Jim Clark wrote:
> The harm is when individuals spend exorbitant amounts of money
> for misguided "relief." I remember reading a story about a women
> who lost a baby in childbirth, spending hundreds of dollars to
> call telephone psychics who putatively put her in communication
> with her baby.
I'm not sure how I would respond to the question were it really to arise in
class, but my attitude is strongly affected by the clip of "Peter Popoff"
(faith healer) in the James Randi "Secrets of the Psychics" video. Popoff
physically and mentally abuses several elderly women - on tape - in the name
of faith healing. An off-screen interviewer asks those women if they really
believe they're healed, and one insists that she must be "because God
doesn't lie". I'm sure they feel better for the time being. It's still
abuse.
Paul Smith
Alverno College
