Bloody Mary Variations

[Idiotpickle]

Everyone knows this urban legend, but I'm curious if anyone else has regional variations of it. I'm well aware of the queen of scots origin, but in rural Kansas my community had a different version. According to our community the origin was about a woman called Mary who was murdered while she was pregnant and buried in a field near our school. She's called bloody Mary because she's supposedly covered in blood when she appears, and for us you couldn't just chant 'bloody mary' in front of a mirror alone in the dark. You had to chant 'bloody Mary, bloody Mary, I have your baby, I have your baby' three times, as she's said to wander the earth looking for her baby. Now, I don't buy into this at all, I just think it would be interesting to hear other variations

Edited June 6, 2019 by Idiotpickle

[Imaginarynumber1]

[HandsomeGorilla]

We did this in daycare. You closed your eyes in front of a mirror, said Bloody Mary three times and opened your eyes. Of course we all swore we saw something, but only in one particular bathroom. 

['Walt' E. Kurtz]

Beatle juice Beatle Juice Beatle Juice:-) Bloody mary got nothing to do with the paranormal there is a natural state where you can start to see other faces  in the mirror If you stand in a dim lit room staring at the mirror for some time but i cant remember what it's called.

Edited June 6, 2019 by Impedancer

[eight bits]

42 minutes ago, Impedancer said:

 If you stand in a dim lit room staring at the mirror for some time but i cant remember what it's called.

Strange face illusion (and similar names).

A version of it was a popular pastime for older children and adults on Hallowe'en in the US 100 years ago, more or less. Here's an article about that which includes pointers to laboratory research on the phenomenon:

https://uncertaintist.wordpress.com/2014/10/23/practical-magic-on-main-street-halloween-1914/

Researchers then tried it with real live faces, rather than your own face in a mirror, and it still worked fine. Apparently, Scientologists teach a variation on the live encounter version and, coming at it from another direction. the live encounter version is a way to fall in love, or more in love.

https://uncertaintist.wordpress.com/2015/10/29/practical-magic-for-you-and-a-friend-this-halloween/

Edited June 7, 2019 by eight bits

[Imaginarynumber1]

Quote

Caputo suggests that the dramatic effects might be caused by a combination of basic visual distortions affecting the face-specific interpretation system.

The visual system starts to adapt after we receive the same information over time (this is why you can experience visual changes by staring at anything for a long time) but we also have a system that interprets faces very easily.

This is why we can ‘see’ faces in clouds, trees, or even from just two dots and a line. The brain is always ‘looking for faces’ and it is likely that we have a specialised face detection system to allow us to recognise individuals whose faces actually only differ a small amount in statistical terms from other people’s.

According to Caputo’s suggestion, the illusion might be caused by low level fluctuations in the stability of edges, shading and outlines affecting the perceived definition of the face, which gets over-interpreted as ‘someone else’ by the face recognition system.

https://mindhacks.com/2010/09/18/the-strange-face-in-the-mirror-illusion/

[Idiotpickle]

5 hours ago, Imaginarynumber1 said:

Oh god how I wish lol

[Scholar4Truth]

The Candyman films were loosely based off of it.

[+Desertrat56]

I never heard of Bloody Mary.  I heard of "beetljuice".

[the13bats]

i was about 8 ot 10 and started hanging with a couple boys a year or two older, bart the oldest would sneak us into dwaynes moms master bathroom, her bedroom was always spooky and dark, a red swag lamp hanging in a corner.

he would do the bloody mary thing 3 times in the moms bathroom mirror, only light was from that red lamp the setting alone had me scared, but the irony we never saw anything dwayne would push it and nothing,

but i was still scared,

[Grim Reaper 6]

This urban legend was originally based upon Queen Mary I or Mary Tudor. Originally after you stood in front of mirror and called her name she would appear holding a dead baby, if wasn't holding the baby she would say she was coming after yours. She was a pretty wicked ruler, and a lot of people died under her rule, during this time is when she received the title Blood Mary.

[Piney]

On 6/10/2019 at 3:59 PM, Scholar4Truth said:

The Candyman films were loosely based off of it.

The book actually.