Discover perhaps the strangest town sub on reddit. Is the town supernatural? is there something shady going on? Judge for yourself: r/marton

163  2019-09-11 by _-Drama_Llama-_

r/marton

I stumbled on this sub through a Youtube video, in which a Kiwi comedian visits a small New Zealand town to "investigate" it after seeing how weird its subreddit is.

Out of curiosity I had a look at the place, and felt more confused than anything on Reddit has ever left me.

Since the clip aired, the Marton locals seem to be offended and angry that their town is getting attention, and an influx of users wondering what the hell is going on over there.

It appears that the sub's moderators have given their phone numbers to many in the community, as the mods are apparently constantly getting phone calls from users asking posts to be removed/users banned, etc.

They also have weekly meetups.

I suggest you just go to the sub and start reading random threads, because just about everything there is weird.

See if you're able to piece anything together.

The current sticky which is cryptic and leaves more questions than answers

Regular users to the sub are sick of receiving PMs from people asking for explanations

A guy finally gives some answers; the town's population is in decline, tap water is undrinkable, and the paranormal is a regular occurrence.

That sub doesn't make me doubt it.

A regular Daylight savings post

Video of one of the sub mods claiming that a chemical called 1080 has killed the wildlife/birds in the region, which ties in with many posts about complete and total ambient silence.

It's like a town filled with schizos.

If it's all a larp, then it could be the most elaborate one I've ever seen.

Could it be something in the water? Aliens? Government experiments?

What're your thoughts?

48 comments

1  SnapshillBot 2019-09-11

No wonder you have an army of pretentious neckbeard losers following you around

Snapshots:

  1. Discover perhaps the strangest town... - archive.org, archive.today, removeddit.com

  2. r/marton - archive.org, archive.today*

  3. Youtube video - archive.org, archive.today

  4. the Marton locals seem to be offend... - archive.org, archive.today

  5. The current sticky - archive.org, archive.today, removeddit.com

  6. Regular users to the sub are sick o... - archive.org, archive.today

  7. A guy finally gives some answers - archive.org, archive.today

  8. A regular Daylight savings post - archive.org, archive.today

  9. Video of one of the sub mods claimi... - archive.org, archive.today

I am just a simple bot, *not** a moderator of this subreddit* | bot subreddit | contact the maintainers

1  dokapon111 2019-09-11

There's no way this isn't just some larp. This reads exactly like some fake television broadcasts I've seen in YouTube.

1  [deleted] 2019-09-11

[removed]

1  CucksLoveTrump 2019-09-11

its one of those ARG LARPs that the gen x'ers love so much

1  _-Drama_Llama-_ 2019-09-11

These are the 3 moderators:

Flowerguy

Chalky-leary

Dovetail90, as in OP

So 2/3 are boomers

1  kingdong112382 2019-09-11

I saw the second photo and assumed Chalky mods here.

1  junkieradio 2019-09-11

[Her post history has some gems](I used to use it when I was cutting the grass, you can probably use it for other things)

1  simplicity3000 2019-09-11

Chalky Leary, former Mayor and incident specialist.

https://www.reddit.com/r/marton/comments/625r9z/i_receive_many_pms_about_the_sightings/dfl21yy/

1  avanj 2019-09-11

The Twilight Zone for future boomers.

1  [deleted] 2019-09-11

[removed]

1  TaysSecondGussy 2019-09-11

Yeah they messed up badly with that “close your curtains” bit, copped straight from a pretty famous creepy vid thing.

I’m guessing larp by mods hoping to get recognized on YouTube, the fact that it’s a blighted and aging town reinforces it because it’s very unlikely that any of the people from there will stumble in and call them morons.

1  snallygaster 2019-09-11

It's a shame that they immediately went overboard with generic creepypasta "the orbs!" "they're watching" freemason chanting type shit instead of just describing small but compelling out-of-the-ordinary events. The mods/regulars are probably having fun but it doesn't do anything for me. The people buying into this are morans who've somehow never seen an ARG

1  TaysSecondGussy 2019-09-11

Yep. There really is an art to it, sad to see such potential with zero imagination.

1  AIDS_IS_A_CHOICE 2019-09-11

I remember reading the Wiki for 11B-X-1371 and thinking it sounded so creepy and mysterious. Everyone was so spooked. Then I watched the video and it's the cheesiest fake teen project you could imagine. People are fucking dumb.

1  Kaiser-romulus 2019-09-11

Interesting.

1  creamygoodnesspirate 2019-09-11

Rural NZ is pretty odd in general actually.

It is a bit peculiar that the Marton wikipedia page doesn't have any photos from earlier than 1909...

