Evolution, Psychology, and Horror, Part V

 Copyright 2012 by Gary L. Pullman

 

Note: This post assumes that you have seen the movie The Exorcist (1973). If you have not, Wikipedia offers a fairly detailed, accurate summary of the plot.

 

Results of a 2009 Pew Research Center survey indicate that 33 percent of scientists believe in God; another 18 percent “believe in a universal spirit or higher power.” However, 83 percent of the American populace as a whole believes in God and 12 percent “believe in a universal spirit or higher power.” As far as disbelief is concerned, 41 percent of scientists do “not believe in God or a higher power” and 4 percent of the general public share their view. (A 2017 poll places the number of Americans who "do not believe in any higher power/spiritual force" at 10 percent.)

 

Source: fanpop.com

According to some evolutionary psychologists, faith developed like any other evolved adaptation, or trait: it promotes human survival and reproduction. Faith, proponents of this point of view argue, is comforting, provides community cohesion, and offers a basis for ethics and “higher moral values.” Others regard faith as a spandrel or an expatation, that is, a “by-product of adaptations” that is useful for reinforcing the authority and status of the clergy and for providing emotional support for the faithful in times of trouble. As is true of many of the arguments of evolutionary psychology, these claims are controversial, keeping critics aplenty busy on both sides of the discussion.

Source: pinterest.com

The Exorcist offers a concrete example of faith in action in Father Karras's exorcism of the demon (or demons) who allegedly possess Regan MacNeil.

 

Source: flickriver.com    

The priest's faith may provide some emotional comfort for him, but, it is obvious to the movie's audiences, his faith does not extinguish his feelings of guilt regarding his perceived neglect of his ailing mother, and faith as such offers little immediate comfort or reassurance to any of the other characters, with the possible exception of Father Merrin, who is killed early in the movie.

Although Karras's faith may hold the “community” of Regan's family together, his life as a priest, although it may assist some members of the wider world, seems to offer little benefit to his own life or to that of the Church he serves.

 

Source: pinterest.com

Karras's faith does seem to cause him to judge, condemn, and feel revulsion toward the demons who allegedly possess Regan, and he frequently rebukes them, denouncing their behavior as impious, blasphemous, and sacrilegious, without passing judgment on the girl herself: he hates the sin, not the sinner.

 Source: docuniverse.blogspot.com

Throughout the movie, Karras experiences a crisis of faith. The ordeal that his mother faced during her illness, his own callous treatment of his mother (as he sees it); the apparent indifference and cruelty of human beings for one another; the sins that he encounters daily, both as a man and a priest; and the evil he witnesses as he seeks to exorcise the demons that have possessed the child he seeks to deliver suggest to him that, either he has lost his faith and, indeed, might never have had a true basis for belief in and trust of God; God has abandoned him; or, worst of all, God is “dead” or never existed to begin with, except as a myth. In any case, faith does not appear to have any true survival value—until Karras makes what Soren Kierkegaarad calls “the leap of faith.”

Close to despair, Karras does not despair. Close to renouncing his faith in God, Karras remains faithful to God. He shows that he is, indeed, the man of faith whom he has long professed to be. He has been discouraged. He has had doubts. He has entertained disbelief. However, to save Regan, he invites her demons into himself and then leaps out of her bedroom window, falling to his death. In doing so, he delivers her from the evil spirits that possessed her. But Karras accomplishes more as well; he remains true to his own beliefs, to his calling, to himself, to God. 

 

Source: ft.com

According to the online Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, in Kierkegaard's thought, “the choice of faith is not made once and for all. It is essential that faith be constantly renewed by means of repeated avowals of faith.” Despite his doubts, Karras has constantly renewed his faith. Despite his temptation to despair, Karras does not despair. Close to renouncing his faith in God, Karras remains faithful to God. In each of these decisions, he maintains his faith and, therefore, himself.

As Kierkegaard points out, “in order to maintain itself as a relation which relates itself to itself, the self must constantly renew its faith in 'the power which posited it.'” This “repetition” of his faith sustains Karras, allowing him to deliver Regan. Initial appearances aside, the priest's faith, as it turns out, has tremendous survival power, both for Karras himself, who, in remaining true to his faith in God, remains true to himself, and for Regan, whom he delivers from her demons.

 

Source: listal.com

For those who do believe in God, even if they represent a minority of the populace as a whole, their faith delivers them (and, indeed, many others whom they aid). Their faith makes them whole, even if they are broken; sets them free, even if they are possessed; enables them to reach—and even sometimes save—others, believers and disbelievers alike, by their example. Even if their accomplishments were to be attributed solely to their belief in belief, to their faith in faith, and to their trust in trust, rather than to an objective, real, personal God, these amazing and extraordinary accomplishments stand, testaments to the assertion that the trait of faith has survival value.

Unsafe

Copyright 2018 by Gary L. Pullman

For most, home is a sanctuary, where it's safe to be oneself, to relax among loved ones, and to share one's innermost thoughts and feelings. In such a place, we let down our guard; we lower our defenses; we unbend. It is a safe place, free from the “slings and arrows” of everyday life, if not of “fortune.”

Other safe places, other retreats, include resorts; city, country, state, or federal parks; churches, temples, or mosques; friends' or neighbors' houses; the lodges of fraternal organizations; schools; and workplaces.

