Black-eyed Children

What are Black-eyed Children?

Black-eyed Children are ghoulish creatures who have been trying to gain entrance to homes and vehicles since 1996. They usually appear at night, knocking on doors or windows and begging to be let inside. Unfortunately for the children, they are almost always rejected, since an aura of terror clings to them.

Characteristics

Physical Description

Since the Black-eyed Children began appearing in 1996, witnesses have given varying descriptions of their appearance. Taken together, these reports describe a diverse and ghoulish crew. Still, the children do have some common traits.

The children are usually pale, with light-colored hair. They generally wear modern clothes, although a few witnesses have reported them wearing old-fashioned or “Mennonite” clothes. They might wear sunglasses or grow long bangs to conceal their eyes.

The children usually travel in pairs, which doubles their ability to intimidate their victims. They can be boys or girls, ranging from 6 to 16 years old. Usually, one child in the pair is several years older than the other.

Of course, their eyes give them their nightmarish appearance. Before you see their eyes, you might mistake them for ordinary children. When you see their eyes—solid black, without distinction between pupil, iris, and whites—that mistake becomes impossible. A few witnesses have claimed that their eyes look like ragged holes, while others describe their eyes as shiny black bulbs.

Personality

From military men to beloved house cats, every living thing that encounters the Black-eyed Children has the same reaction: terror.

Clearly, the children radiate negative emotions like panic and dread, but their true personality is a little less clear. Are they actually as evil as the feelings they inspire? Since next to no witnesses have reported letting the children inside their houses, it’s unclear exactly what the children’s intentions are. They may be sinister or innocent.

Generally, one child in the pair (the older one) will be shameless in approaching strangers and insistent upon coming inside. Meanwhile, the younger child will be quiet and shy. Some witnesses report feeling a strong urge to help or protect the younger child.

Other than their insistence about coming inside, the children are usually polite. They use words like “please, sir, ma’am” when they are talking to you, and they usually leave without a fuss when they are rejected.

Special Abilities

Again, because the Black-eyed Children rarely succeed in getting inside a house, their full powers remain hidden. No one knows what devastation they would unleash if they could only get past their first objective: entering a house.

Still, witnesses have reported enough strange happenings around these children to suggest that they have incredible powers.

First, they probably have some form of psychic or telepathic abilities. Witnesses have reported the children staring at each other, as if in silent communication, and calling out to adults before they came into view. They have also tracked some individuals from town to town, despite the individual moving in secret, changing his phone number, using a fake name, etc. They are famous for their ability to manipulate emotions, inspiring fear, panic, and dread so strong that witnesses tremble or sweat and animals hide. At the same time, they can also exercise a hypnotic pull on their victims, making them feel like they should open the door and let the children inside.

Second, the children seem to have an electric or radioactive field around them. Flickering lights and power outages are common when the children pop up. One witness claimed that she let the children inside and has since suffered from nosebleeds and been diagnosed with advanced skin cancer, consistent with exposure to massive radiation.

The children’s ability to speak may be limited. Some witnesses have reported that they could only say one or two phrases (“we need to use your telephone” or “our parents are coming soon”). They might also be stuck using old-fashioned expressions, like telegraph instead of telephone, and they sometimes make non-sense requests, like asking for ketchup to put on an apple. Other witnesses describe the children as intelligent and responsive. For example, if you tell them they can’t come inside to use your telephone, they might ask to come inside to use the bathroom or warm up.

Although the children have been active in broad daylight, they seem to prefer travelling late at night. Their activity surges around Halloween each year.

Cultural Representation

Origin

The Black-eyed Children first appeared in 1996, when Brian Bethel, a reporter in Abilene, Texas, published a story about them in a paranormal mailing list. The legend caught on and became an internet sensation. Reports of Black-eyed Children began popping up all over paranormal and horror fiction forums, but all of the stories were published anonymously, and none of them could be linked back to actual news or police reports.

The emergence of new social media platforms, like Reddit and Quora, have fueled the growth of the children’s legend, leading many people to believe in these nightmarish creatures, despite the lack of verifiable witnesses.

Pop Culture

To this day, paranormal internet forums remain the stronghold of the Black-eyed Children’s legend. However, their story has been picked up by a few larger media companies. MSN, the Daily Star, and Mirror have all picked up stories about the strange children. A crowd-funded horror film, called Black Eyed Kids, has also been built on the back of this modern folktale.