"There aren't any ghosts. Evolution proves it." (comic)

[DetlefK]

found on smbc-comics.com

[intaglio]

1. Thanks and a link to SMBC front page

http://www.smbc-comics.com/

[AlbertCat]

2. I crack up at ghost hunter/ haunted house shows... especially when all serious and stuff

It's hysterical!

Grown men and women walking around empty old houses solemnly intoning "Is anyone there?... Are you angry?... What do you want?"

Then, in a 150 year old house a floor board creaks or a door slowly opens by itself "Did you hear that????!!!!" "OMG! That 150 year old door just slowly opened by itself on its 150 year old jam! HOW could such a thing happen without spiritual intervention????????!!!!!!"

The more serious the psychic is, you can bet the more full of shit they are.

(Looking very very grave and serious as they enter the building for the 1st time) "Oh yes... there is definitely something here. No doubt about it. There's a strong presence. Wait.... did you hear that?" (as the 75 year old plumbing gurgles)


They're sooooo serious! Too funny!

[onager]

3. My favorite moment...

A ghost-hunter was running around in a house with her EMF (Electromagnetic Field) Detector. That's used to detect electrical energy.

She started yelling about getting a "hit" and "strong indications of a Presence," bla-bla-bla. The camera zoomed in on her EMF detector and, sure enough, it was going crazy with the needle wildly oscillating to the end of the scale.

Then I noticed where she was holding the EMF meter - right beside a live electrical outlet.

I nearly fell in the floor laughing.

Caught another show where a man was "attacked by a ghost!" It pushed him down the stairs of his shop! It could have KILLED him! IIRC, he made his pregnant wife go to a hotel because he was afraid it might attack her! SCARY!

Then it turns out, his "shop" is a bar/saloon. As more of his story came out, I started to strongly suspect he was attacked by the ghost of Jack Daniels or Jim Beam.

[Lordquinton]

4. there was one where the guy was going into an old abandoned building

On one of the old "inaccessible" areas a "ghost" had written "the cake is a lie"and he spent a good minute explaining what the ghost really meant.

[onager]

6. Did someone leave the cake out in the rain?

Off-topic reference, of course, to a song that has haunted me for years with its overblown stupidity, "MacArthur Park." And no, I'm not linking to a video/audio file. Even I have some standards, low as they may be.

Weird Trivia - the name of the park is not possessive and has no "s" on the end, but Richard Harris recorded it that way. Despite many re-takes with songwriter Jimmy Webb yelling at him about it, according to legend. Webb finally gave up. Given Harris' lifestyle at the time, there's a good chance he was drunk during the recording session. Donna Summer repeated the "s" mistake in her disco version.

Tourist Tip - visit MacArthur Park at night and you have an excellent chance of becoming a Potential Ghost. It's located in the Westlake area of Los Angeles, a pretty dangerous neighborhood after dark. Good place to go if you need meth or a fake driver's license, though. Or so I hear.

[mr blur]

8. I've always loved that song since I heard it on the radio when it first came out.

but there is, of course, no accounting for taste!

Of course I was only an English teenager, I didn't even know there was a real MacArthur Park.

It fitted perfectly with the music I was listening to then. Later on I realised that I like not because it's not stupid (it is) but because it's like a perfect little snap of Harris' life at the time - famous (great) actor known for drinking too much too often, flirting with this new druggy hippy business and bringing his drunkard's performance to what in other hands is just another hippy-dippy piece of fluff. He takes that song and owns it, hypnotically awful though it is. Because of that, actually.

[onager]

11. I'll grumpily admit to some nostalgia for it as well.

Recognized Harris' voice on the first hearing and my reaction must have been: "WTF is THAT?"

If you want to see a little of the real MacArthur Park, watch the 2013 movie "Gangster Squad." The last scene, a big shoot-out, was partly filmed there. The elaborate water fountain in that scene is a fake, though. Only created for the movie.

Filming a big shoot-out there is perfectly logical. The lake in MacArthur Park has been drained a couple of times for maintenance. Every time, the bottom of the drained lake yielded a nice layer of tossed handguns.

The place was called Westlake Park until 1942, when it was re-named for General You-Know-Who.

Off-topic tour guide going off duty now...hey, where's my damn tip...?

[Curmudgeoness]

5. Well, if the ghosts never show up when you are there,

it is simply because some people have such a strong aura that they repel ghosts.

At least that was what I was told by a ghost hunter who kept trying to scare a bunch of us with this noise or that cold area...and every time I had a logical explanation. Therefore, the ghosts were just staying away....because of my aura.

[onager]

9. Variation on that: "You're ESP-thick."

"Your aura repels ghosts" sound like a different version of a veiled insult we can get right here on DU: people who believe in ghosts, ESP, etc. are enlightened and sensitive souls, unlike us poor non-believing lumpenproles. Now substitute the Holy Ghost for regular ghosts...

It's just another way of saying we lack something. In this case, Other Ways Of Knowing (tm).

Some years ago on Halloween here in L.A., a bunch of OWOK people invaded an old movie theater in Hollywood that was supposedly haunted. Boy-howdy! Just about every phony psychic, ghost-whisperer, talker with the dead and I don't know what-all showed up for the party. And in Hollywood, that's a big part of the population.

Everybody wanted in because the party was being videotaped for a TV show. Lots of people had visions of getting their 15 minutes of fame.

But then the Skeptics Society showed up to rain on their parade. Every time somebody yelped about a Weird Noise, a cold spot or some other ghostly phenomena, the skeptics were right there to provide a logical explanation.

That drove the ghost-hunters crazy. In the end, they were reduced to screaming things like: "You couldn't see a ghost if it was standing right in front of you! You don't have THE POWER!" Etc. etc. It was hilarious.

[Curmudgeoness]

10. It really is a great technique, isn't it?

Blame the skeptic. Well, part of it for me was a "compliment". I was an "old soul" with such "strong aura" that the ghosts were frightened away from me. I guess that this technique works better than "you are just too stupid to see it". I guess that I was a skeptic before I could spell the word---or knew that there was a word. I knew right away that this was their way of shutting me up and keeping me from being offended. I wasn't offended, but I did laugh.

And to be honest, I have always wanted to believe in interesting things like ghosts or UFO's. I have searched them out, but only with a scientific, logical attitude. So far, no evidence. I will let you know if I find any evidence, but don't hold your breath.

[sakabatou]

7. I find ghost hunter shows as pure entertainment.

[AlbertCat]

12. pure entertainment.

Then why are they so boring?

Homeopathic entertainment? The dead air has a memory?

[sakabatou]

13. Chalk it up to different tastes.