Amun-Ra
11-14-2001, 04:54 PM
“When you believe in things that you don't understand, then you suffer . . .” These words from Stevie Wonder's hit song “Superstition” seem to summarize the potential for danger in living life unexamined.
It is difficult to talk about belief and nonbelief in God without addressing superstition in some form because it has become a truism that one man’s superstition is another man’s God and it for that reason that superstition must be addressed as 35-44 percent of Americans believe in some aspect of psychic phenomena including ghosts and ESP.
Every year millions of peopled are bilked out of their hard earned money by purloining preachers, felonious faith healers and a variety larcenous psychics, mystics and paranormal charlatans whose only real ability is their remarkable proclivity for relieving trusting dupes of their funds. Sometimes the amounts are small ranging from a few dollars up to a few hundred dollars.
On the other hand, people have had their life savings cleaned out by these unscrupulous fakers. Unfortunately, those who are bilked are those who can least afford it coming from the ranks of those living on fixed incomes or the poor. Still, in most cases the money is given willingly regardless that often they are persuaded into giving by promise that cannot be kept.
Still, it is only money. Charismatic religions, those religions that depend upon the leadership of one man or woman are big business today. However, it is these enterprises that are most likely to abuse the trust of their followers. Abuse ranges from simple deception and false promises to punishable offenses such as mail fraud, racketeering and embezzlement.
Despite how many people may be hurt by this holy hucksterism, usually it is only financial taxing and extremely embarrassing. Obviously, this is not the case when savings accounts are wiped out or people are put under financial stress because of money hungry dream hustlers.
When people die because of superstition or belief in the paranormal, it becomes an extremely serious problem. Two problem areas are faith healers and psychic surgeons who prey on people giving them false hope, often delaying pivotal medical treatment and usually extracting a fee, either directly or indirectly, to do so.
Ghosts, Goblins and Evolution
Superstition runs high in parts of the black community as well as the rest of the United States where psychics, card readers and paranormal mediums are running booming businesses. An interesting survey by the Gallup group indicated that 31% of American adults believe in ghosts.
Poll after poll in the United States shows we believe in things such as UFOs, angels, psychics, reincarnation and ghosts when we have absolutely no credible proof to support these beliefs. Indeed, the lack of proof is often used to promote conspiracy theories and to show that higher powers are in control. Still, a Gallup poll of more than a thousand adults Americans showed that 67 percent reported having psychic experiences and 42 percent believed it was possible to communicate with the dead.
These figures are frightening in an age that is largely ruled by science and technology. We have pictures from planets millions of miles away. We have cloned animals. We have harnessed the atom and yet, 52 percent of those surveyed reported a belief in astrology. These figures are difficult to take seriously in 2001, but numerous other polls have shown nearly identical results.
Still, polls indicate that nearly 35-44% of Americans believe in at least some aspect of psychic phenomena. This unfounded belief in paranormal occurrences and outright superstition has helped build thriving businesses for “barely” legal hucksters, spiritual con men and women, and marginal “new age” spiritualists.
“Television advertising for so-called "psychics" is clearly aimed at the black community. The list of these psychic pitchmen reads like a roll call of black entertainers on the downside of their careers. Of course, there is Dionne Warwick, but also Billy Dee Williams, Esther Rolle, Nichelle Nichols, Ted Lange, Jayne Kennedy, LaToya Jackson, Denise Nicholas and Phillip Michael Thomas.”
People pay $3.99 per minute or $239.40 per hour to talk to these hocus-pocus hucksters and it is no mistake that the black community is targeted for such deliberate ventures. “One component of the African-American stereotype is superstition, which is manifested as excessive religious devotion and a penchant for the supernatural. These supposed traits can be traced all the way back to the Salem witch hysteria of the 17th century, when a black woman was accused of introducing witchcraft to white youngsters.”
In an essay published in the African Americans for Humanism newsletter, Dr. Charles Faulkner said, “Society equates African-American religion to their viewing themselves as children (in opposition to the "father," "God"). It equates their propensity for the use of astrology to the failure to develop their ability to determine with the use of logic how to make their lives successful.
It equates their acceptance of superstition as a contribution to the evolution of a fearful race of people who are prone to manipulation. And, it equates the belief in the "What goes around, comes around," concept of poetic justice to a race of people who sit idly by, waiting for some unseen force to rescue them from the evils of their society while the perpetrators of the evil go unpunished
. . . The very oppression of African-Americans cries out for them to throw off the cloak of the supernatural, which appears in the form of astrology, ESP, palmistry, theism and ghosts—and to throw off the fear and intimidation that accompany them. Freedom requires sound, logical thinking that removes the crutches of phenomena whose existence has never been proven.”
Recently, popular psychic, Miss Cleo, was hit with two lawsuits from the Missouri attorney general for allegedly violating the state's no-call law and consumer fraud. The Jamaican accented, head-wrapped, Jamaican patois spouting physic regularly appears on trash television commercials and late night television spots promising insight in personal love life’s, lottery predications and relationships.
Unfortunately, for Miss Cleo, her physic powers did not reveal the lawsuit in the making. For the most part, superstition seems relatively harmless until it replaces common sense and causes people to act in ways that are harmful to themselves and others.
