It's late, you're preparing for bed when there's a familiar ping from your phone. A little red bubble appears over your messenger app. A friend who keeps tabs on the worst scumbags in the paranormal field has something to show you. You open the message getting the feeling you have when you pull open the door of the seediest bar of your town. That's what happened to me tonight when my friend directed me to Steve Huff's Patreon (0). Just when you think that a human being could not possibly sink any lower than selling broken radios to the gullible at massively inflated prices. When you believe that this same person couldn't do anything more tasteless than 'contacting the spirits' of recently deceased celebrities.
He suprises you on both counts.
Let's get something out of the way first. I have no objection to people opening a Patreon. Heck, when I mulled over the move from blogging to making Youtube videos and podcasts I considered doing the same. The time restrictions on making videos meant I may well have to cut down my working hours and I thought Patreon would help me do this without impacting my family. I never made that move, mainly because I enjoy writing and the time constraints of recording audio and editing videos were just too limiting. But opening a Patreon isn't something I rule out, nor is it something I frown upon others for doing.
So why do I have a problem with Huff doing this?
Essentially, it comes down to the fact that Huff uses the videos and content he creates in order to sell his ridiculous range of broken or at best, poorly functioning radios. He's already receiving a revenue stream from the videos he creates, which are essentially just advertisements. But he's not content with that. He wants his followers to pay him to create his advertising material. Obviously, Huff can't outright say this, so let's unpack his justification for soliciting money from his followers.
Huff tells his followers that by donating to him through Patreon they are helping him to conduct his 'research'.
His "drive is stronger than ever before"? I guess a lot can change in a few months because only last year Huff quit the paranormal 'field' after claiming he was under sustained attack from demons! (1), As for Huff's claim that he is conducting 'research'. Where is it? In his introduction video on his Patreon he claims that people have never even seen the majority of his research.
Two questions. Why is that? And given that is the case, why the fuck should anyone pay to support Huff conduct more research, just for him to lash the results in the fucking garbage?
Sitting in your bedroom playing with neon-lights and broken radios is not research. It's tinkering and he's got a damn nerve asking others to pay to allow him to continue to do it. Now he's receiving money just for the purposes of research doesn't Huff have a responsibility to his donors to properly and publically present that research?
I believe so, but he gives no indication that he is going to do this.
In the above video, Huff declares that he is broke, that he can only continue his 'research' without donations. But surely he's got a revenue stream from selling his junk? In fact, only on January 25th, he posted his latest products on his website, costing between $900 - $3995! (2)
And finally, the model that costs over $3000. It will set you back over $4200 if you want it shipped abroad!
Now, Huff can't have lots of his money tied up in stock of this rubbish for the simple reason that he requests you accept that he won't build your box until he's got your cash in his hand.
There's another interesting condition the Huff asks his customers to agree to. He asks his customers to accept that there is no guarantee that his boxes will actually work!
Can you imagine any other type of retailer selling a product that they don't guarantee will work! Huff may actually be falling afoul of a piece of US legislation, the Sales and Storage of goods framework (3), which states:
This requires that the seller knows that an item is fit for purpose at the time of sale, Huff is expressly telling his customers that he does not know that!
Back to Huff's Patreon, as well as crying poverty, you'll notice that Huff brings the issue of heaven and hell into the equation of whether you choose to support him. Huff tells us he has categorically discovered there is a heaven and a hell, and his research is helping discover who goes where when they die. In this respect, Huff has made himself indistinguishable from televangelists like Jim Bakker who threatened that viewers' grandchildren would go to hell unless they buy a $60 bucket of pancake mix. (4) Well, there is one difference. Give your money to Bakker and you get some pancake mix.
So what is Huff offering to his donors? It's a lot sleazier than pancake mix.
Steve Huff. Ghoul for Gold.
So, for your monthly contribution, Huff is offering to attempt to contact your deceased loved one. Of course, with everything Huff offers, he's quick to point out there are no guarantees. And when it does work, it's very likely because the patron has provided Huff with the name or names of the person they want to be contacted. Something which makes audio pareidolia and suggestibility a much easier for Huff to exploit.
Clearly, in the pursuit of the almighty dollar, there is no level Huff will not stoop to now. He is quite happy to manipulate his patron's grief and pain. Something that shills in the paranormal circus have been doing for years.
