Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think any sort of Séance is a load of bollocks

60 replies

complexnumber · 01/12/2011 16:44

Has anyone actually been to a séance where cups have moved of their own accord and spelt a dead aunts name, or windows have blown open and all the lights gone out?

Just asking.

OP posts:
Original poster
complexnumber · 01/12/2011 20:35

And that

OP posts:
Pakdooik · 01/12/2011 20:39

it's bollocks - you are not being unreasonable

flatbellyfella · 01/12/2011 20:41

It's no game messing with paranormal ouija boards, I have seen glasses fly off the table & smash against the wall , they are not to be taken as a game.

seeker · 01/12/2011 22:45

That happens when people throw them.

seeker · 01/12/2011 23:12

About katieScarlett's experience. Someone manipulated the letters. But, sadly, 1 in 4 people get cancer. And most of the other 3 in the 4 are touched by cancer in some way. So it was a coincidence- but not a very unlikely one. Cancer is a very "safe" word for a psychic to say, because it will be a fit for most people in one way and another.

And katieScarlett only remembered it because of the fact that it "came true" if it hadn't it would never have come to her mind again.

WorraLiberty · 01/12/2011 23:13

It's a load of bollox but you'll always get someone who knew someone else who was related to their Auntie's mate's cousin's hairdresser who got thrown across the room during one.....

TotemPole · 01/12/2011 23:19

Seeker, how could they have manipulated the letters? They knew where the letters were?

dancingmustard · 01/12/2011 23:20

I don't want to trample on anyone's nutty hair brained idiotic embarrassing belief that seances are a portal to the afterlife :)

seeker · 01/12/2011 23:21

I don't know how they manipulated them, but they did. Magnets, pre arrangement, sleight of hand- there are loads of ways.

TotemPole · 01/12/2011 23:25

They were blind, if they were in on it they'd have to memorise where the letters were.

A magnet under the table moving the pointer, operated by one of the other people. Hmmm.. yes that's a possibility.

NorkyPies · 01/12/2011 23:26

My spirit guide tells me that the glasses on ouija boards move in accord with the subconscious urges of the people touching them.

ninedragons · 02/12/2011 00:07

@complexnumber, there are lots of lists of keyboard shortcuts out there.

Here are the international accents

And here is a list of shortcuts for symbols including currencies. So, for example, if you need to type a Yen symbol, hold down the Alt key and type 0165.

That's on a PC keyboard. Don't know if there's an Alt key on a Ouija board Grin

chipmonkey · 02/12/2011 00:33

So Katie's Mum, who is blind, set out to fool Katie and the others by using magnets? Since when is a glass magnetic?

CreamolaFoamless · 02/12/2011 01:03

I had one once as a teenager (17) and my dog starting going absolutley ape.

All her fur stood up and she was barking and snarling and 'biting' the space underneath the coffee table we were doing it on.

The 'person's' name was Jeldi

Still freaks me out a bit thinking of it

WhoopsyLa · 02/12/2011 01:13

When I was in a youth drama group we dd one as part of an acting excersise and in the middle of it, the lightbulb smashed in its socket and showered us with shards of glass....

FellatioNelson · 02/12/2011 05:46

You cut and pasted a word into your thread just to get an accent on the e? Wow. That is hardcore. Grin

In answer to your original question, Yes. I was a kid, larking about with friends but the cup did indeed really move by itself and came off the board on what I can only describe as a cushion of air, a bit like the sensation you get when you try to push two wrong sides of a magnet together. It totally freaked me out. Although what it spelt out meant nothing to any of us.

It was only about three letters that didn't even make a word, so hardly an important message from the grave. But I'll swear on my children's lives that what I experienced/felt was the cup lifting off the board and moving around.

FellatioNelson · 02/12/2011 05:52

Oh and I had a very spooky experience when I went to see a medium once as well - when I was about 22. There was only the two of us in a small room in her house, with a little table at one end of the room (out of reach) and us at the other. Halfway through the session there was a knock or a bang on the table, like someone hitting it or dropping a book onto it. I nearly jumped out of my skin. The woman didn't seem shocked at all said things like that were normal and it was a way of whoever it was trying to show me they were there. It wasn't sacry, just weird - even a bit reassuring.

velvetvamp · 02/12/2011 11:33

I'm open-minded but undecided. I've never done a seance so no experience.

seeker · 02/12/2011 11:42

" The woman didn't seem shocked at all said things like that were normal and it was a way of whoever it was trying to show me they were there. It wasn't sacry, just weird - even a bit reassuring."

Of course she wasn't scared- it was part of her schtick!

BarmyBiscuit · 02/12/2011 12:11

I did the ouiji board when I was young and it worked. We ended up getting addicted to it. Ended up stopping when all the glasses in the room smashed at the same time. I was petrified after that

tigermoll · 02/12/2011 12:22

Two blind women doing seance with letters mixed up. They spelled out the word cancer. I was there along with other ladies 2 kids, must have been about 15. We deliberately only let the mums push the glass IYSWIM? There is no way either of them could have seen the letters.

How to explain this? Well, without having been present its hard to know exactly what happened, and draw any conclusions. I'm sure Katie isn't lying, but the tendency is for people to remember things as being more impressive/convincing/inexplicable than they were.

The way that ouija boards 'work' is the ideomotor effect, - the people with their fingers on the glass ARE pushing it, although they do not feel as if they are. Therefore, each of the 15-y-o's present would swear (and be being truthful) when they say that they absolutely were not pushing the glass, - but they WERE pushing it.

Look at it this way, - if the glass really was being moved by spirits, then why doid anyone need to touch it at all?

The glass spelled out 'cancer' and within a year two of the people were diagnosed? That is just a coincidence, - sadly, one in three people will develop cancer in their lifetime.

tigermoll · 02/12/2011 12:24

Ended up stopping when all the glasses in the room smashed at the same time. I was petrified after that

Right, I'm going to stick my neck out here, and (at the risk of sounding like a cynical old sceptic) say no they didn't.

WorraLiberty · 02/12/2011 12:26

tigermoll I'll see your no they didn't and raise you an utter bollocks Grin

Sorry but there's no way in a million years I believe that.

seeker · 02/12/2011 12:27
tigermoll · 02/12/2011 12:34

I can see that the dog/seance experience must have been pretty freaky, - but the most likely explanation is that your dog was responding to your elevated nervousness. You were tense and excited about the seance, so she started to behaved oddly, and this made your more freaked out etc.

The 'smashed glasses' denouement to a ouija board story is a common one, and an easy one to become exagerated. I've witnessed this in a friend of mine, - over the years her story of the ouija board went from 'the glass felt really hot after we'd used it' to 'the glass broke' to 'all the glasses in the room broke' to 'all the glasses in the room broke and we rushed into the living room and there was this huge glass fronted cabinet and it just smashed and glass went everywhere'. Each time she retold the story it became more extreme, but (and this is the crucial bit) I really think that she believed each revision to be the truth.