Growing Popularity of Paranormal Studies - Essay Example

The Growing Popularity of Paranormal Studies and Haunted Houses in the U.S. Paranormal studies have been on the rise, because there are several television shows on the paranormal. Everywhere you turn now days there is something on the paranormal. Due to this fact people have become more interested in haunted houses in the U.S. Some of the shows are fact base while others are not real. People have always been fascinated with paranormal possibilities and now most towns across America have their own paranormal societies. Paranormal investigating or ghost hunting is a phenomenon worldwide. People are chasing the spirit world with digital cameras and different types of recording devices. People’s main objective is to catch something to prove that there are ghost. People have become obsessed with the afterlife. Those interested are from a wide variety of people with different types of backgrounds. It doesn’t matter if you are educated, uneducated, young, old, white collared or blue collared to be interested in the paranormal (Sedersten). Amateur paranormal investigators aren’t cautious like serious investigators are in the type of evidence they show people. Amateur’s take pictures with digital cameras and think that any little thing in the pictures is an orb. Serious investigators only want to show people what they know for a fact is real. Amateurs can cause problems, because most don’t truly understand what they are seeing. This is why it is hard to make a skeptic believe that there are real ghost in the world (Sedersten). Paranormal investigators have a range of different devices that they use. Some are very costly in price and some aren’t, but most the items needed you can pick up anywhere. Here is a common list of items needed; LED lights, digital camera, motion detectors, electromagnetic voice phenomenon (EVP), and thermal imaging devices. These items are supposed to help determine if what you have is real or not. The multiple different television shows on paranormal activity has left people wanting to know more about the afterlife (Sedersten). The show Ghost Hunter’s has made paranormal investigating popular with people. The most interesting concept of this show is how they try to disprove whether something is paranormal or not. Jason Hawes actually started this group as the Rhode Island Paranormal Society in 1990 and later changed it to the Atlantic Paranormal Society. In 1992, Grant Wilson joined the group, but he was a friend of Jason’s for many years. Jason and Grant worked for Roto-Rooter plumbers for years. In 2004, they made their debut on the Syfy Channel and were an instant hit (Hawes). This show is what really got people more involved than ever before in the paranormal. Most of it has to do with the way the cast handle each case and don’t turn around and say everything is haunted. They conduct each case as a skeptic and try to disprove or debunk a haunting. Their team does research prior to each case, so they have a general idea of what their client believes is going on in their house. Also, they have team members conduct historical searches for their clients (Hawes). People like the fact that the T.A.P.S. team doesn’t say in every single episode that a house is haunted. However, they have caught a good bit of evidence in some places that it is truly haunted. Many people’s favorite episodes are Waverly Hills Sanatorium, St. Augustine Lighthouse, Eastern State Penitentiary, the Stanley Hotel and Myrtles Plantation. The Stanley Hotel is also famous, because Stephen King was inspired to write the Shining after he stayed in room 217 at the hotel. This show has sparked interest in the paranormal for many people. Waverly Hill Sanatorium in Louisville, Kentucky is truly a haunted place. This hospital was built in 1910 as a two-story hospital, but with tuberculosis on the rise in the area it wasn’t big enough to hold the entire patient’s. In 1926, they opened the new Waverly Hills hospital. This site was chosen, because it set high on a mountain out of people’s way. They believed that it was best from patient’s suffering from this disease to have plenty of fresh air (Bryan). The treatment for this disease was very primitive, so they relied on natural cures. Most patients spent their time in an outdoor type porch way to get fresh air. The doctors used dangerous experimental treatments which included pneumothorax, deflating a portion of the lung and procedures that removed 2 or 3 ribs. These methods were unsuccessful and only five percent of patient’s survived (Bryan). Over ten thousand people died within the first three years. They even created a body chute that ran outside to keep the patients from seeing the bodies. In all over sixty-four thousand people died, before a cure was found. Due to the inhuman treatment and experiments that went wrong, this is why it’s considered one of the most haunted places in the U.S. This is the reason they have so much paranormal activity (Bryan). Ghost Hunters found many evidence that this place was haunted. They could see shadow people were the children use to play on the roof top. They even had a child entity roll a ball back and forth to them. Then there was a story of a nurse who was pregnant and unmarried, so she hung herself in the door way of room 502. There was supposedly another nurse who worked in room 502 that jumped off the balcony. In the body chute tunnel there are eerie sounds that can’t be explained (Hawes). When Ghost Hunters investigated the Stanley Hotel it left no doubt in their minds that it was haunted. One investigator experienced his bed shaking and a black shadow standing by the bed. The room that Stephen King stayed in was room 217 it’s said to be active, because a housekeeper was injured in the room years ago in a gas explosion. They experienced their luggage being moved around the room (Gonsalves). In room 401, there is breathing and thumping sounds reported. Hawes slept in this room and his camera picked up on a door being opened and then another sound. When he began looking around he found the closet door open and a glass shattered on his nightstand. Female investigators have been pinched, touch and their hair pulled in this room. When you sit in the closet you heard disembodied voices (Hawes). The employee passageways underneath the hotel are where they heard voices. They seemed to be answering questions being asked by an investigator. The investigator tried to get through the tiny passageway in order to get closer, but could only go so far. The Stanley Hotel is one of their favorite haunted places. They have done a few Halloween specials from this location (Hawes). Ghost Hunters actually caught evidence when they went to the St. Augustine Lighthouse in Florida. In the light house you could actually hear noises. When they are going up the stairs of the lighthouse they see a figure a couple of flights above them on the stairs. Then after a few seconds in darts several fights up to the top and you see a figure leaning over the rail looking down at them. Another