People are sharing the craziest things to have kicked off in their local Facebook groups

If there’s one true blessing Facebook has bestowed upon the human race in its nearly two decade-long run, it’s undisputedly the humble local community group.

Every area has one; a private Facebook group in which people can partake in discussions and share any local news and events with their neighbours and wider community.

Yet while these groups tend to consist mainly of missing cat appeals, bad parking and people asking for DIY advice, they can be the perfect spot to sit back, relax, and scroll through page upon page of neighbourly drama and shenanigans.

So, when one Reddit user decided to share the craziest thing to ever ‘kick off’ in his local Facebook group, he was inundated with thousands of hilarious (yet somewhat bizarre) tales from within the dark depths of these private groups.

The initial question read, ‘What’s the craziest thing that’s kicked off on your local Facebook group?’, and told the tale of an Amazon delivery, a suspicious bloke lurking on a porch, and a forgotten collection deal between two neighbours.  

The post quickly grew in popularity and gained hundreds of stories from other local page members from all across the UK, ranging from arguments over murderous swans, dog muck drama and people getting off the bus too early.

Highlights include the story of a woman posting in their local group to share that her car had been stolen, in which she began the process of hunting down what happened to the car, and the requisite ‘what is the world coming to when you can’t park your car any where. Wouldn’t have happened back in my day’.

The post concluded: “A couple of days later, she posts that her car has been found – someone had found it slightly further up the road than where she was looking, and it was exactly where she’d parked it. She’d gone in one entrance to the park, and walked out of another a little bit further along the road.” Awkward.

Another response involved the nationally hated issue of owners not picking up after their dogs; this Reddit user recalled the time incriminating Ring doorbell footage showing a pair of dog owners in the act was shared into their Facebook group.

@mtimber71 / Unsplash

However, the whole group became divided over the footage, with some residents feeling ‘unsafe’ being videoed all the time and branding the owner of the Ring doorbell as ‘perverts’, while others were quite rightly sickened by the dog muck. 

Pure drama and ‘brilliant entertainment’. 

Another post read: “Woman posted in absolute rage saying someone had just tried to abduct her dog. The story goes that a van (which she had detail of) had followed her up and down the road. Eventually they rolled down the window and thrown some drug laden food to her dog – she evidently then ran home terrified and posted all over Facebook.

“Not long after there was a post from the owner of the van, a local tradesman, explaining not only was the reason they were driving up and down because they’d been given a wrong address and couldn’t find it; but the ‘drugged food’ was actually just a pepperami his passengers had thrown at each other and accidentally chucked it out the window.” Whoops…

David Dixon / Wikimedia Commons

The Reddit thread included stories of majorly paranoid neighbours, too; one woman explained that a photo of her husband on his commute home had been posted into her local group after he was seen repeatedly getting off the bus too early.

She wrote: “Same thing happened to my husband! ‘Suspicious guy gets off the bus at the same stop but walks in the direction the bus is going past other stops. Maybe casing out houses!’ With a photo of him for good measure.

“Truth is the bus gets too crowded after that stop so he gets off and walks the last 15 minutes home.”

One post read: “Someone put some litter off the street into a neighbours bin that neighbour kicked off and put a chicken carcass down the drain of the person who put the litter in her bin. Completely denied it but was caught doing it on cctv!”

Sandy Ravaloniaina / Unsplash

Another memorable entry comes courtesy of swan shenanigans, with a member of the community page allegedly appealing for help with splitting up two swans attempting to ‘murder’ another swan.

The post reads: “Got an argumentative one brewing at the moment. Local park has a lake with swans on it. Someone asked this morning if there was anyone who could help a swan that was being ‘murdered’ by 2 other swans, as she’d tried to split them up but the murderers were relentless. Half the replies are saying well done on helping the other half saying to leave alone as its nature. It’s all getting a bit nasty.”

A classic ‘suspicious man in a van’ post told an unfortunate tale of mistaken identity: “Our new build estate has a WhatsApp group, and was in uproar one day with images of a suspicious van driving slowly around the estate and some guy getting out and going up to different houses.

“It was the milkman.”

There were also plenty of lockdown dramas, with many saying their local community pages ramped up the mayhem while Covid was at its peak. 

One person recalled one of her neighbour’s somewhat irrational fear of the virus after she reported a runner coughing outside of her house, writing: “Lockdown was a ‘brilliant’ time on the local pages. We had a woman complaining because a runner had coughed outside her window. Full description of the runner and their clothing included.”

For more local community group mayhem, visit the full Reddit thread here.