Ghost hunting is on the rise. In the past six months, ghost hunting agencies have been receiving more calls than ever. The amount of ghost hunters has risen due the attention that people are now giving to the supernatural. Don’t worry. Ghosts are not taking over New York City. It’s the reporting of ghost problems and the hunting of ghosts that’s becoming more and more popular.
There is no license required for the hunting of ghosts. Two people can start a website, get some calls, get into a van and take care of a ghost problem. As demand goes up for ghost investigations, more and more ghost hunters are hitting the streets.
The human fascination with the supernatural is nothing new. What is new is the scientific approach to hunting the ghost, both in reality and on reality TV shows. Common tools used by ghost hunters are purely scientific, including EMF (Electro-Magnetic Field) detectors, night vision cameras, motion sensors, thermometers, thermal imaging cameras, and EVP (electronic voice phenomenon) detectors. The ghost used to be contacted solely through religious means or by séances and psychics. The goal was to communicate with the ghost. Now the hunting of the ghost is what is important. The scientific evidence is what matters.
Now temperature changes, reflections in cameras, and disembodied voices are the empirical evidence of ghosts. People are paying anyone who says they are qualified to check out their house or business for the paranormal. If they are lucky, their case will be enough to get their house and family on TV.
Donald Ryles holds a PhD in transpersonal counseling and psychology, which integrates psychology with meditation and spirituality in order to help people overcome emotional problems. He also holds a Masters degree in Metaphysical Science.
“People want to encounter the paranormal more than ever now since people tend to want to be involved in what is the ‘in’ thing and now the paranormal is that thing for many,” Ryles said. “I feel that many people want to temporarily escape from our current reality, like the state of the world and the economy. Sort of like in the past when people escaped by day dreaming they were James Bond or Cleopatra. Only in this case it is much stronger because you really can be a ghost hunter like you see on TV or in the movies. You can “be” James Bond so to speak.”
That “in” thing that Ryles refers to is the influx of reality shows about ghost hunting and stories about hauntings. Current ghost hunters feel that these shows, like “Ghost Hunters” and “Paranormal State” are making a mockery out of their profession.
Noel Short of the “NY-PA Paranormal Society” said, “We started ghost investigations ten years ago but we hid in the closet with it because people didn’t accept it. They thought we were witch and demon hunters.” Now she says that she refuses to let TV “take her over” because a new fad in the paranormal isn’t going to draw her in. “This profession is about helping people, and that is the least of the concerns of the ghost hunters on TV I’m waiting for this fad to die, because once it does, we can continue as we were.”
There is an entertainment factor in ghost hunting that extends past television. Stacey Jones of “Central New York Ghost Hunters” said, “There’s been a stunning increase in false alarms, and people call me three days after “Paranormal State” airs and say the same thing that was happening in the show is happening in their house.”
Not only does Jones receive false alarms, but she feels insulted by the false alarms that are completely contrived in order to get her to a house where no one is experiencing any type of ghostly experience. “I don’t charge people and I go out to their homes with all my equipment after hearing their stories over the phone, Jones said. “I got to a woman’s house once and there was actually wine and cheese set up and a whole bunch of neighbors ready to see the investigation. I was the entertainment. I asked them if they had realized what they had done to me. I told them that this not entertainment for me.”
“TAPS,” or “The Atlantic Paranormal Society” released the first hugely successful reality ghost hunting show on the Sci-Fi Channel in 2004. The founders were Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson. Since then reality shows in this genre have multiplied to the point where there is a new series coming out on Animal Planet called “Haunted Animals.”
David Condoluci, lead investigator for the “Center for the Paranormal Investigation Association” is a member of the “TAPS Family.” He believes that the ghost hunting shows have impacted ghost hunters positively.
“Before Jason and Grant [founders of TAPS] brought everything to light, people were afraid to talk about ghost problems,” Condoluci said. They thought that people would think they were crazy. Now they call us and we can either help them or point them in the direction of the help they need.”