one of the U.S. most haunted locations in the Myrtles Plantations in St. Francisville, Louisiana. There Ghost Hunters had plenty of stories to investigate. One was a story of a slave woman who was a mistress of her master. He later caught her listening in on a conversation and cut her ear off. She thought she would be sent to the field, so she poisoned his wife and children wanting to nurse them back the health. She gave them too much poison by accident and killed them and she was hung. They didn’t see the slave woman during their stay. They were able to debunk several of the claims to the plantation, such as seeing someone in the mirror. It was a huge antique mirror that could give the impression of someone looking at them, but it wasn’t the case. There was also a story of hearing children playing outside, but they didn’t catch that either. However, in one of the outside cottages a table did rise up and shake which startled everyone in the room. There was a lamp in a room the moved slightly. The cast didn’t come to the conclusion that it was haunted and wants to visit it again (Hawes). Ghost Hunters International was the second spin-off of Ghost Hunters in 2008. Ghost Hunters International is also known as “GHI”. They are still apart of the Ghost Hunters team, but they traveled overseas to other possible haunted locations. Many of the GHI team was members of the original Ghost Hunters team. The main difference is Ghost Hunters between them was the fact that Ghost Hunters wanted to remain in the U.S. They have many historical locations that the GHI team covered, but they are more quick to say a place was haunted (Fitzgerald). Ghost Hunters Academy was the third spin-off of Ghost Hunters in 2009. Ghost Hunters Academy is also known as “GHA”. Steve Gonsalves and Dave Tango train people who want to become ghost hunters. This show is similar to many reality shows that eliminate people in order to find the most qualified candidates to join either Ghost Hunters or Ghost Hunters International. They take the trainees to haunted locations and teach them to use the equipment. They make sure that they can handle the stress of ghost hunting and don’t get spooked too easily (Gonsalves). There are three basic types of hauntings. One is a human or intelligent haunting, which can enter act with people. This type of haunting seems to have human emotions and personalities. They can appear in faint form at times. They are usually attached to a house or place. Some rearrange furniture and respond to changes made in the home or place. You can pick up an ‘E.V.P.’ which is a disembodied voice or catch a glimpse of them in pictures (Johnson). The second type is a “residual” haunting, which normally don’t enter act with people. This happens most where a scene from the past will replay itself and can be seen by a living person. Most of these are where some type of tragedy occurred. Most of our famous U.S. hauntings are residual, especially where the Civil Wars took place. There are numerous reports of this all over the North and the South at different historical battlefields (Johnson). The third type is known as “inhuman” or demonic” type hauntings. These are the most debated and dreaded of them all. A “demonic” type can take on a human form and cause harm. They might seem innocent at first, but are definitely not. They are invited into your home usually unintentional by a Ouija Board, untrained psychic experiment, séance or performing a magic ceremony that you aren’t properly trained to do. If you are experiencing this type you need to call a clergy member or priest for an exorcism. This type can follow you even if you move is not dealt with by the proper people (Johnson). Another group was formed called Paranormal Research Society at Penn State in 2001. This group was the creation of Ryan Buell and including student from Penn State. Buell wanted to create a professional paranormal society. His mission is to “spiritually and scientifically” explore the paranormal or supernatural like no other. They formed a branch called Field Investigators and Research and another called Parapsychology and Laboratory Research (Buell). They gained notoriety with the Field Investigators and Research department, because they were involved with public law enforcement cases. When this happened A&E television offered them their own show called Paranormal State in 2007. Their motto is “To Trust, Honor and Always Seek the Truth” (Buell). Paranormal State television show is based on seeking the truth behind ghosts, scary life mysteries and hauntings. They are contacted to help ordinary families who are afraid of the events happening in their homes. They even claim the Catholic Church ask them for help from time to time. Most of their shows have a dark menace in their home which the researchers believe are “demonic” (Buell). This show always leaves viewers watching with more questions than answers. Many times it seems as though Ryan thinks “Legion” is following him. “Legion” is a “demonic” entity that has more than one demon in it usually six. Paranormal State uses several different types of professionals to come in and help them make sense of what is going on in their houses. They use psychics, demonologist, medium, psychologist and counselors to help these families out. When dealing with mostly ‘demonic” or “inhuman” entity it is good to get a demonologist, since this is the area of specialties with the training needed to handle such evil (Buell). The growing popularity of paranormal studies and haunting in the U.S. is because it is everywhere today. There is more television reality show on the paranormal and there in the movies on this subject. Several years ago all we had was unsolved mysteries and now almost every television channel has some type of paranormal show. People used to think others were crazy if they thought they had a ghost or your house was haunted. Now day’s people think, it’s cool and are interesting in paranormal research. There are even paranormal classes one can take online to learn to be a paranormal investigator. They have television shows teaching children to use their sixth sense or psychic abilities. People even enjoy going on ghost tours in New Orleans and Savannah, GA. You used to have to go to a make believe haunted house at Halloween to get scared. Now you can just watch television or the movies. We have become a society fascination by the paranormal and want to learn as much as we can about it. Works Cited Bryan, Bobette. Waverly Hills Sanitarium The Haunted Hospital. 2005. 8 December 2010 . Buell, Ryan. Paranormal Research Society. 2008. 8 December 2010 . Fitzgerald, Barry et al. Ghost Hunters International. 2008. 8 December 2010 . Gonsalves, Steve et al. Ghost Hunters Academy. 2009. 8 December 2010 . Hawes, Jason et al. The Atlantic Paranormal Society. 2001. 8 December 2010 . Johnson, Carl et al. "Three Basic, Types of Hauntings." Paranormal Conference. State College: The Atlantic Paranormal Society, 2003. Sedersten, Kris. "Ghost Hunting." 8 November 2010. Ezine Articles. 8 December 2010 . Read More