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From my blog today – what do you think??
Popular media seems to point to a new trend in paranormal investigation. Kids are getting into the field. Most of them come to it the same way that a lot of grown ups do these days. They see it on TV. They think it looks cool. They decide to try it themselves.
Need evidence that kids are getting into it? The Cartoon Network has launched The Othersiders, a group of teens who hunt for ghosts. Author Marley Gibson's Teen Ghost Huntress series is due out this year, and her guide for teen ghost hunters, The Other Side, co-written with Patrick Burns and Dave Schrader is due to hit the shelves soon.
Other projects are also in the works, including the Teen Extreme Ghost Hunters Club. In that program, parents can send their kids to "camp" for several months, paying different prices based on whether or not they allow their teens to appear on the television show that is a part of the program.
The paranormal is being presented as entertainment. In some cases, it is entertaining; however, as we all know, there's more to it than just a good time and a quick thrill. There are expenses. There are scary situations. There is a whole lot of sitting around waiting for something to happen. There is a whole lot of nothing happening. There are hours and hours of evidence review.
Not only that, but there are kids who believe that they are going to grow up to be "professional" ghost hunters. For those of you whose empty wallets scream in pain after purchasing yet another piece of equipment or paying to travel to a new location (like mine does), you know the fallacy of the "professional ghost hunter" better than others. The return on investment is knowledge and experience – not cash.
Whether or not kids and teens <em>should</em> be participating in paranormal investigation, the reality of the situation is that they are. And if is the case, then whose responsibility is it to make sure that those kids and teens entering the paranormal field in droves are learning investigation based on safety, respect and sound investigatory technique?
Let's be frank. Paranormal experiences can be disconcerting for even the most mature among us. In some cases, they can be downright terrifying and traumatic. Many adults who had paranormal experiences at an early age spend much of their lives attempting to understand, rationalize and deal with what it is that they experienced. Now kids are actively seeking out these types experiences – regardless of whether grown ups feel that they should or not.
Because youth ghost hunting is a reality, there needs to be a network of support for those who have experiences. While it is certainly incumbent upon the parents to be part of this network of support, often the parents are just as frightened by their kids' experiences as the kids are. Where can young people who experience the paranormal turn? More and more they are turning to the paranormal community. They are showing up on paranormal bulletin boards, reading paranormal publications and watching paranormal television in an attempt to find answers to their experiences.
When they show up on an Internet bulletin board, they often don't identify themselves as teens (although usually it is fairly apparent). How we respond to these kids can have a huge impact on how they process their experience. They probably don't need to be told what they did or didn't experience. What they most likely need is to be given a basis for critical thinking, a compassionate ear and a dose of perspective so that they can do as we all have done, and work through their own experience.
I'm a big advocate of parents taking care of their own children; however, I am not naive enough to believe that every parent has the tools or willingness to do so. As it has always been in society, it becomes somewhat incumbent on the community at large to help in those cases of innocents whose parents fall short. In the case of kids and the paranormal, we become that community.
Up until now, most of the dialog I have seen centers on whether or not kids should be allowed to investigate the paranormal. The bottom line is that they are. Right or wrong, this is what is happening. Given this reality over which we have very little control, perhaps it is time for the dialog to change. Kids are in the paranormal. Now how can we, as the paranormal community, help them to approach investigation responsibly and process their experiences in an emotionally healthy and constructive manner?
I look forward to hearing what you think about this.
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You hit the nail on the head, most of these kids are doing it for entertainment purposes only. The glitz and glamor of watching these paranormal shows have instigated a surge in wanna be followers. They see the 46 minute program on tv and think, thats cool, I can do that, not realizing the hours spent in doing the research, investigation, and review. I guess it is up to sites like this to educate and inform the future leaders in the paranormal field….
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If a kid that is mature enough, understands what is expected of them and can handle then by all means let them do it. Mine are too young (6 and 3) but we are not going to shelter them from everything in this world. There are worse things that they could get into and I much rather have them into something I know about then something I don't know about.
My nephew who is almost 16 is on my team. He is a junior investigator and has been on 3 investigations thus far. Two at his house and one at the Myrtles Plantation. He is mature enough to handle it I believe. He has had experiences growning up so he hasn't seen anything that has bothered him.
