Have you ever used a Ouija board?

Yep. I deal with facts and science in my profession, too. I do think there are things that we can't yet explain.

Like you, I'll hedge my bets and not mess around with things like Ouija boards.

Actually, it originated hundreds of years ago, as a way of contacting the Beyond. People would write letters, plus "yes" and "no" on cards, stick them around the edge of a table, then take a wine glass, dampen the rim, turn it upside down and have people put their fingers on the base of the glass. The glass would then be rotated around the table until it stopped at a letter. (Ouija actually means "Yes" in french Oui and "Yes" in German Ja. I don't know why it has yes twice in the name.)

Ouija or Talking Table.

Also, people would (and still do) use a planchet with a pencil in it, and use regular writing paper. These were always used to contact other worldly things, and the Exorcist may have introduced them to some, but many people used them, and had experiences (including members of my family) LONG before the book or the movie came out. I have a Sears catalog and a Montgomery Ward catalog from the 1880s and the early 1900s, and Ouija boards are available in both of them.

They were mass marketed in the late 1860s or 1870s, but in England a lot of people still use the table, either with cards with letters on them or the letters painted or written directly on the table. It was originally away to contact the Beyond.

If people choose not to believe, it doesn't bother me at all. I just hope they know what to do when... unusual stuff starts happening. And, breaking, burning or even attempting to throw away the board isn't the cure....

I've not used one since high school. Actually, it's a pretty cool idea for an adult Halloween party.

In high school we summoned all sorts of spirits and ghosts. That may have been the booze and ditch weed.... ok it was the booze and ditch weed.

same

I do think that there is something to this. I have never used the Ouija board as something to contact the dead or suprnatural, because I've always understood how they work. I think if someone wants to make them "freaky," then they can be--they can say all kinds of upsetting things, maybe even conjure up things that we know subconsciously to be true, making them seem like they are reading something about us that no one could possibly know. The power of believing is strong.

That said, I will amend my first post: I'm sorry if I offended anyone. There may be people at your party who will be uncomfortable with a Ouija board, so tread lightly with using it as a party game for that reason. It may seem silly or unreasonable to some people to not want to play with it, but as this conversation has indicated, some people feel very strongly about it.

Let me say, that I get that perspective as well, now that I've read other people's responses and stopped to think about it. I am somewhat religious--Jewish, very liberal in my views, culturally it means a lot to my identity, and being Jewish means following practices that are often more tradition than actual strict religious beliefs, unless you are more inclined to orthodoxy. In any case, it is strictly forbidden to attempt to contact and communicate with the dead. I've never used a Ouija board thinking it is capable of doing that--I've always believed that WE control the planchette, we determine what it spells out (if subconsciously), and I never tried to "talk" with the dead. I don't even know if I believe it possible. But I would never participate in a seance, for instance. Not because I think I'd contact any spirits, but as per my Jewish observance, I wouldn't want to act out anything that indicates that I am. That would make me uncomfortable.

I do think that there is more to existence than what we understand, and that there are forces (for lack of a better term) that we can't perceive just by our bodily senses. It's a fine line between the power of our minds (which I think is tremendously powerful), and the power of the unknown. Ouija boards are harmless in my mind. In another mind, it might not be so.

I'm amazed that you have the formula for doing that. If you DO believe in "haunting", there are a lot of people that have suffered miserably from haunted houses and lives, who wanted NOTHING more then to be "left alone" and those "spirits" didn't seem to give a damned (maybe pun intended" that they wanted.

Of course if you DON'T believe in this stuff, then just lock your front door, use the peep hole and ONLY let in who you want. Indeed.

Yes, it didn't really do anything.

Same here. I believe the spirit world is real, and yes, Ouija boards can be gateways to demons. Glad I'm not the only one here who feels that way.

How do you know it's not the cure? How do you know that there's not another perfectly reasonable explanation for unusual events? For example, a friend of mine was convinced that he was haunted. Doors would slam of their own volition. Lights would flicker and die. Curtains would flap when there was a non-existent wind. All of which turned out to have reasonable explanations. For the first, because of the layout of his house, when a window was open in the kitchen, and another was open in the front rooms, it would cause a draft to be funnelled through the house, and thus cause the doors to be slammed when there was relatively little wind outside. The second, turned out to be rats chewing on the cables by the fuse box, outside. The third ... turned out to be the heater. Very ghoulish. In that sense, destroying the board isn't the cure, but neither is the board the cause.

I do think that I need to clear something up: the makers of the ouija board (which, while those two words do mean yes, it's thought that those words aren't the root of the word 'ouija', though no one can be entirely certain) made it solely as a game, it's not their fault if people misuse their products for ridiculous means. This happens all the time with a variety of appliances - tarot cards, for one link, and certainly people did use cards before then for ill-gotten means, to swindle and prey on the weak-minded.

There is more than one train of thought on Ouija boards. It's not like these things have been proven scientifically.

In some cases, people don't know how to protect themselves psychically or how to rid themselves of things that shouldn't be there.

I've been spending the occasional spare evening with a paranormal investigative group, and we've seen this kind of stuff in action. Usually homes where there is discord or someone has an illness (emotional or physical) tend to be more effected, but not always. Of course, there's no proof that I'm right. And, of course, no way I can prove that there are more than one trains of thought concerning Talking Boards.

I just know I sure as hell wouldn't have one in my home and I'm most likely less psychically vulnerable than some.

I'd just warn people to be careful and not mess with them if they don't know what they are doing. And I don't think you'll disagree that most people don't know what they are doing when it comes to stuff like this.

I think a strong warning or caveat is only responsible. BTW, I didn't say anything about 'maturity', just being careful and not taking this stuff too lightly.