GROUPTHINK AND THE PARANORMAL

by Chris Chaos

(Groupthink, occurs when a group makes faulty decisions because group pressures lead to a deterioration of “mental efficiency, reality testing, and moral judgment”. Groups affected by groupthink ignore alternatives and tend to take irrational actions that dehumanize other groups. A group is especially vulnerable to groupthink when its members are similar in background, when the group is insulated from outside opinions, and when there are no clear rules for decision making.)

This phenomenon is displayed day in and day out and showcased in the world of a "paranormal investigator". This usually occurs within amateur ranks after they repeated watch a popular "ghost hunting" show on TV and then like minded individuals meet up and attempt to replicate what they viewed in the TV show. One prime example is concerning EVP's (Electronic Voice Phenomenon) and Orbs in photographs. Many of the shows focus on these unscientific and proven otherwise many times over occurrences. The individuals of these groups are so entrenched with the thoughts of a location being haunted they will see any little noise or out of place items as undisputed proof that there is a ghost there. In short they fall victim to Confirmation Bias and virtually ignore any and all evidence to the contrary.

An example of confirmation bias would be an assumption on the part of the investigator thinking that a location is haunted. They enter the premise to investigate and unscientifically take evidence; a simple audio recording with an unexplained sound instantly becomes a ghostly voice in an EVP. Random photographs are taken with their digital camera and later they find what they think are orbs, spirits or energy captured in digital form. Although studies conducted by the various camera manufacturers, in particular Kodak, all stated that these anomalies are either reflections, defects or dust captured by or in the camera itself. In addition the majority of the locations that self proclaimed ghost hunters investigate have been long abandoned and accumulated much dust. When the investigators enter these locations they stir up the dust and when they take photos or videos it is captured and then provides exclusive "evidence that the place is haunted." The skeptic in the more scientifically based research groups would not take the orbs or not readily explained audio recordings at face value as absolute proof that a ghost is haunting the location.  They will look into the matter with a much greater degree of thought in the quest for identification of what was actually captured. Even in some of the most cleanest of environments dust will get kicked up when people enter and disturb the scene which will undoubtedly be captured on camera.

Audio and EVPs captured are also the producers of false positives by amateur researchers. I have heard countless audio clips presented by ghost hunters claiming they have definitive proof that a ghost voice was caught by their equipment. As a listener that was not on location it is difficult to prove or disprove what the sound actually is. For the most part, many of the sounds/voices captured were from one of the team members due to poor planning and communication during the audio capturing exercises. One (of the many) fatal flaws that many investigative groups fall victim to is having way too many people on site, it is difficult to keep track of the locations of random roving members walking around the property. Maintaining silence at all times is also crucial to the progress of acquiring audio evidence. Too many expeditions are ruined and sabotaged due to group members creating additional noises that are picked up in the audio recording sessions and then mistaken as ghosts or explainable noises and sounds later during evidence review.

Groupthink also makes the group stagnant if they do not interact and compare notes with groups other than their own. The directional thinking becomes a one way street with no new processing being injected into said group. It is always best to get an outside opinion or someone to play devil's advocate to challenge all evidence deemed as positive. For each occurrence that is considered a "yes", come up with counter arguments of why it can be considered a "no".

The below are common symptoms and remedies for groupthink and extend to beyond the paranormal world.

SOME SYMPTOMS OF GROUPTHINK:
Illusion of invulnerability –Creates excessive optimism that encourages taking extreme risks.
Collective rationalization – Members discount warnings and do not reconsider their assumptions.
Belief in inherent morality – Members believe in the rightness of their cause and therefore ignore the ethical or moral consequences of their decisions.
Stereotyped views of out-groups – Negative views of “enemy” make effective responses to conflict seem unnecessary.
Direct pressure on dissenters – Members are under pressure not to express arguments against any of the group’s views.
Self-censorship – Doubts and deviations from the perceived group consensus are not expressed.
Illusion of unanimity – The majority view and judgments are assumed to be unanimous.
Self-appointed ‘mindguards’ – Members protect the group and the leader from information that is problematic or contradictory to the group’s cohesiveness, view, and/or decisions.

REMEDIES FOR GROUPTHINK:
a) The leader should assign the role of critical evaluator to each member
b) The leader should avoid stating preferences and expectations at the outset
c) Each member of the group should routinely discuss the groups' deliberations with a trusted associate and report back to the group on the associate's reactions
d) One or more experts should be invited to each meeting on a staggered basis. The outside experts should be encouraged to challenge views of the members.
e) At least one articulate and knowledgeable member should be given the role of devil's advocate (to question assumptions and plans)
f) The leader should make sure that a sizeable block of time is set aside to survey warning signals from rivals; leader and group construct alternative scenarios of rivals' intentions.