Just like mediums or anyone else who proposes to contact the dead, Huff is a ghoul. Pure and simple. It angers me greatly to read the messages from patrons on Huff's page requesting him to contact their loved ones.
No-one deserves to be exploited in this way.
No one.
So what can we do? The first step I'd suggest is going to Patreon directly. I have to say that they aren't particularly responsive, but if enough people register their disdain perhaps we can help shut down this thinly veiled exploitation. Next, raise awareness, whether by spreading this post around social media or by writing your own posts and articles.
One thing should be abundantly clear here, Huff is a fraud and a charlatan. He has shown himself to have absolutely no boundaries in what he will do for money.
What is it about certain individuals and groups within the paranormal field that causes a complete abandonment of any idea or taste and decency with regards to the recently deceased? Where are these team's ethical standards when it comes to consideration of the loved ones, friends and family members of the recently deceased?
In the horrible example here, the only answer can be "completely absent".
Steve Huff (left) and a paranormal group who follow his reprehensible Modus Operandi
I've written about a repeat offender in this regard, Steve Huff, several times before (1). Huff's MO is supposedly using ITC methods, mostly with devices he builds and sells himself (2) to contact recently deceased celebrities. The most disgusting example of this was when Huff claimed to have contacted former Ghost Adventures star, Debbie Constantino (3), a few short days after she was brutally by her partner Mark. There was a groundswell of disgust at this from the paranormal community that had been absent during Huff's sessions with dead celebs. To many, Debbie was well known and well liked, and they saw Huff having crossed a line that he had previously not crossed.
None of this deterred Huff, after every celebrity passing you could predict with morbid certainty that Huff would be exploiting it shortly after with little regard for the hurt he caused. He continued this grim pattern undaunted until earlier this year, in early August, when he suddenly declared that as a result of "demonic attacks" he was quitting the paranormal/ITC community for good (4). There was a lot of suggestions as to what may actually be behind Huff's exit, with some suggesting possible legal woes on the horizon and others implying that various trading standards agencies were, at last, taking an interest in his sales practices. I myself was very curious about Huff's motivation, mulling over the possibility of this all being in view of a potential book deal. Whatever they suspected Huff's reasons for quitting were, few were surprised when Huff was back up to his old tricks a few weeks after quitting for good and fewer still were surprised that his operation hadn't changed one iota. Since Huff returned, he's conducted sessions in which he's alleged to contact Hugh Hefner and Tom Petty.
As I've stated before, I think Huff is utterly disgusting. He seems to have no issue with using the deaths of celebrities to promote himself. His practices are cold, cruel and completely devoid of compassion or empathy. I never thought I'd come across an individual or group more contemptible than Huff in the paranormal field, hobby or whatever you choose to call it.
That all changed today.
"Paranormal Den" is a group that predominantly produce EVP and ITC videos for Youtube and Facebook, where their page has almost 11,000 followers. They do not hide the fact that they are heavily influenced by the aforementioned Steve Huff, they use similar equipment, like his FB page and even have claimed to have contacted Huff's spirit energy in the past (6). Unsurprisingly, given this influence, they also conducted sessions with deceased celebrities, Chris Cornell and Chester Bennington. Clearly, this makes them as tasteless as Huff, but what makes them worse?
How have this group lowered the bar?
On October 7th Paranormal Den, presumably comprised of the two individuals pictured in the page's profile image, though they aren't specifically named on the page or the Youtube channel, decided that they would attempt to use a radio sweeping device to contact the spirits of the victims of the Las Vegas massacre.
"Crazy and unreal" they call it.
I call it crass and shameful.
At this point, I am posting their video, I am not going to give them the views and attention they desperately seek. Even though I've ripped it directly from their Facebook page. It's bad enough I had to watch it, I don't want to encourage you to do the same. It's here for completeness, nothing else.