Though those people with actual ghost problems may be stepping forward, many more ghost sufferers and ghost hunters are stepping into the limelight. Stacey Jones calls the hunters who learn how to “ghost hunt” on television “ghost groupies.”
“Not only do they not know what they are doing, but they can actually end up hurting people. They will always determine that something is paranormal, even if it’s not. Our job is to help people. Telling a woman that she has cancer because there are negative energies in her home is not helping someone.”
“It doesn’t matter if a problem is psychological or paranormal,” Jones said. “All that matters is your state of mind when dealing with a problem that you feel is in your house. My team will deal with the problem and if the problem is not paranormal, that does not mean we walk away. If someone reaches out for help we give it to them. There is only a problem when someone reaches out to basically waste your time.”
So why are there suddenly ghosts in people’s houses again? A ghost overlaps over our plane of existence. Noel Short of NY-PAPS asks the question, “How would you feel if you walked in a room every night and you weren’t noticed? You would want attention. The ghosts were humans. They don’t want to scare us. They just use their only way of getting attention.”
Emily Bauman, who holds a PhD and is a Master Teacher, taught a class entitled Supernatural Fiction at NYU, in which she explored the parallels between time periods and trends in the embodiment of the supernatural.
“No one wants to be a ghost,” Bauman said. “We as a society are not identifying with ghosts. We are identifying with ghost hunters. I think this is because ghosts don’t have free will. We are glorifying ourselves by asserting power over the ghost. All that we can do as people is get people around us to pay attention to us. Is that that different from what a ghost does?”
The virtuality of our lives also plays a part in the search for the supernatural and the upswing in ghost hunting. Gregory T. Erickson, a professor at NYU with a PhD in English said, “Our society has shifted from the belief in the alien, when we were afraid of things like bioethics and body issues to the belief in the ghost. Everyone now lives in a virtual experience, both in and outside of our bodies at the same time. Things like Facebook and e-mail have fragmented who we are and a ghost is a symbol of fragmentation. Even the lines between identities have become more flexible. The most solid identities, of man and woman, are now possible to switch for those who become transgender. These used to be the most unchangeable aspects of humans. So if you can go from man to woman, why wouldn’t it be possible to go from human to non human? Why can’t you believe that you’d become a ghost or a vampire? Why wouldn’t you be able to find a ghost?”
Bauman feels that the influx of the ghost hunters has to do with the haunting of the house itself. “People are getting kicked out of their houses. Americans thought they knew how the economy worked and then that was pulled out from under us. Now it is a time of inscrutability. Housing and labor are concerning people. Asserting control over a house is connected with finding a ghost in your house and kicking it out. You have the free will in a time where it seems like you do not have control. The ghost does not have free will, so if you hunt it, and if you catch it, you dominate it.”
“Ghosts are not really that ‘other,’” said Erikson, “They are mostly human. They have been connected closely with faith, but the feeling that science would solve all problems hasn’t left us. It obviously hasn’t happened, but things like black holes and the idea that time is flexible are still science and are deeply entwined in the supernatural and the unexplained. Why couldn’t there be multiple dimensions? Many scientists think that there are. So if they are trying to prove it empirically, it makes sense that people who deem themselves ghost hunters are hunting the unexplainable empirically.”
The issue now is not proving that communication is possible beyond the grave. It’s the quest to find them. It’s not the first time that people have widely believed in ghosts. It’s just the first time that an empirical approach has been so widespread and that so many people have jumped into the scientific action.
“It’s like the Titanic,” said Jones of the Central NY Ghost Hunters. “Ghosts are a subject that will keep turning around on itself but with a new spin every time.”
Maybe it will be ghost hunting with science now, and the fad will fade for a while as Jones predicts. Maybe next time, we’ll actually catch “a real live” ghost and get to study it. As of now that’s as likely as empirically determining if God exists. But, ghost hunters are out there now, and there’s no shortage of new recruits. The calls for help with ghosts are increasing, whether the old school ghost hunters like it or not.
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