Psychics can be irresponsible unknowingly

First of all let me tell you where I stand.

Unlike a Derren Brown and Amazing Randy I am not against "psychics" <-do notice the quotes. I do not believe there are any real psychics.
I think Psychics CAN do good, some people find solace by the fact that their loved one has died and they go and see a psychic and they hear that their loved one
is on the other side feeling happy, comfortable and is watching over them. This can be very therapeutic.

The problem is that when you are not a trained psychologist some things that may sound so innocent, gentle and friendly can really create mental havoc.

You need to remember the fact that a great majority of people visiting a psychic are mentally unstable, hence they come to see a psychic they need a strong hold they can't find in the real world. Unstable people are highly suggestible and an innocent negative suggestion could cause a seed to be planted.
A simple seemingly benign statement as: "You have a dream. You know it is feasible and yet sometimes you doubt it is. But deep down it is a dream you'd like to fulfil. I can tell you that as soon as you decide to for it you will succeed! It will change your life significantly knowing that what you do is what you really want to do."
Now when this person has a good job as an investment banker but her dream is to go and become a professional singer then this could actually hurt the person. We know that less than 1 in 500.000 people become a professional singer. So this advice in the long run could hurt that person's finances. Imagine if that person has kids and is the sole provider!

So in order to be responsible it needs to be much more careful and pointed at the person. However these sorts of answers aren't really psychic are they?
"You have a dream... At times you doubt this dream is feasible and it is good to have doubt because we all have our far-out dreams. But some dreams can change our lives for the better and there are many examples out there for people chasing a lofty dream and becoming rich. You need to ask yourself if this is a lofty yet successful dream or just that a lofty dream. The only person who knows the real answer is you, deep inside you know just ask yourself and find the answer. When I would tell you the answer then it could either result in you not putting in all the effort that it takes, or you would leave a strong dream --which motivates you-- behind here in my office, I am not here to shatter dreams or provide lazy hope".

Rainbow ruses are rather innocent and can be used safely in my opinion but deeper advice needs to be avoided imho.

This is pretty much my concern over the issue.

Raymond, I would like this post in the thread regarding this debate, do you mind if I move it?

rdoetjes wrote:

First of all let me tell you where I stand.


You need to remember the fact that a great majority of people visiting a psychic are mentally unstable, hence they come to see a psychic they need a strong hold they can't find in the real world. Unstable people are highly suggestible and an innocent negative suggestion could cause a seed to be planted.
A simple seemingly benign statement as: "You have a dream. You know it is feasible and yet sometimes you doubt it is. But deep down it is a dream you'd like to fulfil. I can tell you that as soon as you decide to for it you will succeed! It will change your life significantly knowing that what you do is what you really want to do."

Now when this person has a good job as an investment banker but her dream is to go and become a professional singer then this could actually hurt the person. We know that less than 1 in 500.000 people become a professional singer. So this advice in the long run could hurt that person's finances. Imagine if that person has kids and is the sole provider!

Ray. You hear messages about "following your dream" and "creating reality" and "go for it" and "you can do and be anything" every single day from a bunch of sources, don't go blaming psychics for hurting people because they may use similar lines.

If you are being totally sincere here, then you simply disagree with NIKE's "Just do it". So some unstable guy out there is thinking of doing harm to his girlfriend, he is walking around the mall, sees the NIKE add. Decides to "just do it."

Single mom who wants to follow her dream but hates her job which is keeping her down. Her friends tell her she should go for it, though some say she should be careful. She is at home flipping channels on the telly, see the inspiring "just do it" NIKE add. She quits her job the next morning and eight months later loses her house. Blame NIKE?

How about a teenager who is considering suicide? His mom buys him a pair of NIKEs for Christmas. He sees on the box "Just do it". He doesn't live to see the new year.

C'mon. Can't pin stuff like that on Psychics. Really?

I can go on, but I think on this forum, there's no one better to answer you than those who do this for a living, so I'll let them have a go.

I understand your point Alex - the difference is, that shopping attracts an equal amount of the psychologically damaged and the non-suicidal (although shopping always makes me consider the prospect). Whereas psychic do tend to attract the psychologically damaged, those for whom conventional therapy has been found lacking.......

Psychologically damaged? First, who isn't psychologically damaged anymore?

Chris, honestly, if anyone who visits psychics, and there may be one or two here, reads this, they may be insulted by your statement.

I just disagree.

'Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong, maybe a shouldn't be singing this song....'