(Chris Chaos is a long time resident of South Jersey who once again resides in and writes from Gloucester City, New Jersey. He is a filmmaker, a business owner, writer, urban explorer and investigator of the odd and weird, a proud parent, happily taken and a connoisseur of hot wings. Chris can be reached at AxisVideo@aol.com)

THE ACCLIMATION OF FEAR

by Chris Chaos

Most people fear the unknown, whether it be real or a figment of their imagination. But the more you get exposed to this fear and the unknown, the more you get accustomed to the surroundings and the fear goes away and the unknown becomes the known. Effectively
taking the power away from fear.

FEAR: a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil, pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined; the feeling or condition of being afraid.

ACCLIMATION: to accustom or become accustomed to a new climate or environment; adapt.

Repetitive exposure to the offending object or situation will accustom the individual to it and the fear will gradually subside.

Fear is inborn into humans, it is what protects us from the dangers of the environment and predators. It is an evolutionary trait that gets passed down from generation to generation and keeps us alive. In modern human industrialized nations there are no natural predators and not too much that can kill us like in the distant past. Of course this fact is different in under developed nations, but let us take America and most of the Western European nations for an example. For the most part you just have to worry about your health, becoming the victim of a crime in certain areas, traffic and recreational accidents. Many of the dangers of death are self inflicted: drugs, alcohol, poor diet or participating in dangerous activities such as sky diving or skiing.

Some fears are retained in modern man that came from our neanderthal days: fear of the dark, heights, bugs, snakes and people unfamiliar to us. The fear of heights is a natural inbred legitimate fear. There still exists a danger to humans of falling to our deaths, especially in a city with high rise buildings, windows or cliffs.

The fear of the dark stems from the fear of the unknown, you do not know what is there if you cannot see. Sight is the most prominent sense that humans rely on. In the dark there could be a poisonous bug, a venomous snake, an unseen rapist, or the fear that modern man created, a ghost.

THE DARK:
How do we, as a fearful human, combat some of these fears? By getting accustomed to it of course. For an example, if you are afraid of the dark and need to keep unnecessary lights on at night when you are trying to sleep, you need to realize that for the most part there is NOTHING to fear. Go into a room and make sure it is well lit, examine all corners of the room, look in the closet and make sure there are no people, monsters, bugs, snakes or purple people eaters in there. Leave the room and come back 20 minutes later and search the room again. Once you verify that it is safe, leave the room once again for a few minutes and then return, but this time do not turn the light on, go into the room and sit down on a chair or a bed in complete darkness. Repeat these steps several times until you become accustomed to the dark and realize that there is nothing to fear in your safe home.

HEIGHTS:
Another common fear that is widespread in humans and can be a legitimate fear is heights. Some common fears can be: being afraid to go over bridges, going on top of tall buildings or sitting on top of a stopped ferris wheel. All the mentioned examples do provide the real danger of falling, but for the most part there are safety measures put into place to prevent accidents. So how can one get over the fear of heights? Once again you must face the fear head on and become accustomed to it, after repeatedly being exposed to this fear it will diminish. Go to the rooftop of a tall building (or bridge with a foot path), obviously make sure it is a building that you can legally go on and has proper fencing or safety features. Bring a friend that is NOT afraid of heights to look over the area for you and to confirm that it is safe. Gradually get closer to the edge (with a safe fence or barrier to protect you) until you can look down at the ground below and see there is nothing to be scared of. Repeat this process for how ever long it takes you to get accustomed to the fear and it eventually will go away.

THE UNKNOWN:

An additional fear is of the unknown, many people do not act upon something just because they fear what may happen if they do. But I ask you this, do you not fear what may happen if you don't? A common example could be public speaking, when in front of a crowd you may stutter, stammer or forget what you are supposed to be saying. This also is a legitimate fear since the people in the audience may be judging you based on the how's and what you are saying. But as with anything, the more you do it, the more you will feel comfortable in front of the crowd and the better that you will do.

HORROR MOVIES:
A man made fear that obviously has no real physical harm would be a fear of horror movie. Usually when we are young we are fearful of scary imagery that is featured in horror movies and they seem to come back and haunt us at the most inappropriate times; in the dark at bedtime, when we are home alone, or on that walk back from the store in the darkness of night. Obviously as an adult we know that Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers do not really exist, so what makes this fear surface in us when we are alone or in the dark? First you have the fact that at a young age you are unaccustomed to the "horror" presented in these movies, then you have the secondary fears surfacing, such as the setting of darkness, being alone and fear of the unknown. Combine all of these elements together and you can see how a young mind can become scared.

