Stage hypnosis or just a sham?

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Permalink Reply by Richard Rumble on February 8, 2010 at 1:10pm

excellent edington.... from a person in the audience's point of view...

NOW.. were you just watching a show where you thought people were faking and the hypnotist was being " dishonest" or were you the client who paid to have entertainment at the party?

Can YOU as a non hypnotist by your own admission tell beyond a doubt that any of the people who were on stage were "faking it" ... or is it just conjecture and opinion that they were "faking it"?

Did YOU as the audience member talk with the person or people on stage and interview them after the show to ask them if they were faking it and why they continued to "fake" when they were on stage for such a long time? I mean.. why waste that much time onstage by following directions AS IF you were hypnotized if you were not really hypnotized?

Last Night.... at this show I did for the sports agent... 7 HUGE football and baseball players.. ONE little girl about 12.. ( gymnast) she responds .. but just a little.... about 75% through the show... ( and because the HUGE guy to her left was beginning to not respond well) she starts to LOOK as if she is coming out of trance.. ( opens eyes and looks around while I am talking about the next skit..) and I am sure that everybody thinks she is out of trance and "faking it" and then I give them all a SIMPLE suggestion of name loss... cant say it... cant see it... its like its on the tip of your tongue but stuck.... EVERYONE of them responded perfectly..... even the little girl lost her name. BIG guy has a really LONG name like Ackubar.... but trans logic ( and he is a mis-matcher) he says " My Name is BOB"... its a riot....

By the way.. after the show... the little girl could not say why she could not say her name... and I am reminded of a time when I was being hypnotized by Ormand McGill... and when he asked AFTER the demo why I did what he had suggested.... my response was... " well.. I don't really know.. but it seemed like a really good Idea at the time.

Caring is good... and probably not a good Idea to do a mind read on who is or who is not hypnotized and be pissed at the dishonest hypnotist when your not the person either hypnotized.... or paying the bill... if you did not enjoy the show because of that one person..... don't go see that hypnotist again... or become a hypnotist and do your own shows.. or just lighten up.. its supposed to be about HAVING FUN.

Richard Rumble
Mister Hypnosis

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Permalink Reply by Richard Rumble on February 8, 2010 at 1:51pm

I figured I would do the polite thing and since it was his post and his question.. I would respond to him... but of course... as it is an open forum it is open to anyone who wants to post ;-)



Fable Goodman said:

Richard Rumble said:

Alan117... Can you define "REAL" for the group?

JUst for your information,

Alan 117 (whio started this thread, has not logged on to hypnothoughs for a few months.
So asking him to define "Real" is unlikely on this occasion to get a response.

LOve and hugs,

Fable

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Permalink Reply by Gilson Costa on February 8, 2010 at 4:51pm

Reg Blackwood - The Quicknotist said:

If they're CHOOSING to comply then it's simply not hypnosis.

I've been in a sort of sabbatical, so I'm not reading whole threads, so... sorry if I repeat arguments, etc.

1. Yes, Hypnosis IS compliance! People always choose to comply. And then we must conclude that the success of hypnosis, as seen by the hypnotis, is total compliance by the person, be a client or any person in a show. The myth that hypnotists have some form of control, besides voluntary compliance, is just that: a myth.

2. People have different REASONS to comply. "Clinic" hypnosis is about "solving problems" and "stage" hypnosis is about doing what the hypnotist says... That's the explicit goal for everyone there. They some times go to places only because there's a stage hypnosis show! They pay for it, they wait for it, they WANT it, etc. And the hypnotist want all of them in this state of expectancy.

3. Every normal human being is able to do all "effects" in a stage hypnosis show. We could think of a hypnotist disappearing on the stage as a memorable feat, but, have you lost your keys? And then you find them at the same place you've looked them a million times? A Rose by ANY other name....

4. Most of these attacks, or so called "explanations" are, in fact, based on social compliance themselves. The stage for them are the society/culture they live in, and they have a script where non relevant data are put into a jar of science and is served as science. And most people comply with their proponents in the same fashion a person in a stage hypnosis show comply to imagine something so intensely that it seams "real".

If I tell a person that he can't open his mouth and he complies to it, the only thing that makes him not open his mouth is the compliance! In fact he CAN open, just won't open because he agrees with me. This is a very good definition for compliance. There's no hidden power that "force" him not to open. It´s all internal business. The map is not the territory.