However, obviously I do not mean to imply that all people who visit psychics are psychologically damaged. That is like saying that George Bush had brown eyes, therefor all people with brown eyes are stupid psychopaths. It must be a truth (although I have no evidence) that people who have looked for solutions to problems, i.e. grief, dissociation, depression etc - and have not found help through conventional channels, are likely to look elsewhere. Just take the example of grief over the loss of a loved one. There is no doubt in my mind that some 'so-called' psychics do intentional damage for financial gain. Some do unintentional damage through lack of insight or knowledge of psychology. Other do a very positive service in providing hope in the context of an expanded awareness of potential existences. So I am not saying all people who go to psychics are psychologically needy. Nor am I saying that all psychics are morally corrupt or lacking in responsibility. But in both cases - some are - and there lies the point.

Christopher J Gould wrote:

'Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong, maybe a shouldn't be singing this song....'

and there lies the point.

I don't like your use of the word "lies".


... is there a middle finger emoticon here in the Moon ...?


Here ... just flip this upside down

Sorry but isn't this covered elsewhere?

I can see both side of the arguments, I am lucky to have some counciling skills and am used to dealing with damaged people, people that not only have a mental health problem but also a learning difficulties so i have tools to help me within a reading.

I sometimes work for someone that puts on psychic fairs and they would rather have a mentalist reader then a psychic reader as they feel the mentalist has more of a footing in the 'Real' world as some psychics can be a bit full of themselves and that their answers/guidence is right.

But then you have people like Julie on here who I can tell from their posts know what they are doing.

(yes it is covered elsewhere - I just wanted to experiment to see if I could structure the argument a little more by setting out a premise and seeing if it could not develop in a more structured fashion. The original thread started with quite a different topic. I am trying to make 'Defining Concepts' look different from the general chat forums. The process would be: 1. someone puts forward a point to debate. 2. everyone else tries to develop the argument - ensuring it keeps on topic. Whereas Albino and Negrado behave just like any other forum - i.e. the topic just drift and meander where they want. What I am trying to do here is take the gist of another thread and make it into a prepossession for a discussion - then everyone cuts and pastes the points they made on the other thread here. On the outer forums, the talk is free, on here it would be edited by the moderators for clarity (i.e. really focusing on the main points). Again, this is just an experiment. Not sure it will work myself, it may be too complex - in which case we will drop the idea.... but let's see what happens)

(I get that Chris but I thought this had been done alread in this part, ingnore me )

@ALEXANDRE

I understand what you are saying but it's not a matter of whether common daily influences influence you but that a psychic does!

Bear in mind that people go and seek "HELP" from a psychic, this is a person in authority. People in authority have much more influence than signs on the streets or equal peers. The psychic apparently knows something your peers may not!

I have a degree in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy here you learn that a therapist can unknowingly hurt a client. However we are trained to see this, frame sentences in positive phrases ask or look for feedback. A psychic most likely has no such background and their advice "CAN" hurt people. The difference with "daily influence" (which we are exposed to daily) is that here there's a person direct cause of the results by suggested claim that he/she may know something someone else doesn't.

Now that is the BIG DIFFERENCE!

Sure I believe all psychics work from a positive influence but even that can (as I have shown) consequences.

Just imagine this sequence of events:
Your dream is to start your own cafe. The psychic says that she sees the dream happening and succeeding. The person thinks: "Cool let's go for it because it will work out". Now the person can be unknowingly slacking by the believe that it is a given fact that he will succeed. Forgetting to mention that the person needs to do everything in their power by working hard expanding their network etc in order to succeed. Could be the difference between success and failure.

So that is my problem that unintended you can misinform people severely and I think the psychic "as an authority figure" is responsible for this.

NOt at all, it was actually intended to be there. I now know ye require reply

Christopher J Gould wrote:

This is pretty much my concern over the issue.

Raymond, I would like this post in the thread regarding this debate, do you mind if I move it?

In the situation you describe, the one about opening a new business, there is no way I would just say that the person's dream will happen and succeed without other information to go with that. I am not irresponsible, most psychics I know are not irresponsible either. Even if the cards showed success and that the dream would happen, certainly there would be other information available too, such as making sure it's the right time, if it is the right time, then making sure that all the finances are in place and things like that, some of those things the client will have to decide outside of my reading room.

I resent the earlier comment that people who visit psychics are mentally unstable, it shows you don't know what you are talking about and are actually making assumptions. I work as a psychic every day. I know this is not the case. In fact I have had two local politicians who get readings from me, police officers, moms, everyone in my family gets readings and with the exception of maybe one or two of us, we are all very mentally stable thank you very much.

Anyone can be irresponsible unknowingly, I don't know why this has become focused on psychics alone when it is really a truism.

I do my best with my clients and the sort of readings you guys imagine happens with psychics are fantasies of yours, because in reality, they don't happen like you imagine, there is more connection between psychic and client, I care about my people, I believe in karma, and as a psychic I help people make decisions, I don't push them into them.


Julia

I always tell my sitter that the cards give us one outcome of their future and nothing is set in stone.

Firstly, let's get the facts straight here/.

Psychics do not talk to the dead. They use a 'sixth sense' or intuition to tell the sitter things.

