other hand, depending on what the consultancy does, many people who are technically brilliant struggle with written language. The large consultancies I worked for had multiple layers of quality control and peer review, as well as training graduates, to catch errors like this. They also employed document production specialists like me to format and check reports as part of this process. Many of our consultants also spoke English as a second language. Learning to use professional English is an important skill for a consultant, but rejecting candidates because they're not perfect will get you mediocre consultants.
Best coder I ever worked with had awful spelling and grammar skills. Yet his programs were fantastic and written with a speed that amazed everyone. When people would correct him he would just laugh it off. Unless you're hiring a writer or editor, maybe let it go?
I used to make my children repeat " could have, could have ..." ten times every time they said "could have" (which they picked up from school). Fortunately for my sanity, they learned the correct way after a while.
Language drift. It's a thing. As is the fact that English is one of the most versatile languages ever, and is still morphing, and growing. Hopefully most of these candidates went onto bigger, and better things rather than getting ensnared by this ossified, stilted, judgemental company.
''We have a long history of linking spelling skills to intelligence. We think people who can't spell are ignorant, illiterate, or stupid, despite having research dating back to the 1970s that shows that there is NO significant association between spelling ability and intelligence'' bruh what about us poor dyslexic peeps that have high IQs but can't spell for s**t and need to learn words via flashcards and mnemonics.
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Could of also annoys me intensely. The person using it can't spell it either and yet how many ways of saying things in the english language are not picked up on. - Who broke that vase? - Not me Of course it should be not I. Carry on that thought. Not I, I didn't break it . Not, not me, me didn't break it. Another thing that has become the norm is the incorrect use of amount. TV presenters talk about amounts of people which is wrong, wrong, wrong. Here's how it works. I am making an apple pie. I have ten apples. Then you say I have a large number of apples in my pie. If I have made them into stewed apple before putting them in my pie and they are a heap of apple and you don't know how many there were originally you say I have a large amount of apple in my pie. So a number applies to things you can physically count. So there are a large number of people in the stadium. A large amount of people would be too gross to contemplate.
Seems reasonable. This isn't spelling or grammar. This is just knowing words. They'll have heard 'could've' as could of and then write it like that. If you can't speak or write in the language maybe don't apply for a job that needs both done accurately? NB no problem with people who err when using a second language but this particular mistake is NEVER made by them, always native speakers..
Weird flex. Glad I am not going to have to deal with you.
I can understand this. Even if you are not grammar-minded, it is worth the extra time to double check, or even have a professional proofread your CV, because... well, it matters as one can see from the post.
I feel like this is a phase that would not be common in applications. I wonder if his filter is also finding could of in other phrases like "we could offer."
Hurray for you! I'm so FED UP with the increasing ignorance in our country.
My godson doesn't vote for anyone that can't write a proper sentence in their voter pamphlet paragraph.
Add to that: impact, impacts, impacting, impacted, impactful (an amazing abortion of a word), and unimpacted. Also, it wouldn’t hurt to filter out “the fact” to eliminate the morons who tell you about “the fact” of something, instead of just telling you about the thing itself.
I think people say impact because they don't know the correct use of affect or effect.
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No word of a lie - I triaged Masters Degree applications with this kind of logic. If your application was incomplete, it went in a bin. Had to do that to some people who had perfect GPAs and who took the time to write great cover letters, but not the time to read the instructions and follow them.
"Could have" is the correct English. Because it's often contracted to "could've" when spoken, a lot of people mishear and mistakenly think it's "could of." Just another one of those vagaries of our weird mother tongue.
Load More Replies... Hmmm I usually sign all my resumes "A horse is a horse, of course of course" so this could be a problem.
It isn't always grammatically incorrect. "I could of course start earlier if that's more convenient for you and the consultancy. Thank you for considering my application and I look forward to hearing from you."
I would put commas either side of "of course" in this sentence. That would then not have been filtered out
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Some time in my life, I intentionally tried to speak less literature style, to avoid look arrogant or not make feel stupid non native speakers, with whome I interacted alot that moment. Those people speak not perfect in my home language, but they made my mind so much more rich!
Sorry, but why did the three people who downvoted DarkGlassSphere's comment do so?
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Yup, I used to be a fairly high end Chef in many exclusive Restaurants and Hotels and one of my duties over the years was the recruitment and training of junior Chefs ; one thing that was an immediate interview stopper was, if I asked the question, " where do you want to be in 5 years time" and the answer was " I want to be famous / on TV". One chap actually cried when I told him after 10 minutes of interview that he wouldn't be working at the Michelin Restaurant that I was running at the time because of that answer. He went on to be employed by another nearby establishment and apparently he was f*****g useless, lazy, incompetent and delusional - as, indeed are far too many wannabe 'celebreties'.