The "session" is laughable. The purpose they claim is to question the spirits with regards to the ridiculous conspiracy theories circulating regarding the Las Vegas shooting, such as the debunked idea that there was a second shooter at the Mandalay Bay Hotel (7). You'll be unsurprised to learn that the usual tropes and errors associated with the presentation of EVPs are all here. The audio is presented with captions explaining what the "spirits" have supposedly said resulting in a highly suggestive experience. I listened without captions as I always do with ITC and didn't get any results that Paranormal Den caption. When they hear "execute" I hear "eggs" for example. In addition to this, the responses that were supposedly given barely line up to questions asked even if we accept Paranormal Den's interpretation of the snippets collected by the broken radio they consider a piece of scientific equipment. What is especially laughable about this is the footage is heavily edited with lots of cuts implying that the laughable responses are the cream of the crop in regards to what was collected. I have to wonder if Steve Huff is aware of this group? Maybe, they're in his shitty ITC collective. I wonder if he is, does he have the balls to condemn this disgusting exploitation of innocent people gunned down by a lunatic. Steve, if you're not aware of them, they're certainly aware of you. They're following the model that you've established withs regards to high profile, exploitative ITC sessions. This is your legacy. Hopefully, the next "attack" you suffer that prompts you to quit won't "demonic" but one of conscience. That said, I suspect that like demons, you're conscience is highly unlikely to actually exist.
Steve Huff is upsetting folks again, so I'm going to take some time out of my busy day (that beer isn't going to drink itself you know) to rubbish his latest bullshit claim or despicable lack of respect for the dead. Let's see what Huff has said now (highlighting not added by me):
Wait.... I wasn't expecting this, but I agree with much of that statement. What's going on? I agree with Steve Huff... What's the expression for such an event? Oh yeah...
Of course, I disagree with the specifics of why Huff believes the Ouija board is harmless, and we shouldn't give Huff too much credit, a broken clock is right twice a day after all. Huff believes that the devices he uses are much more powerful, and therefore more dangerous than the Ouija board as it opens "larger portals". Whilst I hold, that neither the Ouija board nor any other ITC or spirit communication device opens a "portal" of any kind. Further to this, there's no reason to believe any such portals exist in the first place.
Hmmm... I'd actually agree with the opening statement: Demon communication is not an option. Demons don't exist. Also, there are some great reasons for owning a Ouija board even if you don't believe them to be a spirit communication device. How about to admire the craftsmanship of a particular talking board? Many of these boards are very aesthetically pleasing, is it any wonder that some people would want to collect such things? Or perhaps to admire the historical aspect? Or for the purposes of displaying the curious nature of the ideomotor effect? The board can certainly be an interesting curio. Or what about using the board for it original purposes, as a game or parlour trick?
Many of the reviewers hit on a particular theme. The irresponsibility of allowing a child to use a Ouija board, the potential harm that could result from this. Let's be clear here: a Ouija board cannot hurt either a child or a vulnerable adult, or anyone else for that matter. What can hurt these individuals, is the ignorance, fear and superstition surrounding the talking board. The only antidote to this is educating people regarding the actual mechanism behind the movement of a planchette on the board.
The problem is that the only debates that are currently raging with regards to Ouija boards is "Are they dangerous are they not? Do they contact ghosts or demons?" The truth is that these debates are the equivalent of two bald men fighting over a comb. The debate is settled by the fact that there's a very rational mechanism behind the Ouija effect.
The only actual mystery behind the Ouija board is how an explanation can be so straight forward, confirmed and tested and widely known yet not be "common knowledge" amongst believers. The ideomotor effect isn't a new phenomenon, William Benjamin Carpenter, a British physiologist, introduced this theory in 1852. As Scott G Eberle explains in a 2012 article for Psychology Today:
"The planchette may seem to drag our hands along as it selects letters that spell out words, but it happens that muscular action does not always arise out of deliberate will or volition, or in fact, even upon our awareness. Our keen expectations for a certain outcome will sometimes direct the movements of our arms and hands as the planchette glides easily on felt-covered feet. This happens at a level that lies below our conscious attention. “Dousing” sticks or “divining” rods which also appear to move strangely on their own work in exactly this way by amplifying muscle movements. Whether we’re looking for buried pipes or for answers, though, subtle unacknowledged suggestions, not spirits, guide our actions. Yes, we select the letters ourselves in this game; it’s just that sometimes we don’t quite know that we do it or how we do it."-Scott G Eberle, Psychology Today(2012)
So why are many believers unaware of this rational explanation of the Ouija phenomena?