Also, when someone puts some data in a very scientific, well formated jar, and this information SUGGESTS them "x is y", etc, etc, we're facing the same phenomenon. They don't state clearly, they just suggest it. We can accept suggestions much like people in a stage show, or in a more "clinic" setting, can accept them.

And "compliance" is a "after-the-fact" evaluation. If it's accepted, THEN we have compliance....

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Permalink Reply by Richard Rumble on February 8, 2010 at 10:20pm

First off Edington, I am truly sorry for your experience. Have you alerted the authorities so that you can press charges against the people who perpetrated this sexual assault? Have you sought counseling of some sort to help you deal with the trauma? Have you done everything you can to make sure that you are not in the same situation anytime again in the future? Not living with that woman... not having any parties or gatherings that this "hypnotist" is going to be attending so that you will not be abused again?

All that being said... I am very curious about your choice of words: "a woman who was living ijn my house allowed a person who must have been a skilled hypnotist to put me into a trance from sleeping"

So you were SLEEPING in your own home.. and the person you lived with let someone into your room while you were sleeping to use a technique to change your sleep into a hypnotic trance in which you were not able to object to or break out of and made you do things that have caused you harm? THAT scenario bears little or NO semblance of anything that I have ever done nor seen or even heard about as it relates to a stage hypnosis show. It has nothing to do with any kind of clinical hypnotherapy I have ever heard of... ( though I have heard of the technique of bringing someone UP from sleep into a hypnotic state.. which was presented in this seminar as not very reliable and should the person wake up.. ALL trust and rapport would be blown thus making future hypnotic sessions impossible) What YOU are describing, ( or what I think you are describing please correct me if I am wrong) is more akin to a sexual Assault and Rape than it is to a hypnosis show and the techniques we use on stage. So I am just a little perplexed at your ire at the Stage Hypnotists. YOU know that trance is real... and you must know that what happened to YOU may not be possible with ALL people.. under ALL conditions or settings.. I am having trouble seeing how you draw the conclusion that if someone in my audience believes a volunteer is "faking" or if I let someone on stage stay when I think that they are "Faking" how that has any baring on my integrity as a hypnotist.

I will personally GUARANTEE you.. That if I have a WHOLE STAGE of absolutely hypnotized volunteers.. there will always be someone in the audience who thinks that they were faking. So by your standard... how can any stage hypnotist do a show with integrity? How can any stage hypnotist do a show without some people thinking it is a sham and it ruins the name of hypnosis world wide?

Again.. I am sorry for the experience that YOU had with an unethical roommate and an unethical person who may have used hypnosis on you... and I sincerely hope that you can find a way to correct the wrongs... and I hope that you can see the difference between what happened to YOU and what happens in a Stage Hypnosis Show, and separate the two from your hurt and anger.

Richard Rumble
Mister Hypnosis

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Permalink Reply by Reg Blackwood - The Quicknotist on February 14, 2010 at 9:43am

Absolutely.
Some of the posts here seem to state that Hypnosis IS compliance and subjects continue to choose to comply.
In my opinion, compliance is but a part of the Hypnotic process.
There comes a point where the conscious process of compliance is no longer relevant.
Reg
http://quicknotist.com/

edington said:

bruce said:

Reg, with respect, you are misinformed. Almost all hypnosis begins with a choice to comply... at least that's my experience, and I think 99% of the members of this site would agree with me.

this is not answering the question. obviously volunteers taking part in a stage allow themselves consciously to be hypnotized. the word comply infers a CONSCIOUS decision to obey. the point is, in a dissociated amnesiac trance the choice is no longer there because the analytical conscious mind is lost to some degree, leaving only the unconscious mind which cannot reason in the same way.

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Permalink Reply by Reg Blackwood - The Quicknotist on February 14, 2010 at 9:59am

The thing I find so incredible about this thread is how so much interpretation can be derived from so few words.
Your opinions "Hypnotists have no control" and "It's all voluntary compliance" (all Hypnosis is self-Hypnosis) have been debated/ridiculed elsewhere here and will no doubt continue to be debated/ridiculed. So I won't attempt to debate/ridicule them here.

Reg
http://quicknotist.com/

Gilson Costa said:

Reg Blackwood - The Quicknotist said:

If they're CHOOSING to comply then it's simply not hypnosis.

I've been in a sort of sabbatical, so I'm not reading whole threads, so... sorry if I repeat arguments, etc.

1. Yes, Hypnosis IS compliance! People always choose to comply. And then we must conclude that the success of hypnosis, as seen by the hypnotis, is total compliance by the person, be a client or any person in a show. The myth that hypnotists have some form of control, besides voluntary compliance, is just that: a myth.