In an interview with the Mirror last year, Manuel revealed what early confession became a hit, receiving 36,000 likes on the page: "My husband's dying wish was to make people think he led a double life,” an anonymous person submitted via an online form. “We had three blacked-out Landrovers follow the corsage and had actors in suits and trench coats as the funeral conductors. He was a bank manager for TSB. To this day, we haven't told anyone the truth."
Rob Manuel pointed out that observational comedy is the core of it all. “Observational comedy with the added richness of going, 'is this is real?' And we're sort of recognizing we are to some degree, imperfect," he told the Mirror.
I'm a survivor of abuse with severe PTSD - I have made a point of getting unique tattoos on my arms, legs, and torso. I love tattoos so no one questions my motivation but the the truth is that if I am ever dismembered, and only one piece of me is found, the police will have an easier time identifying my body.
Maybe prep them for that so they don’t make your GF uncomfortable or offended by accident?
Over the years, Rob’s observational comedy transcended Twitter and was presented to the general public in a book, titled The Very Best of Fesshole: Britain Confesses Anonymously, comprising “Fesshole’s” greatest confessions to date. The founder of the Twitter account and the author of the book was also able to go on tours, presenting some of the submissions in front of a live audience.
“I enjoy doing the live shows the most—seeing different parts of the UK and meeting people,” he told Bored Panda. Rob added that doing audience confessions tends to get pretty funny. “We've had police people talking about letting people off crimes,” he said, providing an example. “There was also a guy who was running a WhatsApp group with 200 members for exchanging fart recordings, who turned up and told us all.”
Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Associate Professor of Leadership and Ethics at Columbia Business School and author of 'The Secret Life of Secrets', Michael Slepian, explained to Bored Panda how getting things off of your chest can benefit a person: “When we keep a secret entirely to ourselves, we leave only one venue to work through a problem: our own mind. But when we choose to be alone with something, we often don't develop the healthiest ways of thinking about it. Other people's reactions often temper overly negative thinking, and help us out of unhelpful thinking loops.”
Don't keep this secret. Your family needs to know you're on antidepressants and should be part of your support network.
“When someone reveals a secret to a person they are keeping it from, I call this confession,” Prof. Slepian pointed out. “When we reveal a secret to a third party, I call this confiding. Confession is sometimes the right thing to do, but not always. But confiding is the best of both worlds: you get to reveal a secret to someone while still keeping it secret from others.
“What is helpful about confiding is that the person often responds in a useful way, offering emotional support or practical advice. Confiding in someone anonymously can be helpful too, but only to the extent the person offers a helpful response,” he added.
For those that don't know, Kew Gardens is a botanical gardens in Richmond, south of London. They have trees & plants there from all over the world.
Even though this isn’t as relevant when it comes to social media accounts, such as ‘Fesshole’, sharing a secret can create a stronger bond between people, which is especially prominent among kids. “Both children and adults use secrecy as a way out of getting in trouble, but if you ask a child what a secret is, they'll say a secret is something that you only tell your best friend,” Michael Slepian suggested.
“Young children think about secrets as something to be shared, and too often adults lose sight of this. Sharing a secret with someone, something you wouldn't tell just anyone, is one of the most powerful social forces we have control over. Our confidants recognize revealing a secret as an act of intimacy.”
If reading people’s darkest—well, in some cases, not so much—secrets is something you enjoy, you’re in luck, as we have quite a collection of ‘Fesshole’s’ posts here at Bored Panda. You can find our previous editions on the Twitter page here, here, here, here, and here.
It makes you feel fancy as well since it was seen as a treat when I was growing up!
This is basically the plot of a black mirror episode, it's scary that that kind of thing is possible
hilarious. I hate golf so I am totally ok with people cheating in it. Please do not murder me. My contempt for it is due to how it is used to occupy vast parts of african land and water which underprivileged people cannot use for housing in a country with water shortages.
Hmmm, i faked not knowing english or swedish to get out of talking to some pushy guy but never to this level.
this happened to me, but it was my year 7 science teacher.... :( i really liked them
I’m a woman from oz & always assume that the majority of guys do this
Sorry, I thought you said 'friends'. Are they aware you are anything but a friend?
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What's wrong with that? Yesterday on here I was reading complaints that it's all American!
Load More Replies... What's wrong with that? Yesterday on here I was reading complaints that it's all American!
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