1  _-Drama_Llama-_ 2019-09-11

In 1869 local citizens changed the name to Marton to honour the birth place of Captain James Cook in Middlesbrough, marking his landing in New Zealand exactly 100 years earlier. It is not known if this change of name was influenced by the mistranslation of 'tutae' (meaning 'dung') and 'nui' (meaning 'large').

Definitely can see why they wanted to change that.

1  Elite_AI 2019-09-11

Oh God oh fuck they're honouring Middlesborough over there

this explains everything

1  darth_tiffany 2019-09-11

I don't get ARG at all. Who has the fucking time for this shit?

1  Chapocel 2019-09-11

What is ARG?

1  darth_tiffany 2019-09-11

An Alternate Reality Game. Basically a murder mystery but on the internet.

1  Chapocel 2019-09-11

Well, thanks Tiffany. I guess. Gazes over at Ivanka

1  darth_tiffany 2019-09-11

Or you can just Google is yourself you lazy bohunk.

1  PM_ME_UR_VENTS 2019-09-11

The youtube accounts connected to all of this has content thats been posted for years, so if it is all a big troll, its a really elaborate one

1  snallygaster 2019-09-11

It's a small town, these people know each other IRL and probably get on reddit every once in a while to fuck around and share in-jokes. The town does have alleged paranormal activity so they're probably just playing it up for laughs

1  gunowner63 2019-09-11

Larp. They were a little too heavy handed with the daylight savings crap or it would have been a good troll.

1  McGovernEagleton 2019-09-11

this has to be correct. that’s some no sleep shit

1  Arnold_Schrodinger 2019-09-11

After thoroughly sifting through all their crap, I 100% agree this is all some bullshit long game creative writing exercise.

All of the accounts talking nonsense before the first viral video dropped were created between march and may of 2017. I am fairly certain they are all alts of maybe like 2 or 3 people.

The whole thing reads like a cross between nosleep and SCP.

1  simplicity3000 2019-09-11

To everyone else, resist! Go out after 8pm. Don't go to mandatory colonics or lice treatments. Never forget the birds of Calico.

1  McGovernEagleton 2019-09-11

this some ARG?

1  IAmAAMA_AMAA 2019-09-11

It almost seems like it's half ARG, half actual residents just posting regular shit. There doesn't seem to be too many accounts dedicated strictly to larping. I'm 9 months back now and there's just [a lot of weird shit](https://www.reddit.com/r/marton/comments/9xl269/bloody_pagan_ceremonies_back_for_ten_years_what_a/).

1  simplicity3000 2019-09-11

don't think so. just a bunch of weirdos

1  BannedAccountNumber6 2019-09-11

This is legit kindve creeping me out has anyone gotten any answers or proven it to be fake?

1  CountChadvonCisberg 2019-09-11

I mean, there’s an ongoing newspaper that validated (as in there are people actively reporting phenomenon) everything they’re saying. Not saying it’s true but I think this goes beyond a larping joke subreddit. Especially with the various YouTube videos spanning years back

1  Pomodorodorodoro 2019-09-11

If you read through some of the older threads, there's a sense of humour to a lot of it, and a bit of back and forth between the 'characters'.

My guess is it's some locals having a laugh.

1  Rise_up_Dirty_Birds 2019-09-11

If you think it’s strange now you should’ve read the stuff that was on there a little bit over a year ago, before dovetail purged the sub.

1  junkieradio 2019-09-11

Is there anyway to read that?

1  Rise_up_Dirty_Birds 2019-09-11

Honestly I wish I archived it but he was purging them faster than I could get on a computer, I’m mainly a mobile user. I did manage to grab some screen shots but I’ll have to dig back through my photos to find them. They were wild stories!

1  junkieradio 2019-09-11

What sort of timeframe I'll check web archive.

1  Rise_up_Dirty_Birds 2019-09-11

It was about this time, a year ago. I’m at work now but I can go back through my comment/ post history to find it later!

1  chalky-leary 2019-09-11

no need

1  ResidentAccount 2019-09-11

Please update,

1  ryzyryz 2019-09-11

this is some SCP irl making or somthing? Pretty cool tbh

1  [deleted] 2019-09-11

[removed]

1  queerjihad 2019-09-11

Some of the posts you linked to are a year old.

Guy Williams made two videos about Marton. One was a year ago, it starts off being about a house that noone wants to buy but then he meets the crazy ginger and the STEMtwink and they go to Marton to eat fried chicken. The second one is a more recent video, which is the one you watched.

1  simplicity3000 2019-09-11

This was on craigslist

via r conspiracy

1  MacisCheesy 2019-09-11

obvious bait, not even trying to hide the fact that it's forced AF

1  FrostyBlowmanSnowman 2019-09-11

A lot of it reads like it's inspired by Welcome to Nightvale without the sarcastic tone.