What things scared you as a kid? Or still do as an adult?

[Raffine]

Toothpicks in baked goods.

We had a neighbor lady when I was a kid who loved to bake fancy cakes. The probelm was she held them together with a mouth-piercing array of tooth picks. After biting into one in sombody's birthday cake for years I could not eat cake or similar baked goods without checking it closely for toothpicks.

[retrorussell]

I used to cringe at the thought of someone having one go through the roof of their mouth!

[retrorussell]

Anyhow, what scared me as a kid and still does?

The Beyond The Door TV spot.  This scared me badly as a kid and I admit that I still don't feel easy when I see it. 

-bDdncqvtfQ

He he he.. definitely a change of pace for Nanny from Nanny & The Professor!

[zelmo73]

This part from Dawn of the Dead (2004) didn't really scare me, since I didn't find that movie particularly scary, just hella fun to watch. But I was always disturbed by the girl's unfortunate death-by-chainsaw for some reason. Probably because I wasn't expecting her to go out like that, and she looked like a fine piece of tail.

[retrorussell]

Any insect or spider with REALLY long legs scared the hell out me when I was a kid.

Nowadays they jolt me for axproximately one nanosecond before I unload some SQUISH on them!

[Texdar]

My mother and grandfather made me very paranoid around dragonflies.  They told me, when I was a kid, if you talked too much around them, they'd sew your lips shut.  I don't mind them nowadays but I still feel a bit on guard when I do see one.

[Gst0395]

My phobias when I was younger were quite irrational in nature. One such was this anti-piracy commercial that was seen on alot of UK video tapes during the final years of VHS. I think it speaks for itself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTMIz0_Iij8

[retrorussell]

I was unable to handle horror movies (other than really old ones) for a really, really long time, though I still would watch them.  Up until my later teens.  I read a book by Tom Savini on how special effects were done, and that pretty much told me "It's only a movie".  They don't scare me anymore.

[Trevor]

Being rejected, abused and abandoned: those have happened to me too often.  

Losing my father to the civil war in my birth country: even to this day, I still panic when I see a police car stopping near me (Dad was in the Police Reserve) and last year, the taxi I was riding in was pulled over by a cop and I was searched and frisked. Lord knows why the taxi was stopped or why I was frisked. I had a major panic attack when I got home. 

The dark. I still sleep with a light on and also people that I don't know getting too close physically to me.

----------------------------------------------

On a more cheery note: things film wise that scared the crap out of me as a child: 

The scary scene in the McCloud episode Someone's Out To Get Jennie: 

The crash sequence / vision sequence in Baffled with Leonard Nimoy: 



The poster for Dead Of Night / Deathdream: 



The monster in Space 1999's Dragon's Domain episode: 



Lots of things: scary to be sure but remembered fondly.

[Newt]

The cavemen from the old Popeye cartoon.  No idea why.  But I grew up in a very large, very old house and every night in winter when the floors would 'pop' progressively and regularly when the steam heat came on, half-awake through my open bedroom door I would 'see' those cavemen slowly and inexorably marching up the staircase toward my room, chanting their song.  The 'pop's were their footsteps.  I thought they could hear my heart beating - and that it would stop, had to stop, it was pounding so hard.  I knew they had emerged from the dark closet under the stairs where there was a huge old iron safe. In my mind's eye I think they were more an amalgam of the Popeye cavemen and the guards of the Wicked Witch from The Wizard of Oz.  I never found out or imagined what they would do once they got to me - they just scared the spit out of me on their way up.   

The flying monkeys from the Wizard of Oz.  NOT comfy.  Also the scene where the witch appears on the cottage roof in the forest.  Yikes. Gut reactions, both.

I read Dracula (and Frankenstein) at the age of 10.  Since then I have not been entirely comfortable sleeping without the covers tucked around my neck.

I used to be afraid of turning off the basement lights and going back up the stairs.  Always felt something was RIGHT BEHIND ME.  Until the day I took a deep breath and forced myself to stop halfway up the stairs and dared it to grab me.  From that point on I never rushed up again but walked up slowly, very dignified.  Confidence was like a charm that both protected me and fed itself.  That was a very important lesson for me.

I am however very pleased that I have through conscious effort overcome my irrational fear of spiders.  I am not fond of the critters, but I can stand very close to one now and not get at all upset. 

[Gst0395]

This was a strange thing that scared me when I was younger.

[DeepBlueNothing]

The sound of a train late at night when it would blow its horn. It scared the crap out of me and I would have a hard time going back to sleep. I had some nightmares about it too.

And there was this man's voice that was deep sounding that would say "One moment please!" whenever the film would break or there were technical difficulties;that really scared me to death.I was growing up in Houston both the late 70's and early 80's when the TV station that's now known as CW 39,used to be 39 KHTV. In fact, I believe his voice was used for both some of the commercials and introductions for some of the cartoons when they began,like the old Bugs Bunny cartoons for example. It wasn't until some years later (in the 2000s), when I saw the actual man on a car commercial talking with that same deep voice. It made feel better seeing the actual person with that voice,because I wasn't scared of him anymore.

There was another issue I had with being scared of human skeletons all the time,even if it was just pictures of fake replicas. It was to the point that was trying to either hide from them or keep as far away from them as possible. One of the mean kids did things in the first grade to egg on my fear. I can safely say I have long since out grown the fear.

[retrorussell]

The creepy old PBS bumper from the 70s used to really freak me out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AofJfWEhesg

[Gst0395]

The creepy old PBS bumper from the 70s used to really freak me out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AofJfWEhesg

The TV industry was loaded with infamously scary closing logos back in the day, from companies like Screen Gems and Viacom. Believe it or not, there have been many logos scarier than that imo. I had my fears as well back in the day, I was not a huge fan of the roaring lions from MGM logos.

Speaking of those, whose brave enough to watch this in full screen in the dark?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xg6FE5FWSmY

[Mr. DS]

The movie Poltergeist...in general.