45 Times People Faked Pics For Internet Points And Got Called Out On This Online Group

We all know we can’t believe everything we read online. People have vivid imaginations, and the internet is an endless cesspool of information that requires no fact-checking to share. Improvements in photoshopping technology and the increase in people who know how to hack and code has only made the world wide web less reliable, so it’s important to always take things with a grain of salt. But at the same time, we want to believe that things we see on social media are true. What incentive do these people have to lie, anyway?

Well, apparently, plenty of people feel the need to channel their inner Pinocchio and share blatantly false stories online. And that’s where the Untrustworthy Poptarts subreddit comes in. This group, which has amassed an impressive 174k members since 2016, is “for all those posts that make you question whether OP really did find those things in that stuff they bought or found. In other words, we know you staged those screenshots, OP,” the page’s moderators write. “You're fooling no one.” 

To learn more about the origins of this popular subreddit, we reached out to the group's creator, Russian_For_Rent on Reddit, and they were kind enough to have a chat with us. "I was scrolling Reddit one day and came upon this post of a common occurrence on /r/mildlyinteresting, saw that the sub did not exist, and simply created it," they shared with Bored Panda. "That post was popular enough that it got a healthy amount of traffic that day, and enough people stuck around that the sub was able to keep going."

The post in question, which was found 6 years ago, features someone claiming that they received three Poptarts in a package that’s only intended to contain two. It was immediately called out by viewers, with comments stating that it must have been staged. “How do we know you didn’t put a 3rd one in the pack?” But because the post gained plenty of traction, receiving over 37k upvotes, the Untrustworthy Poptarts subreddit was born. And it's been successful ever since, with the creator noting that, "The sub gets a decent amount of engagement for its size."

"Initially we were thinking what the best direction was to actually keep the sub going, rather than just for when people post stuffed Poptarts only, and then it was realized that there isn't really a staged photo sub," the creator went on to explain. "Except for maybe KarmaConspiracy, but that one's turned into basically just a meta joke of a subreddit. So this sub does that with a tiny bit of meta joke misbehavior every now and then too." 

We were also curious what Russian_For_Rent's thoughts were on why people attempt to pass off these photos as real. "The number one reason is attention, of course," they said. "Posting something ridiculous enough that people can give a slight benefit of doubt that it's not fake or perhaps doesn't even cross their mind that it is, makes for a great way to get engagement and attention on the internet. Some are definitely posted as jokes, which the poster does not realize," the creator added. "Usually if it's satire, it's pretty obvious, and the post normally wont get a ton of growth on the sub."

They also shared that some of their favorite posts from the group are OGs from when it first started, such as this one right here.

Today, there are only a few simple rules that members must follow, one of which being that Poptarts are not required. The mods also explain that the group is for untrustworthy content only, creativity is welcome, no photoshopping is allowed, no screenshots of stories are allowed, and members shouldn’t “be lame”. “Don't be the 211th person to passive aggressively use the word ‘sure’ in your title, and it'll make it much easier for someone to find your post by searching if you title it uniquely and/or descriptively,” the moderators write.