2. People have different REASONS to comply. "Clinic" hypnosis is about "solving problems" and "stage" hypnosis is about doing what the hypnotist says... That's the explicit goal for everyone there. They some times go to places only because there's a stage hypnosis show! They pay for it, they wait for it, they WANT it, etc. And the hypnotist want all of them in this state of expectancy.

3. Every normal human being is able to do all "effects" in a stage hypnosis show. We could think of a hypnotist disappearing on the stage as a memorable feat, but, have you lost your keys? And then you find them at the same place you've looked them a million times? A Rose by ANY other name....

4. Most of these attacks, or so called "explanations" are, in fact, based on social compliance themselves. The stage for them are the society/culture they live in, and they have a script where non relevant data are put into a jar of science and is served as science. And most people comply with their proponents in the same fashion a person in a stage hypnosis show comply to imagine something so intensely that it seams "real".

If I tell a person that he can't open his mouth and he complies to it, the only thing that makes him not open his mouth is the compliance! In fact he CAN open, just won't open because he agrees with me. This is a very good definition for compliance. There's no hidden power that "force" him not to open. It´s all internal business. The map is not the territory.

Also, when someone puts some data in a very scientific, well formated jar, and this information SUGGESTS them "x is y", etc, etc, we're facing the same phenomenon. They don't state clearly, they just suggest it. We can accept suggestions much like people in a stage show, or in a more "clinic" setting, can accept them.

And "compliance" is a "after-the-fact" evaluation. If it's accepted, THEN we have compliance....

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Permalink Reply by Lee Darrow on February 15, 2010 at 3:36pm

edington said:

to take the second point first I meant that if a atage hypnotist deliberately allows faking, such as 'play along and there will be $100 after the show' he does not have integrity. I'm sure many people in the audience do not think the volunteers are in a trance because they do not understand hypnosis. there is a you yube video of Tom Silver on a tv show with an audience and he has a subject hypnotized. the tv presenter says-how many people think the person is hypnotized? only 3 people raise their hands, Tom Silver says 'I take that as a compliment'.

now, about my experience. what I have said is only a small part of the whole story and I do not wish to elaborate on that.
there are hypnotists who claim to be able to hypnotize a sleeping person, L Ron Hubbard explains how he does it, scroll halfway down the page,paragraph trance induction, I think he got the idea from Estabrooks,
http://www.lermanet.com/exit/parsons.htm
now, I found out what a hypnotic trigger was years ago and I had not forgotten it. there was a hypnotist on the tv and he had a young girl sitting, she looked no older than about 16. he said a few words in her ear and she immediately went into deep somnambulism. she did not slump forward or close her eyes. her eyes remained open and all the muscles in her face relaxed. he then took a fold of skin on the back of her hand, pushed a needle through it and the expression did not change. I learnt that it takes several sessions to plant the trigger in someones subconscious.
I discovered what had happened when a man who I thought was a stranger sat beside me on a coach journey, started a conversation, and used what I realized later was a trigger phrase. it was 6 words and it did not work the first time, he had to repeat it 3 or 4 times. I lost consciousness and the next thing I knew the coach had travelled some distance.
several things fell into place. during the conversation the man knew something about me I had not told to anyone, I remembered some of the 'dreams' I had, also I remembered one night I was aware of somebody in my bedroom.
to find out for certain, one night I propped a chair againet the bedroom door and left a tape recorder running while I slept.I played the tape the following morning and I could hear the door handle turning and someone trying to enter.
later I was told of some of the things I had done which I had no memory of. this was was complete covert hypnosis, no compliance, no role-playing, I did not know before that I was going to be hypnotized.

Ok, let's start with a quote from L. Sprague DeCamp, award-winning science fiction author, from a Chicago World Science Fiction Convention back in the 60's which occurred when a Scientology proselyte tried to recruit him to their ranks. Sprague, who worked at the desk next to Hubbard's at Astounding Science fiction looked the kid dead in the eye and said: "Son, I knew Ron Hubbard when he was a Small Time Crook."

A few facts - Estabrooks was a front man for the CIA during the MKULTRA years, he admits to as much in his classic work "Hypnotism" and also states that the project failed, miserably (he was right).

Secondly, converting sleep to trance is very difficult and fails more often than not.