I believe one of the main reasons for this is the popularity of a Ouija board as a paranormal Mac Guffin (a plot device in the form of some goal, desired object, or another motivator that the protagonist pursues, often with little or no narrative explanation. The specific nature of a MacGuffin is typically unimportant to the overall plot.-Wikipedia) in popular culture. Think of the amount of horror films that use the concept of a protagonist using a Ouija board and inadvertently triggering a sequence of paranormal events. Whilst it's become something of a lazy cliche, one has to credit the incredible social influence of the movie The Exorcist in almost single-handedly creating such a powerful and widespread, and widely believed for that matter, trope. It wasn't the first movie to use the Ouija board in such a way, but it is by far the most influential and is responsible for much of the fear around the board. Sorry Koko, you might have been in the first piece of film to show a Ouija board but that's what you get for being the star of a massively racist cartoon.
This trope doesn't just effect the movies. The Ouija effect is part of the cultural zeitgeist. Everyone and their Aunt in the paranormal community has a Ouija story, the board is often introduced to many more mundane haunted house or ghost tales as a Mac Guffin or often as the very denouncement to the tale itself. My Childhood was filled with many a boring tale of moving pint glasses and cold spots and ghostly voices ending with "...And then they found a Ouija board in the attic/cellar/outside lavatory..." guaranteed to elicit an "Oooooh" from many listening. In fact, many skeptics, myself included, held on to the mystique of the Ouija long after we've abandoned other supernatural beliefs.
So how does this pop-culture influence prevent believers from exposure to the truth, i.e: the non-supernatural explanation behind the Ouija board? It could be that the prevalence of the board in pop-culture and word of mouth tales means that many feel they don't actually have to do any actual research to learn everything they need to know about the board. Certainly any time it's mentioned on social media, believers come in droves to share diabolical warnings of demons, evil spirits and such nonsense, contacted through the board. Rarely is a dissenting skeptical or rational voice heard and often such opinions are drowned out or the comments are removed altogether. Again, as mentioned above, generally the only dissent is in the form of questioning the exact paranormal nature of the Ouija Board.
Youtube and various video hosting sites feature thousands of Ouija Board videos with comment sections dominated by credulous posts, many of which remark on what "rules" should be followed, what it's acceptable to do, what it's not acceptable to do. And of course, the dire warnings abound. Few commentators indicate what the source is for their information, many citing personal experience as their guide.
Even if a curious believer was to attempt to find more information about Ouija boards, a cursory Google search leads to more rules, guidelines and warnings. Try the question "Are Ouija boards safe?" for example. Not one of the sites from the first page features the word "ideomotor" once as the comparsion below shows.
The significance of this is that a believer curious as to whether a Ouija Board is dangerous or not simply won't be exposed to the correct answer: "No, they rely on the ideomotor effect." unless they are already aware of the ideomotor effect to begin with. Of course, a more direct question like "How do Ouija Boards work" will yield more rational results, but having the mindset to pose this question likely means the believer is on the way to rejecting the phenomena anyway.
You may have noticed the most popular result for the ideomotor-less search request, Wiki-how. Not a paranormal site. Would you expect at least some rationality from a seemingly sensible site that people usually visit to learn how to unclog a drain or repair an iPad? If so, you'd be mistaken. The Wiki-how page is filled with the usual rubbish that propagates paranormal pages. Here's a quick sample:
Is it any wonder that so much ignorance surrounds the Ouija board, when, for a better word, a mainstream site publishes such utter fucking horse-shit as "Sometimes, the spirit will end the session first. If it doesn't, you will need to move the pointer to the word GOODBYE. This is important. If you don't do this, you will leave the doorway to the spirit world open. Other spirits might use this to enter your house."? The page even has a question and answer section where visitors can request more nonsensical information.
Perhaps the mystique of the Ouija board remains partially because it gives some believers the opportunity to claim expertise. Pretending to have access to some arcane and forbidden knowledge, or some terrible secret gives some a sense of self-worth. They may even begin to believe this themselves. But a false sense of self-worth is not worth the propagation of ignorance. While these prognosticators issue their dire warnings of "Zozo" and other such rubbish the people who listen to them go misinformed, they spread this misinformation further.
