Um--before I link to the story, really Hasbro? Pink? I protest. My baby-goth inner-child is offended. A 'real" Ouija board has to be sepia-toned and old-timey, or it won't work. It won't even give you the heebie-jeebies of a good ghost story, or saying "Bloody Mary" three times in front of a mirror. Seriously, from baby blankets to Barbies, to breast cancer and designer vajayjays, does everything in a woman's life have to be tinged with pink?
But I digress. Because the big problem with the pick Ouija board isn't that it's pink like the bing on your cherry. Oh no. The problem is witchcraft:
"There's a spiritual reality to it and Hasbro is treating it as if it's just a game," said Stephen Phelan, communications director for Human Life International, which bills itself as the largest international pro-life organization and missionary worldwide. "It's not Monopoly. It really is a dangerous spiritual game and for [Hasbro] to treat it as just another game is quite dishonest."
Phelan, who has never played the game, said the Bible explicitly states "not to mess with spirits" and that using a Ouija board will leave a person's soul vulnerable to attack.
"All Christians should know, well everyone should, that it's opening up a person to attack, spiritually," he said. "Christians shouldn't use it."
Asked how the game differed from magic kits or Harry Potter-themed merchandise, Phelan replied, "The difference is that the Ouija board is actually is a portal to talk to spirits and it's hard to get people to understand that until they actually do it. I don't pretend to know how it works, but it actually does."
Oooh! Oooh! I know how it works! I do!
Now, my long-time readers, if I had any, would know that I occasionally refer cryptically to my past dabbling in the spiritual arts--I was a big fan of Aleister Crowley, and he was a big fan of Ouija boards.
So of course I've contacted the spirit world that way, right?
But no-- Ouija boards work because the platen "mysteriously moves" towards the letters and numbers and "answers" questions posed to it. This has something to do with "automatism" or the ideomotor effect--here's a trick you can try on a friend. Bend a paper clip into the shape of a "U" and drape it over a pencil, and then have your friend hold it completely still--they won't be able to do it. The harder they try, the more the U-shaped wire will wobble, because people are full of the fidgets. A combination of fidgets, and probably at least one or more people in the group "subconsciously" cooking the responses is a pretty reasonable explanation of why the boards seem to give answers. The more you "practice" or believe that you will get answers this way, well, the more you will. The subconcious is vast and weird, but apparently, trainable.
It's a more sensible answer than "demons gonna get you" but, alas, it makes the whole thing less fun. But it does make me wonder when anyone supposes that a mass-produced entertainment from a major toy company is a portal to the spirit world that could actually lead to "spiritual attack." It's more of a gateway to owning tarot cards, wearing too much black with Renaissance Faire jewelry, and picking absurd on-line handles like "Vixen Strangely." Which isn't all that tragic.
I think.
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