Now some comments - I keep hearing reports of things like your experience more and more these days. They are remarkably reminiscent of the claims made by people who claimed to have been abused by the non-existent international multi-level Satanic conspiracy to take over the world (partly by "inducing" multiple personality disorders, now termed Dissociative Identity Disorder, through hypnosis) back in the late 1980's and into the 1990's. None of the claims about the structure of the alleged conspiracy proved to be true, none of the claims of abuse through hypnosis panned out (except in the case of Dr. Bennett Braun, MD whose insurance company settled a very strong claim against HIM for inducing the belief that such things had happened to one of his patients) nor has anyone been able to come forward with more than unsupported claims of hypnotic attempts at mind control such as the ones that you claim.

IF your claims are true, you would certainly have grounds to pursue criminal and civil actions against those responsible.

I would suggest that your energies would be better spent pursuing legal recourse than by stirring up heated emotions on an internet forum where the only result that you could manage would be to stir up heated emotions.

By discussing your case, you could irrevocably damage any possibility of redress through the courts and the law.

I would suggest that you consult a good personal injury attorney as well as your District Attorney and pursue any actions through their offices and report on the results here AFTER the case(s) have been handled through the legal system.

I would hate to see you destroy your ability to gain redress for these alleged acts and will await the results in your case(s) with great interest, but again, strongly advise you against discussing these alleged acts in public any further so that you don't destroy your ability to pursue legal redress.

However, if you do choose to continue in here, then I feel it is only right to invoke Sagan's Baloney Detection Kit and request that, because you have made some extraordinary claims, you should, in fairness to all here, provide extraordinary proof that these events actually occurred.

Respectfully,

Lee Darrow, C.H.
author of the first two books dedicated to Stage Hypnosis Safety ever published.

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Permalink Reply by Lee Darrow on February 21, 2010 at 1:38pm

edington said:

firstly, I've nothing further to add to my own experience of being hypnotized, except to say believe or not.
now something about Estabrooks, from a book entitled, Secret don't tell, the encyclopedia of hypnotism, by Carla Emery.
page 83- George Estabrooks (1885-1973)
Estabrooks was a Canadian who spent three years at oxford as a rhodes scholar. he received a doctorate in 1976 from harvard. he was a prominent figure in the american hypnosis scene for fifty years- from the 1920s to the 1970s. most of these years he was head of colgate university's department of psychology. he published over sixty articles and several books, the most interesting is entitled, simply, Hypnotism.
Estabrooks estimated ten hours of hypnosis would be enough to accomplish his basic intention. however, he recommended a ten month regime for canditates who were both personality spilt and highly trained. what he called canditates were not volunteers. his basic procedure for creating the UNKNOWING hypnoprogrammed subject began with a disguised induction. it then proceded to suggested amnesia and the giving of a post-hypnotic suggestion for instant re-induction by cue.
I would like to quote a piece, which I think is relevant, from a book entitled. Open to suggestion, by Robert Termple, (not to be confused with a hypnotist of the same name).
page 45- it is a common assumption of nearly everyone that when one is unconscious, one is out-that is, sealed off from the environment, unaware of ones surroundings, and in a state of suspended animation. but we will see that this is not true, when, in the next chapter I give a description of how a patient in a coma was successfully hypnotized. this proves that patients in comas can sometimes, and perhaps always, hear what is going on around them, or at least what is spoken their ears. and yet a coma is meant to be the most inactive of unconscious states, where the patient is hopelessly out of touch with his surroundings.

just one after-thought, I think I must be a natural somnambulist and my experience would not work with everyone.
years before this took place, something happened in a flat I was living and I thought I was unfairly blamed for it. but I often wonder if I did it during somnambulism with no memory.

Carla Emery? Really? The woman who cited the "case" of Svengali and Trilby as an ACTUAL case? The woman who claimed a doctorate from an uncredited "university" (check the US Department of Education on diploma mills - her school is listed as one!) without having actually EARNED it (but claimed the degree because she had submitted her thesis?

Let's get real here.

Note the use of the word ESTIMATED in Estabrook's claim - not only did he GUESS, but he never tested his claim! No dice there. Sorry.

With regard to the coma claim, Temple never was able to produce the name or any witnesses to his claim. Sorry, bad science there, too.

I hate to be the skeptic, but you are going to have to do better than those sources to support your stance.

As I said, if you have suffered abuse, you need to talk to law enforcement and an attorney (a personal injury attorney), not discuss your allegations in an internet forum where your statements could damage any real claims you might have.... and I'm speaking as an insurance professional in Illinois on that matter as well as from personal experience in having to bring a case before the bar (with licensed legal representation, of course).

Respectfully,

Lee Darrow, C.H.

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