In his Psychology Today article mentioned above Scott G. Eberle, Ph.D suggests an interesting experiment to demonstrate the ideomotor effect and expose how Ouija board works. It's very easy to do and stunningly effective if done correctly without the sitters knowledge:
"Try inviting the Ouija believer to wear a blindfold (I'd suggest having a test run before the blindfolding, then one with the blindfold and the board the right way up before flipping the board);(then quietly rotate the game a half turn. Then ask some mischievous questions of your own devising. (Be nice, now.) If your subject has memorized the position of the letters or the YES and NO answers (on purpose or not) I promise you amusing and instructive results."-Scott G. Eberle Ph.D, Psychology Today (2012)
Every time you're at a social gathering and a Ouija board comes out, insist on trying this out. Let's get a few Ouija stories in circulation that show the Ouija board for what it truly is: a demonstration of a harmless physiological quirk. Let's change the discussion.
*I tried to find an example of this test performed by Penn and Teller for their show Bullshit a few years ago, unfortunately it appears to have disappeared from Youtube. Luckily Willie Kay posted a great alternative to the Bad Psychics FB page which is on the left. Thanks Willie.
I'm saying goodbye now, I don't want to leave a channel open.
My friend of mine queried today how long it would take before some shyster claimed to have contacted the recently deceased singer Prince using a so-called spirit box. I think she knew the answer was less than 24 hours after his death was announced, and I also think she knew exactly who it would be.
Step forward Steve Huff of Huff Paranormal, who, unsurprisingly is using a celebrity death to once again sell some piece of shit device to "contact the dead". I'm not going to spend any length of time debunking the "V2 Wonder Box" or whatever, as far as I'm concerned it's core operations aren't far removed from his last hokum technology, which I commented on here.
As for Steve's comments. As you can see in the screen grab above, Huff can't even keep this own claims straight, between creating the featured video and posting it on facebook the 90% of original words have increased to 99%. Apparently this "proves" that spirits are at work. Huff clearly doesn't understand what the word proof means.
The methods used by Huff are identical to those I exposed in my review of his "Impossible Box", the device pulls phonemes or fragments of language from radio samples, randomly sampled the meaning is provided by the listener's own mind. Audio pareidolia in other words. Once again, listening to the samples before reading Huff's onscreen transcriptions reduces the samples to nonsense or gives completely different context.
If you have an ounce of decency all this is probably leaving a bad taste in your mouth, of course, Huff has an answer to this.
"As for those who say this is disrespectful I have to 100% disagree."
We know you disagree, you've pulled this shit several times in the past. He did the same when Robin Williams and Joan Rivers died and also when Debbie and Mark Constantino died, an act which brought him a huge amount of condemnation and cries that he should be expelled from the paranormal community. As with the Constantino case, Huff once again claims his refusal to allow a period of mourning for these celebrities before picking over their bodies is because their spirits are "easier to contact" within 24-48 hours of their death, Of course, Huff provides no evidence of his claim or even justification beyond "It's this way because I say so".
"...if they have something to say, it is much easier for them to say it within the 1st 24-48 hours (from what I have found over the years of research I have done). I am a researcher, and this is what I do..."
He's a "researcher" so I guess we should just take at his word, right?
Hey Steve. Steve. You know what researchers provide in order to be taken seriously? They provide research. Evidence. Studies. Peer-reviewed papers. You're not a researcher. You're a fraud.
A pretty fucking despicable one too. Of course, he doesn't let that stop him from adopting the moral high ground, it's those that call him tasteless that are in the wrong:
"....anytime someone tries to take a voice away from anyone, living or dead, I question their motives."
Huff is trying to persuade us he's giving the dead a voice. He isn't. He's putting words into their mouths, an insult to those that actually knew those people. This is nothing new in the paranormal, physics and mediums have been making similar claims of public service for years. Like Huff their protestations of moral certitude are often accompanied sounds of coffers being filled.
These are modern-day grave robbers. Picking over corpses of the dead at the expense of those that loved them, pilfering not the physical trinkets left behind but something more precious, the memories they leave those who loved them. They exploit and pervert something that can never be replaced. The most insulting thing about what Huff does, and what physics and mediums do, is they strip all the character from the people they claim speak through them. Listen to Huff's messages from Robin Williams for a case in point. The messages Huff claims to have received could have come from anybody, or crucially, nobody.
In the video above Huff exposes himself in a rare moment of honesty, at 3:18 Huff admits that he has no way to verify that this is Williams he is speaking to. That being the case all the bullshit falls away. This is horseshit, in awful taste.
You know my comparison of Huff and his ilk to grave robbers is very unfair.... at least grave robbers never had the audacity to claim they were doing the dead a favor when they defiled them.
