Ah 4Chan. A place where madness, genius, and degeneracy collide, it’s one of my favorite places to go whenever I want to just cut loose and act like the biggest dingbat on the face of the planet. It’s also a place I go for material given it’s a haven for some of the strangest things you could ever find.
One board I seldom visit though is /b/, the “random” board. It has a reputation not only for housing some pretty seriously illegal content, but it’s also generally just flooded with porn threads nowadays. Every now and then, I’ll post a random image of an animal (mostly to see if I’ll get anything meaningful started), but more often than not, the thread will end up on Page 10 with maybe a handful of responses.
That wasn’t always the case though. Way back in the times of yore, /b/ would have actual threads one could partake in and have some semblance of fun in. That is to say, people who wanted to act like idiots could act like idiots and have fun with other idiots. It was fun, stupid, chaotic, and would likely make the average person nowadays wonder exactly was wrong with the average 4Chan user (not that that doesn’t happen nowadays, but let’s pretend 4Chan is as it was like in the good old days of moot).
At the same time, 4Chan was a place where some truly sick, twisted minds could go to share their… “creativity” and relish in the response they’d get. That’s the case with today’s story, a story that I call what does /b/ keep in the freezer? The name comes from the question the original poster asked the folks over at /b/. So let’s see exactly what /b/ keeps in the freezer, dear reader! Just be sure you haven’t eaten.
The Story
On December 5, 2007, a user on /b/ posted the follow, well, post:
what does /b/ keep in the freezer?
Guess whats in mind
Accompanying the post was a picture of a freezer. I won’t be linking or posting the images because they’re quite gory and this blog is meant to be PG-13 to some degree. However, if you’re curious, just look up “what does /b/ keep in the freezer” and I can guarantee you’ll find something. Or look up Lazy Masquerade’s “9 Deeply Disturbing 4chan Posts”. It’s the first story and he gives a decent enough summary of the story.
Anyways, following this post, several users began posting their responses. Some suggested it was child pornography. Others said a cat. Some posited that it was urine (because if there’s one thing to expect from 4Chan, it’s that there are jars of urine because nobody bathes or uses the bathroom—I can neither confirm nor deny that this is the case). Two other answers were that it was cake and Bambi’s mom.
All of these were wrong though! The winner of the chicken dinner was the person who said it was a body—or at least, a part of a body. In a follow-up post, the OP showcased a black bag with a dead body, which I believe is in a state of decomposition (keep this in mind as it plays very heavily into three of the theories).
Shocking as it may be, 4Chan is no stranger to corpse photos; there have been several instances of dead bodies being posted to /b/ and this wasn’t the first (if my memory isn’t failing me). Alas, as is the case with any instance of corpse posting, our friendly neighborhood /b/ros were quick to say that they were masturbating to the image. Others, on the other side of the spectrum, were appalled and rather unnerved.
As for the original poster, he posted one final image, which showcased the body bag and his arm with a timestamp on it. He also stated he was off to masturbate—I believe to the leg, which had been posted in all of its glory prior.
In total: four images were posted and the most you could really see of the body was a single leg. However, it’s very apparent there was more to it than just that one leg. This led the users on /b/ to try and figure out what exactly the truth to this thread was, but I’ve never been able to find a full archive of the thread (there have been rehashes of the thread, with people posting the same image[s], but as far as I’m aware, they’ve never taken off like the original). From what I know, the original thread did take off, but nothing ever came of it.
In my search for more information on this, I really found nothing. The most I was able to find was a forum thread from a website called fairfaxunderground, a forum that claims to be dedicated to improving “communication among residents of Fairfax County” in the state of Virginia.
On February 22, 2017, there was a thread (gore advisory, but hey, the one time I’ll post a link to said gore) posted to fairfaxunderground about mail order brides, a user asked what the “deal” with them is; pondering if you get to “keep them” or not. The first response stated that there’s an “extra charge” unless you keep them in your freezer. This led into the second response, which reads as follows:
> Unless you want to keep them in your freezer.
+100
This one, let's just say her name was Anna from Ukraine, didn't work out so well. She threatened to leave; I told her we were forever, and I decided when forever ends.
The attached images were of the pictures that were posted in the original 4Chan thread. I’m almost certain this was a troll who wanted an excuse to post some gore, but then again, the same user has been active as recently as July of this year (2020). They also joined back in 2009, so who knows. I figured it was simply worth mentioning.