A medium is someone who talks to the dead.

They are two entirely different things.



Anyone who hasn't done any research on psychology and then proclaims themself to be the font of all knowledge is on to a hiding. There is a law in this country where if you give someone bogus advice and they act upon it, you can be sued.

Readings should be given for entertainment purposes only and you should never encourage people to follow advice which may not lead to the outcome they desire. All the ethical basics are covered in 13 Steps and, to an extent, in Derren Brown's 'Tricks of the Mind' book.

Anyone seeking to enter this form of entertainment should certainly read the works of Paul Voodini as he covers practically everything.

@Julia mentally unstable doesn't mean your nuts but it means that you need "something" else to hold onto.
Much like religion most people who are religious are so for two reasons
1) dogmatic (raised with the believe it is required --take away religion and they become unstable)
2) stability (they miss something in life to give it the shine so to say).

It is a fact that people go to their church more often when they have some trouble in their life and they do so with psychics also!
Sure there are some who see it for what it is entertainment but the majority go there because the believe they can find answers.

A politician comes to see a psychic now this is interesting! Why on earth should someone who has the power to rule go find
help from a psychic?

Freddie who said something about mediums? I can't see it mentioned anywhere. Anyway I second Pauls book as it covers a lot of stuff to do with readings.

I would like to comment to people on this thread, in particular to those who are readers, from the comments it is clear to me that some of those questioning have no idea of psychics or what a reader does. I really do not mean this to be inflammatory, but please at least have a reading first before commenting. Now there is a hint of impatience in my voice, why would anyone think I would be interested in what their belief system is a belief cannot be discussed. That someone can cause problems unknowingly is surely true, certainly of me and any man.
A question to our cognitive behavioral psychologist, with respect when you were taught that a counselor could unknowingly cause harm in the context of a therapeutic session, did you question it? Evidence to support this etc.
bob1a

First of all I have visited many "psychics" and I must say great entertainment value! Very predictable when you come in with the question if you can tape the session And please note that I am not against psychics but they need to realize that they can have profound influence in someone's life.
Plus like I wrote earlier I think some psychics do a remarkable job helping people get to turns with their sadness of a lost one.

Anyways I never questioned the ability of a therapist to harm a person in all their good intend.
For example a client asks you: "Lately I see my relationship declining, what should I do? Should I quit my relation?
therapist: "You know, I can not make that decision for you! You will need to make this decision yourself"

Well that sounds so correct! Important decisions you lay in the hands of your client (as you always should).
However you are implying indirectly he should come to that conclusion to "quit his relationship" himself.

Look at the clear suggestion at the end: "You will NEED TO MAKE THIS DECISION". This is in associative tense (don't know the english word for it), and refers to quitting the relationship --we are going into subconscious linguistics here. Changing the sentence the word: "this" to "that" is already disassociating yourself from the idea as a therapist. But still it can be mistaken as a suggestion to "make that decision to quit the relationship".

A better response would be:
therapist: "As you well know, quitting a relationship is the final station. Are there any solutions before that final station?"

Even questions are usually leading so you will have to be careful with this. Now people who are in seek of stability help are very open for suggestion, ironically depressed people are more open to gloomy suggestions than happy suggestions. It has to do with the our context driven nature.

bob1a wrote:

I would like to comment to people on this thread, in particular to those who are readers, from the comments it is clear to me that some of those questioning have no idea of psychics or what a reader does. I really do not mean this to be inflammatory, but please at least have a reading first before commenting. Now there is a hint of impatience in my voice, why would anyone think I would be interested in what their belief system is a belief cannot be discussed. That someone can cause problems unknowingly is surely true, certainly of me and any man.
A question to our cognitive behavioral psychologist, with respect when you were taught that a counselor could unknowingly cause harm in the context of a therapeutic session, did you question it? Evidence to support this etc.
bob1a

The truth is - both psychics and psychologists are capable of making mistakes, probably due to the fact that they are both human, just with different experiences of reality. Both can inadvertently misuse language and set up what is in effect a post-hypnotic command. This is the subject of an excellent book called: 'Monsters and Magical Sticks: Or, There's No Such Thing As Hypnosis'. You may well have read it.

Someone from the Magic Cafe alerted me to this forum, saying that a new forum had risen up for people who were blurring the line between magic and fortune tellers, mystics and the like.
Getting here, I realize that there are some intelligent questioning voices. Although everyone seems a little too polite and cautious.
Well, I am not here to cause any trouble, but I do speak my mind. I am sure someone will tell me if I am out of line - they normally do!
I come from the tradition that says it is a magicians job to defraud psychics. In my view psychics do untold damage to vulnerable people on one hand, and take money off them with the other. Magicians are in a unique position to understand the techniques used by fraudulent mediums. As a magician, I use the techniques of the psychic for entertainment, rather than immoral deception.
To me belief in spirits, fairies, god, angels and father christmas are all the same - deception of those who have less, shall we say, cognitive faculties.
If you do a 'reading', contact a dead relative or claim you know something about someone that YOU CANNOT KNOW, you are being deceitful. What is worse, you are being deceitful for personal gain. What is worse, personal gain at the expense of someone who may well be emotionally damaged.
Magic has a noble tradition from Houdini to James Randi, of exposing fraud. I will gladly debate with any so called psychic regarding their fraudulent claims - and from the position of empirical proof.

