OK, The Clown Thing...

[Zymologist]

Watching Krampus on Cinemax. Can't help but think of Killer Klowns From Outer Space.

I thought Krampus was pretty good. It had a weird mix of a goofy tone, and a super bleak ending. Worth a watch.

[Carrikature]

It's a bit more to it than people thinking it's mainstream from the internet when it's really not though. You have law enforcement involved and addressing it and even the WH had addressed it.

They're addressing it because it's a concerning internet fad that's influencing RL behavior. Same with the media outlets. Stephen King weighing in on Twitter? Internet thing. The reason for the increase in 'sightings' is internet attention.

That's how things work these days.

[Carrikature]

...dressed as clowns. It's incredibly goofy.

Whole-hearted agreement. That it's an item for discussion at all is goofy. People are such morons.

[seanD]

They're addressing it because it's a concerning internet fad that's influencing RL behavior. Same with the media outlets. Stephen King weighing in on Twitter? Internet thing. The reason for the increase in 'sightings' is internet attention.

That's how things work these days.

Well, yeah, I know it's a fad now because of obvious copy-cats, but how did it start? How did it catch on? It's not like streaking because that's an obvious attention-grabber. How clowns caught on and spread as a fad is a mystery to me. I suppose it started off as an elaborate hoax and just caught on somehow but that's the part I'm curious about just because I'm personally fascinated with memes in pop culture.

[Carrikature]

Well, yeah, I know it's a fad now because of obvious copy-cats, but how did it start? How did it catch on? It's not like streaking because that's an obvious attention-grabber. How clowns caught on and spread as a fad is a mystery to me. I suppose it started off as an elaborate hoax and just caught on somehow but that's the part I'm curious about just because I'm personally fascinated with memes in pop culture.

Check these out:

http://www.theverge.com/2016/10/7/13...-hoax-debunked

http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles...clown-epidemic

From the second link:

The first American "creepy clown" sighting, by most accounts, ended up being for a movie. Gags, the Green Bay clown, was seen wandering around Wisconsin in early August, carrying a host of black balloons. People were a bit freaked out until a local man said that he was using Gags for a short film he was working on.

[DesertBerean]

And here's another sad commentary on bad parents:

http://ktla.com/2016/10/10/creepy-cl...orhood-police/

...of course, it may turn out that somebody was supposed to watch the kid while the, er, grownups went out. *groan*