So what exactly was the truth to this? Well, if it’s anything like a great many other gore posts, probably nothing. As far as I can tell, no arrests—contrary to some Reddit comments—were made. This is probably due to the OP hiding his or her IP address (not that I think that would really matter since I’m pretty sure IP addresses work that way, but I could be wrong). It could also be because the entire thing was a LARP, but who knows, right? That’s where the story ends, so let’s hop into the theories section.
Theories
1. It was a prop
The skeptics theory, the first we’ll go over is that the body was a prop.
If you’re at all familiar with 4Chan, then you’d know users love nothing more than to pull pranks—both innocuous and malicious in nature. In this case, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that this is quite a malicious prank. Though what would the end game be?
Simple: skeeving out the denizens of 4Chan!
There are a great many fantastic makeup and prop artists in the world and making a halfway convincing fake leg wouldn’t take too much effort. However, I sadly don’t know whether or not what was seen in the images shared in the thread would match up with real human decomposition. So this theory, while it may be what most immediately go to given the nature of 4Chan, feels like it has the burden of proof on it and nothing I can find really works in or against its favor.
2. It was a real body
Our second theory posits that the post was of a real body and that the OP was a murderer—whether a serial murderer or not, I don’t know.
This theory is very, very difficult to prove. While there have been alleged serial killers who’ve posted on 4Chan before (one of which we’ll maybe get to next year), I’ve never been able to find an iota of evidence to prove this theory in any way, shape, or form. I tried checking 4plebs and was able to come up with diddly dick in the way of posts on /x/, which is the first place I’d imagine would take a liking to this story. As for /b/, checking an archive of that place is exceedingly difficult and so time consuming that I’d hope you’d forgive me for giving up.
Seriously, combing through /b/ is like trying to find a needle in the Grand Canyon. It’s next to impossible.
With that said, this theory remains extremely popular for rather obvious reasons. It’s the most fantastical and nearly everyone loves a good murder mystery. As such, if you’re looking for your next great Internet Mystery to look through, I would suggest looking here. That, or look into the 4Chan Serial Killer. It’s a helluva rabbit hole.
3. It was a body from a morgue
This theory and the next one both come from a blog called “Subjective Reality”. In it, the writer states there’s a theory that the OP worked at a morgue and stole the body. This is something that, as far as I’m aware, has happened plenty of times before—with employees stealing bodies for sick, twisted purposes (see: necrophilia), only to later be caught. In this case however, I can’t find anything that points to the OP having been found out and trying to find any specifics is exceedingly difficult. In spite of that, this theory looks to be the most plausible.
4. It was a gravedigger and he stole the body
The fourth and final theory, and the other one to come from Subjective Reality (I know, real shocker given I mentioned it), the idea here is that the OP was a gravedigger or at least had some sort of employment at a cemetery. At some point, he stole the body and the rest is history. This theory really lacks any sort of weight behind it and as far as I can tell, there’s nothing to back it up beyond the premise being realistic on its own.
My Take
Truth be told, I have no idea what to think of this post. I can’t dictate if it’s a prop because I have precisely no knowledge of making props and make-up artistry. I think that, at first glance, the body part[s] looks real enough. I also think it’s within the realm of reason to say that someone stole the body from a morgue given it’s happened before and there are enough sick folks in this world. You’re also dealing with a website where someone can remain as anonymous as possible, though I still question the whole “hidden IP address” claim.
I guess if I needed to settle on a theory, the morgue theft one is the most plausible. However, exactly how the person wouldn’t have been found out, let alone noticed, leaves me a bit perplexed. I mean, it shouldn’t be too hard to notice a body went missing, right? Presumably, that employee would’ve also been assigned the task of handling it. So how could no one put two and two together to grill the person until they confessed that they took it?
Maybe that’s me overthinking things, but I guess in the long run: the theory as a whole seems like the most plausible. If I had to pick a second most likely theory that sits well with me, I’d say it was a prop. Perhaps the OP applied some left over chicken and other things something to create a realistic looking body part. I’m extremely doubtful of the murder theory because it seems like we would have heard more about this otherwise.
As for the gravedigger theory, I think it’s the least likely. It seems a bit far-fetched to me. Why? I dunno, just a weird feeling I have. Don’t judge me.
Conclusion
As grisly as it is interesting, I must admit that this story is one of my favorites. It’s a really fantastic insight into the madness and bizarre nature of /b/ and 4Chan as a whole. There’s nowhere quite like it on the Internet and in many ways, that makes it a devilishly magical place to lurk. Though at the same time, I think it’s best that some people—especially those with weak stomachs or thin skin—never visit it. So until tomorrow, see you all on the flip side.
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