:shades:
It is difficult to talk about belief and nonbelief in God without addressing superstition in some form because it has become a truism that one man’s superstition is another man’s God and it for that reason that superstition must be addressed as 35-44 percent of Americans believe in some aspect of psychic phenomena including ghosts and ESP.
Every year millions of peopled are bilked out of their hard earned money by purloining preachers, felonious faith healers and a variety larcenous psychics, mystics and paranormal charlatans whose only real ability is their remarkable proclivity for relieving trusting dupes of their funds. Sometimes the amounts are small ranging from a few dollars up to a few hundred dollars.
On the other hand, people have had their life savings cleaned out by these unscrupulous fakers. Unfortunately, those who are bilked are those who can least afford it coming from the ranks of those living on fixed incomes or the poor. Still, in most cases the money is given willingly regardless that often they are persuaded into giving by promise that cannot be kept.
Still, it is only money. Charismatic religions, those religions that depend upon the leadership of one man or woman are big business today. However, it is these enterprises that are most likely to abuse the trust of their followers. Abuse ranges from simple deception and false promises to punishable offenses such as mail fraud, racketeering and embezzlement.
Despite how many people may be hurt by this holy hucksterism, usually it is only financial taxing and extremely embarrassing. Obviously, this is not the case when savings accounts are wiped out or people are put under financial stress because of money hungry dream hustlers.
When people die because of superstition or belief in the paranormal, it becomes an extremely serious problem. Two problem areas are faith healers and psychic surgeons who prey on people giving them false hope, often delaying pivotal medical treatment and usually extracting a fee, either directly or indirectly, to do so.
Ghosts, Goblins and Evolution
Superstition runs high in parts of the black community as well as the rest of the United States where psychics, card readers and paranormal mediums are running booming businesses. An interesting survey by the Gallup group indicated that 31% of American adults believe in ghosts.
Poll after poll in the United States shows we believe in things such as UFOs, angels, psychics, reincarnation and ghosts when we have absolutely no credible proof to support these beliefs. Indeed, the lack of proof is often used to promote conspiracy theories and to show that higher powers are in control. Still, a Gallup poll of more than a thousand adults Americans showed that 67 percent reported having psychic experiences and 42 percent believed it was possible to communicate with the dead.
These figures are frightening in an age that is largely ruled by science and technology. We have pictures from planets millions of miles away. We have cloned animals. We have harnessed the atom and yet, 52 percent of those surveyed reported a belief in astrology. These figures are difficult to take seriously in 2001, but numerous other polls have shown nearly identical results.
Still, polls indicate that nearly 35-44% of Americans believe in at least some aspect of psychic phenomena. This unfounded belief in paranormal occurrences and outright superstition has helped build thriving businesses for “barely” legal hucksters, spiritual con men and women, and marginal “new age” spiritualists.
“Television advertising for so-called "psychics" is clearly aimed at the black community. The list of these psychic pitchmen reads like a roll call of black entertainers on the downside of their careers. Of course, there is Dionne Warwick, but also Billy Dee Williams, Esther Rolle, Nichelle Nichols, Ted Lange, Jayne Kennedy, LaToya Jackson, Denise Nicholas and Phillip Michael Thomas.”
People pay $3.99 per minute or $239.40 per hour to talk to these hocus-pocus hucksters and it is no mistake that the black community is targeted for such deliberate ventures. “One component of the African-American stereotype is superstition, which is manifested as excessive religious devotion and a penchant for the supernatural. These supposed traits can be traced all the way back to the Salem witch hysteria of the 17th century, when a black woman was accused of introducing witchcraft to white youngsters.”
In an essay published in the African Americans for Humanism newsletter, Dr. Charles Faulkner said, “Society equates African-American religion to their viewing themselves as children (in opposition to the "father," "God"). It equates their propensity for the use of astrology to the failure to develop their ability to determine with the use of logic how to make their lives successful.
It equates their acceptance of superstition as a contribution to the evolution of a fearful race of people who are prone to manipulation. And, it equates the belief in the "What goes around, comes around," concept of poetic justice to a race of people who sit idly by, waiting for some unseen force to rescue them from the evils of their society while the perpetrators of the evil go unpunished
. . . The very oppression of African-Americans cries out for them to throw off the cloak of the supernatural, which appears in the form of astrology, ESP, palmistry, theism and ghosts—and to throw off the fear and intimidation that accompany them. Freedom requires sound, logical thinking that removes the crutches of phenomena whose existence has never been proven.”
Recently, popular psychic, Miss Cleo, was hit with two lawsuits from the Missouri attorney general for allegedly violating the state's no-call law and consumer fraud. The Jamaican accented, head-wrapped, Jamaican patois spouting physic regularly appears on trash television commercials and late night television spots promising insight in personal love life’s, lottery predications and relationships.
Unfortunately, for Miss Cleo, her physic powers did not reveal the lawsuit in the making. For the most part, superstition seems relatively harmless until it replaces common sense and causes people to act in ways that are harmful to themselves and others.
:shades: