Paranormal State (on A&E) is the show I most love to hate, out of all the shows on TV.
For those somehow missing out on this *awesomeness*, the show is a reality series that that catalogs the cases of a paranormal investigations outfit. Their leader is, ostensibly, a UPenn student that was haunted when he was younger. He now leads a team that goes around and tries to help people who are being terrorized by ghosts. (The best person in his crew is Chip, the slightly gay and totally awesome psychic.) So, first the show is just creepy enough to be fun. They uncover stories of murders, and a great deal of the footage they show is night vision, or at least dimly lit. One of my all time favorite movies is The Exorcist, and this punches all of those buttons - but it's real life and on a weekly basis. How could I not love it?
What really turns up the creep factor is that it's *just scientific* enough to freak me out. I don't really believe in ghosts per se. I am willing to accept that *maybe* somehow, as part of the electric and chemical nature of the brain, people can leave "impressions" in places. So, what we think of as "ghosts" are just images, smells, and sounds somehow imprinted on a place. These things are not sentient or active in any way. They're just like film loops. But, even with this limited defininiton of "haunting," I'm still too much of a skeptic and empiricist to really *believe.* That said, I'm paranoid and Catholic enough to not want to tempt fate.
What makes Paranormal State work so well is that they're always using infrared cameras and all sorts of other fancy technology, to try and *prove* what is going on. But, at the same time, it's all also very ad hoc. A lot of their explanations sound, literally, made up on the spot. Plus, there's nothing rigorous about their tests - no counterfactual, no control, no blind testing etc. Because, after all, this is a team on a mission to save a family - not just a bunch of scientists building theory. So, the things they experience seem plausible, but there are big huge holes. This means, on the one hand, I get to be totally creeped out. But, at the same time, I also get to yell at my TV, assuage away my fears, and feel like a smart, smarmy rationalist. Really, this is the *perfect* show for me.
The one thing that *does* trouble me about the show is that I worry about it exploiting people. Another one of my favorite shows is A Haunting, which is on Discovery. A bit different than Paranormal State, A Haunting tells the story of a "real life haunting" through reenactments and interviews. It is also superbly creepy. But, you don't have too watch to many to notice a pattern. And that pattern is: a lot of these haunting coincide with a recent move, financial trouble, a death, a child entering puberty, etc. In other words, trauma leads to stress and maybe some mental illness.(1) In fact, one pattern that comes to light in a cursory overview of both shows is that most of these families seem to be working class, or even down right poor.(2) It seems to me that what we're probably seeing is, much like in generations past, mental illness being passed off as exorcism or haunting. Now, if an exorcism works for you - and you're stable after that - that's awesome. But I worry about the people who make Paranormal State getting rich and famous off of someone else's pain - and me enjoying it. And I worry even more that these people who need help - when the exorcism doesn't work - I worry they might never get the help they need.
(1) Yes, I am aware you could argue stress produces haunting. But, again, skeptic here.
(2) Yes, I suppose you could argue that rich people are haunted - they just use psychaitric drugs to stifle the effects. But, you know, Occam's Razor. The simpler explanation seems to be mental illness.
For those somehow missing out on this *awesomeness*, the show is a reality series that that catalogs the cases of a paranormal investigations outfit. Their leader is, ostensibly, a UPenn student that was haunted when he was younger. He now leads a team that goes around and tries to help people who are being terrorized by ghosts. (The best person in his crew is Chip, the slightly gay and totally awesome psychic.) So, first the show is just creepy enough to be fun. They uncover stories of murders, and a great deal of the footage they show is night vision, or at least dimly lit. One of my all time favorite movies is The Exorcist, and this punches all of those buttons - but it's real life and on a weekly basis. How could I not love it?
What really turns up the creep factor is that it's *just scientific* enough to freak me out. I don't really believe in ghosts per se. I am willing to accept that *maybe* somehow, as part of the electric and chemical nature of the brain, people can leave "impressions" in places. So, what we think of as "ghosts" are just images, smells, and sounds somehow imprinted on a place. These things are not sentient or active in any way. They're just like film loops. But, even with this limited defininiton of "haunting," I'm still too much of a skeptic and empiricist to really *believe.* That said, I'm paranoid and Catholic enough to not want to tempt fate.
What makes Paranormal State work so well is that they're always using infrared cameras and all sorts of other fancy technology, to try and *prove* what is going on. But, at the same time, it's all also very ad hoc. A lot of their explanations sound, literally, made up on the spot. Plus, there's nothing rigorous about their tests - no counterfactual, no control, no blind testing etc. Because, after all, this is a team on a mission to save a family - not just a bunch of scientists building theory. So, the things they experience seem plausible, but there are big huge holes. This means, on the one hand, I get to be totally creeped out. But, at the same time, I also get to yell at my TV, assuage away my fears, and feel like a smart, smarmy rationalist. Really, this is the *perfect* show for me.
The one thing that *does* trouble me about the show is that I worry about it exploiting people. Another one of my favorite shows is A Haunting, which is on Discovery. A bit different than Paranormal State, A Haunting tells the story of a "real life haunting" through reenactments and interviews. It is also superbly creepy. But, you don't have too watch to many to notice a pattern. And that pattern is: a lot of these haunting coincide with a recent move, financial trouble, a death, a child entering puberty, etc. In other words, trauma leads to stress and maybe some mental illness.(1) In fact, one pattern that comes to light in a cursory overview of both shows is that most of these families seem to be working class, or even down right poor.(2) It seems to me that what we're probably seeing is, much like in generations past, mental illness being passed off as exorcism or haunting. Now, if an exorcism works for you - and you're stable after that - that's awesome. But I worry about the people who make Paranormal State getting rich and famous off of someone else's pain - and me enjoying it. And I worry even more that these people who need help - when the exorcism doesn't work - I worry they might never get the help they need.
(1) Yes, I am aware you could argue stress produces haunting. But, again, skeptic here.
(2) Yes, I suppose you could argue that rich people are haunted - they just use psychaitric drugs to stifle the effects. But, you know, Occam's Razor. The simpler explanation seems to be mental illness.
VIEW 7 of 7 COMMENTS
toothpickmoe:
Fair enough. I've given in to a few of those guilty pleasures myself.
obd:
I haven't missed cable. you can find most of what you want on the interweb.