Parents need to make sure that they are involved as well. They don't have to go investigating but they do need to talk to their kids to make sure they are doing fine and not having problems.
As for trying to be on TV, the kids need to understand that it is a very long shot but they can try it if they really want to. Just expect that there is a better chance of disappointment then success.
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I agree with Ryan. If the kid is mature enough, I think they can investigate. And I also think it might be benificial for them, because it teaches them that not everything unknown is necessarily something to be afraid of, and investigating can help them build skills that will help them in the future. My group has a 16 year old, and she is honestly one of our best members. She's extremely mature, she comes up with good EVP questions, and she's very practical and helps debunk claims well.
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Well this is sorta related, but not really. In the funeral profession, I see both sides of families who, half want to bring their little ones to funerals, and half who do not (even for a close relative). One side says, it will help them to deal with the grieving and with death. The other side says, they do not understand and want to shelter them.
So which side is correct?
I'll let others decide, but in my experience, I have seen what the sheltered kids turned adults act like at a funeral, and I have seen what the adults who were exposed to funerals as kids act like as well. Guess which ones are able to cope better with their grief and feelings, and not act scared?
So what does this have to do with the topic, I think if kids are exposed to the paranormal at a young age, they can grow up and be able to process and understand more as adults, as long as they are structured and mature enough to understand….
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Well this is sorta related, but not really. In the funeral profession, I see both sides of families who, half want to bring their little ones to funerals, and half who do not (even for a close relative). One side says, it will help them to deal with the grieving and with death. The other side says, they do not understand and want to shelter them.
So which side is correct?
I'll let others decide, but in my experience, I have seen what the sheltered kids turned adults act like at a funeral, and I have seen what the adults who were exposed to funerals as kids act like as well. Guess which ones are able to cope better with their grief and feelings, and not act scared?
So what does this have to do with the topic, I think if kids are exposed to the paranormal at a young age, they can grow up and be able to process and understand more as adults, as long as they are structured and mature enough to understand….
I am a big believer that death is part of life, and that by giving kids a healthy framework to deal with it, they may grow up less fearful. My family celebrates lives (for the most part) rather than mourning death – so we don't have a lot of funerals as a result. Whenever there has been a death in our family (or the death of a pet), I've used that with the kids to open a dialog so that they can ask the questions and express their fears about death. I often wonder if kids who aren't allowed to go to funerals maybe see death as more of a taboo subject. I sort of see it as a demystifying of death.
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Experimenting and investigating the paranormal is just part of the rite of passage from child to adult. I doubt that many can claim to have never participated in some of the games like "bloody Mary" played at teen and preteen parties. For many these parties were where they got their first exposure to a Ouija board. A long time ago when I was 16 and invincible, I went on my first bigfoot hunt, it was down in Louisiana in an area just south of Fort Jackson. In the following year I went on many such hunts in the swamps, where people with more intelligence than we had, were cautious of going during daylight hours.
Now that my son (15) is approaching the freedom that comes with a drivers license and a car, I can only hope that his curiosity will not overtake his intelligence. I have not taken him on any real investigations but he has been to quite a few interesting places and had opportunities that most paranormal enthusiasts could appreciate. Each time we visited a place, I took advantage of the situation and made it a learning experience. After we would talk about what we had seen, review pictures and we would discuss how the place might have been investigated.
It would be nice if all interested kids could be exposed to the paranormal under guarded situations but it won't always happen. I am a Boy Scout leader and at least once a year we take the troop to Fort Washita, Oklahoma. The fort is unique in that it was constructed to protect the Cherokee and Choctaw mostly from the Apache. After the government decided they no longer needed protecting, the fort was pretty much abandoned but then later taken over by the confederate army. There are 4 different cemeteries on the fort grounds, Union, Confederate, civilian and Indian (or Native American). There have been many sightings of apparitions and ghost lights there and it is generally considered haunted. Normally the only problem we have is the older boys trying to scare the younger boys with ghost stories and wild claims of sightings. Two years ago we camped at the Indian cemetery, the boys tents backed up to a short stone wall that outlines the Indian cemetery, most of the boys didn't know what the wall was for. During the night one of the boys needed to relieve himself and didn't want to walk about 100 yards to the restroom, so he stood on the wall and wrote his name in the dirt. There was a short rain shower just before sunrise, not much more than 15 minutes of light drizzle but that one boy had his tent flooded. I doubt that there was anything paranormal about the flood but you cannot convince any of those boys it was not.