ACCLIMATION:
As time goes on you naturally realize that Jason Voorhees is just a character is a string of Hollywood movies, that there is not a person or a demon hiding in the darkness under your bed and that there is nothing to fear in your closet. As you are exposed to the Jason character it loses its effectiveness, once you realize that nothing hides in that dark room you lose your fear simply because you are familiar with it and are becoming acclimated with it.

BOTTOM LINE:
Repeatedly exposing yourself to said fear, will diminish its power over you.

(Chris Chaos is a long time resident of South Jersey who once again resides in and writes from Gloucester City, New Jersey. He is afilmmaker, a business owner, writer, urban explorer and investigator of the odd and weird, a proud parent, happily taken and a connoisseur of hot wings. Chris can be reached at AxisVideo@aol.com)

The Illuminati

by Chris Chaos

The Illuminati, does it exist?

It seems that as of late many people have been talking about this subject since many of today's top Hollywood entertainers are flashing the supposedly secret society hand symbols and making the old world symbols appear in their music videos and the like. But truth be told many people like to join groups or affiliations of like minded people, this also rings true with the rich and powerful. When people have money, they have influence, so people tend to pay attention and listen. Many entertainers have "sold their souls", so to speak, to become rich and famous...and they sure have paid the price in their eventual decline. Many point to examples of former childhood stars that went down a beaten path of destruction, examples include Drew Barrymore, who at age 11 was doing cocaine and giving producers blowjobs or Lindsay Lohan who fell into a downward spiral of drugs. Just as the average person may join a group or a club that has a focus and a concentration of like minded individuals, so do the rich, the famous and the powerful. It seems as if each and every time a famous celebrity dies, someone states that they were victims of the Illuminati. This list includes Michael Jackson, Elvis, Tupac and most recently Robin Williams.

Many of those in power use the famous musicians and movie stars as influence to push an agenda. The public looks up to singers, bands, sports stars and movie stars as role models, so the people in power recruit these stars to assist in pushing these mentioned agendas. The stars speak and their fans eat it up. Some stars do back up claims that there is a sinister "club" among Hollywood's elite, most notably in recent years was Cory Feldman who claimed that he was molested at a young age by various unnamed producers.

 

Look at hip hop in its infancy, these early crusaders were the voices and the idols of young black people in urban areas. Those in power saw this, hijacked these stars, injected them with tons of cash and told them to sing about drugs, bitches and money, now look at the sad state of rap music and the quality of the people that listen to it. A whole generation of misguided youth going down the wrong path. The rappers got the black and white youths all in one big swoop. Now these young impressionable kids have drug dealers, pimps and whores to look up to as role models. Keep a populous ignorant and they are much easier to control. On Youtube there is a steady stream of videos showing alleged examples of famous stars using either Satanic or Illuminati imagery in their live shows, lyrics and album artwork. The producers supply the money to the stars to get them in, the drugs to keep them going and in exchange they get the masses to listen and follow blindly to do their bidding. Show business is a business, they are there to make money and to get the fans to fork over their hard earned cash for the shows, music and related merchandise.

Some of the Youtube videos can be quite convincing, they use confirmation bias when selecting only the information and related to the point they are trying to make but ignore any evidence that is contrary. I saw an interesting documentary concerning Michael Jackson that stated he was killed by the Illuminati since he was about to expose them for what they are. All the weird news articles and accusations relating to Michael Jackson molesting kids were supposed slander created by the Illuminati to discredit him and make his fans and the world in general view him in an unsavory manner.

People in general fear those that they do not understand. In the United States class warfare is running rampant and those with the power, influence and money are loathed by those who do not possess such attributes. Those without, become jealous and frustrated with those that have; the classic "have nots" VS "the haves". In return the upper class may dislike the lower class and poor viewing them as lazy or as parasites.

The All Mocking Tongue....
Jim Carrey discusses the Illuminati

Other conspiracy theorists speculate that those involved in the various world governments and The New World Order (N.W.O.) are leaders of the new Illuminati and are interested in the centralization of power. The corporations are accused of commercializing and selling everything as a product as if it is one big conspiracy.......

(Chris Chaos is a long time resident of South Jersey who once again resides in and writes from Gloucester City, New Jersey. He is a filmmaker, a business owner, writer, urban explorer and investigator of the odd and weird, a proud parent, happily taken and a connoisseur of hot wings. Chris can be reached at AxisVideo@aol.com)