Teddy,
I think this is a bit too easy of a statement. Initially I was in your realm of thinking until I went to visit all these psychic markets (good entertaining fun).

It was the 2nd or 3rd time I went that I got to chat with a lady my age. She told me a story that altered my vision. She'd lost her child (a gentic heart disease) and she had "help" from psychologist, GPs, and psychiatrists and nothing worked. She told me she'd tried to commit suicide to be with her little daughter.
A single visit to a "psychic" who told her woman that her little daughter is with her everyday. And that she says that mommy shouldn't cry over her in bed or when she's alone because her daughter was no longer feeling sick and she was happy here with grandpa Hans and uncle Harry *you gotta love the warped views after such a session*. These words made this woman so intensely happy, these were the words she was looking for, for nearly two years.

Sure she paid 10 euros for that reading, then again she (or we as a society) had paid several thousands on medical help that didn't lodge the proverbial bullet.

Now is the deceit when you are being such a great help to a person?

Sure Teddy you and I are scientists, we have a very sober look at things. But what we often forget is that most people have believe systems that really are therapeutic for them. Is out our task to rub their face into this and forcefully take away their believes? I think it's our task to write about these things and get it into the media and people who choose to not believe in the scientific facts well... that's their choice. Let them live a "lie".

Teddy Gardener wrote:

Someone from the Magic Cafe alerted me to this forum, saying that a new forum had risen up for people who were blurring the line between magic and fortune tellers, mystics and the like.
Getting here, I realize that there are some intelligent questioning voices. Although everyone seems a little too polite and cautious.
Well, I am not here to cause any trouble, but I do speak my mind. I am sure someone will tell me if I am out of line - they normally do!
I come from the tradition that says it is a magicians job to defraud psychics. In my view psychics do untold damage to vulnerable people on one hand, and take money off them with the other. Magicians are in a unique position to understand the techniques used by fraudulent mediums. As a magician, I use the techniques of the psychic for entertainment, rather than immoral deception.
To me belief in spirits, fairies, god, angels and father christmas are all the same - deception of those who have less, shall we say, cognitive faculties.
If you do a 'reading', contact a dead relative or claim you know something about someone that YOU CANNOT KNOW, you are being deceitful. What is worse, you are being deceitful for personal gain. What is worse, personal gain at the expense of someone who may well be emotionally damaged.
Magic has a noble tradition from Houdini to James Randi, of exposing fraud. I will gladly debate with any so called psychic regarding their fraudulent claims - and from the position of empirical proof.

Obviously I feel for someone in such a situation. However, I cannot think that lying to them can help. The person need to come to terms with her grief, not be give false promises that will distort the grieving process. There is lots of talk in this forum of different realities for different people.

Unfortunately, really, if we are being sensible, we are all living in the same world and the same reality. Time for a reality check!

Teddy, I don't mean to be rude, really, but I think you are the one in need of a reality check.

Are you absolutely sure you have all the answers in this regard?

Science, as fantastic as it is, does not have all the answers. Many things are yet to be discovered, yet here you are confident that you have all the answers regarding this issue.

Besides, not everything that in fact exists can be proven. Can you prove to anyone in the world whether you dream in color or black/white? Yet it's something that absolutely does exist, you DO dream, and you DO dream either in color or black and white, but you simply can't prove it to anyone on this earth. Not yet anyway.

But science didn't help her one bit.
It is a fact that 95% of the people have some sort of a believe system. It being hypnosis, god, psychics, ufos whatever all of those have not been scientifically proven yet 95% of the people believe in something. Even some scientists are avid Theists.

Isn't it ironic that we have scientist in favour of man made global warming with "prove". As well that we have many scientists denying this with "prove".
Reality is in the eye of the beholder Teddy. Your eyes are as tainted as mine or the person next to you.

And even more ironic is the fact that there are no atheist in the trenches! When in dire need we all crasp for something higher it;s a psychological fact.

Teddy Gardener wrote:

Obviously I feel for someone in such a situation. However, I cannot think that lying to them can help. The person need to come to terms with her grief, not be give false promises that will distort the grieving process. There is lots of talk in this forum of different realities for different people.

Unfortunately, really, if we are being sensible, we are all living in the same world and the same reality. Time for a reality check!