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I think that paranormal TV has a big impact on kids, at least I know it has on my children. My son, who's 14, loves Ghost Hunters, Destination Truth, really any paranormal show. He is dying to investigate the paranormal and constantly asks why he has to be 18 to do an official investigation (we've done local 2-hour tours though). I try and tell him that in reality investigating is generally not like what he sees on TV and there are a lot of things to learn first.
I also think it's definitely a good thing to help children be less fearful of death. Sometimes it's really difficult for children to understand death. This reminds me of something that happened when my son was about 7, I think. My stepgrandfather passed away, and as we were sitting there during the service, and my son asked, "When is great grandpa going to wake up?" I tried to quietly explain to him the circumstances and that grandpa had passed away, but he just asked again, "So grandpa is going to wake up soon right?" (I had explained to him before the service, of course, but he just couldn't understand at that time.)
I think children comprehend things at different ages, and that parents should be responsible to educate their children on what paranormal investigation is all about. Make them aware that investigation takes a lot of time, effort, and resources, and that there are safety issues along with possible afteraffects of paranormal investigation.
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I've been going to funerals as long as I can remember & believe that children should be exposed to death, it's part of life.
These paranormal shows however, are something different. I think they see it as entertainment only & not always a good
thing. I think it depends on the child involved. Their level of maturity.
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I think that paranormal TV has a big impact on kids, at least I know it has on my children. My son, who's 14, loves Ghost Hunters, Destination Truth, really any paranormal show. He is dying to investigate the paranormal and constantly asks why he has to be 18 to do an official investigation (we've done local 2-hour tours though). I try and tell him that in reality investigating is generally not like what he sees on TV and there are a lot of things to learn first.
I also think it's definitely a good thing to help children be less fearful of death. Sometimes it's really difficult for children to understand death. This reminds me of something that happened when my son was about 7, I think. My stepgrandfather passed away, and as we were sitting there during the service, and my son asked, "When is great grandpa going to wake up?" I tried to quietly explain to him the circumstances and that grandpa had passed away, but he just asked again, "So grandpa is going to wake up soon right?" (I had explained to him before the service, of course, but he just couldn't understand at that time.)
I think children comprehend things at different ages, and that parents should be responsible to educate their children on what paranormal investigation is all about. Make them aware that investigation takes a lot of time, effort, and resources, and that there are safety issues along with possible afteraffects of paranormal investigation.
Your son may not have understood at the time, but I imagine that service planted a seed inside of him, and he did eventually understand. I think kids need to be exposed to that whether they understand at the time or not, whether it does at the time or sometime down the road, it will give them closure. Days that my daycare provider takes off, I bring my 3 year old girl to work. She has seen bodies laid out in caskets, and tells me, "Shhhhhhhhhh, that lady is sleeping." She might not comprehend it all now, but she will eventually, and when she does, she will not "fear" death, but understand its a cycle of life….
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There is a show up here in Canada called "Ghost Trackers" and they send kids into haunted places to do investigations. I kind of sit on the fence when it comes to kids and paranormal. I used to think it was completely wrong to do, but then someone sat me down and asked me "Didn't your grandmother used to take you to Lily Dale?" and that's when I couldn't really object anymore. I think that we have to be more responsible and selective as to what kind of haunted places our kids go to.
Face it .. paranormal investigation has become part of our culture now. It's a dinner table topic in America and Canada now it seems and just like smoking … kids see parents do it, they're going to want to try it too. Dave Schrader of Darkness Radio has apparently written a book with two other people called "The Other Side – A teens guide to Ghost Hunting and the paranormal" I'm actually thinking about checking it out. I spoke with a parent who's teenage daughter and her friends are getting into this too and she said "I'd rather have my kid hanging out with a dead crowd .. than the WRONG crowd" but the question remains .. how young is TOO young for this ?
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