That is, they are usually safe.

Which is why they're all the more horrific and terrifying when they turn out to be anything but safe. 

Part of the horror and terror we feel when safe places are no longer safe stems from the overturning of our expectations. We expect to be safe, to be secure, to be protected. Experience has taught us that we need not fear danger in our homes, resorts, parks, houses of worship, lodges, schools, or workplaces. We have come to believe they are protected havens. When these expectations are upset, the horror and fear we experience are intensified.

In horror fiction, our safety is violated by various means. A sanctuary may be invaded. Certain parties may defy laws or moral strictures. Poor judgments on our part or another person with whom we're associated may lead to unpleasant, injurious, or even fatal consequences. We may be subjected to the cat-and-mouse maneuvers of an obsessed stalker or the machinations of a serial killer. A house guest may become our worst nightmare. Someone we trust may prove untrustworthy. 

Horror movies and novels play on our fear that, even in a retreat, we may not be safe, that there may, in fact, be no safety, no matter where we are, where we go, or with whom we spend our time, whether with family, friends, neighbors, vacationers, worshipers, lodge brothers or sisters, faculty or classmates, or workplace colleagues. When a safe place proves to be dangerous, there is no safety anywhere.

Such truly is the case, of course: none of us is safe, not entirely, not really. At every moment, our lives hang in the balance. We could die of disease, of injury, of poisoning, of automobile or airplane crashes, of workplace accidents, of falls, of animal attacks, of drowning, of choking on food or drink, by fire, by insect bites or stings, by drug overdoses, through starvation, from complications of surgery or medical care, by explosives, to name but a few common causes of death. Life is fragile. 

Our susceptibility to harm and our dependency on nature for the fulfillment of our needs puts us at the mercy of disease, pestilence, famine, flood, wild animals, each other, and a host of other dangers. We are not as in control as we might have supposed; we are not as able to defend or provide for ourselves and others as we might have thought.

In horror fiction, our dependency, our fragility, our vulnerability are highlighted by extreme dangers. We face monsters, not germs; aliens, not insects; paranormal and supernatural figures and forces, not natural disasters. Such adversaries personify these actual threats, giving them, if not exactly a human face, a personality. Anthropomorphism makes the monstrous relatively human. In the monsters of horror fiction, we encounter that which both is and is not ourselves.

It is we ourselves who make our safe havens unsafe, just as it is we ourselves who are endangered by these threats. We are both hunter and hunted, victimizer and victim, killer and killed. We are Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Dr. Frankenstein and his monster, the man and the wolf as well as the wolfman.

Movies and novels in which such threats occur, as reminders of our own finitude, vulnerability, dependency, fragility, and relative helplessness, include:

When a Stranger Calls (1979): A baby sitter is terrorized by a stranger who calls her repeatedly, asking whether the children she has checked on the children she is watching. Later, the babysitter, now a married woman and mother, is enjoying dinner at a restaurant when she receives a telephone call. The caller, the same man who'd called her years ago while she was babysitting the children he killed, asks, “Have you checked the children?”

The Resort (2004): Bentley Little's 2004 novel is summarized by the publisher, Signet:

. . . Welcome to The Reata, an exclusive spa isolated in the Arizona desert. Please ignore the strange employees and that unspeakable thing in the pool. And when guests start disappearing, pretend it isn't happening. Enjoy your stay, and relax. Oh...and lock yourself in after dark.

Club Review adds.

. . . Opulent doesn't begin to describe the Arizona getaway where Lowell Thurman, his wife, Rachel, and their three young sons have come for one glorious week. Everything at The Reata is perfect-although Rachel is a bit unnerved by the openly lustful gaze of one of the gardeners, something she doesn't mention to Lowell. Nor does he tell her about the frightening sensation he has in the pool of hands clutching at him, trying to pull him under. . . . . To the Thurmans' horror, guests begin to disappear.

For those who'd like to test the waters, here's a dip into The Resort:

He was halfway across the pool when someone grabbed his foot.

Lowell kicked out, flailing wildly, shocked more than anything else, but the grip on his foot tightened, bony fingers digging into the thin flesh, holding him firm. For a brief moment he was swimming in place like a cartoon character, then the hand let go and he floundered [sic] in the water as he fought against a force that was no longer there. 

Twisting, spluttering, trying to keep himself afloat and determine who had grabbed him at the same time, Lowell looked down into the choppy bubbly water beneath him, then scanned the surface of the pool. It was empty. There was still no one in the room but himself (48).

Summer of Night: A Barnes & Noble overview of Dan Simmons's 1991 novel, which has been favorably compared to Stephen King's It, states:

It's the summer of 1960 and in the small town of Elm Haven, Illinois, five twelve-year-old boys are forging the powerful bonds that a lifetime of change will not break. From sunset bike rides to shaded hiding places in the woods, the boys' days are marked by all of the secrets and silences of an idyllic middle-childhood. But amid the sun-drenched cornfields their loyalty will be pitilessly tested. When a long-silent bell peals in the middle of the night, the townsfolk know it marks the end of their carefree days. From the depths of the Old Central School, a hulking fortress tinged with the mahogany scent of coffins, an invisible evil is rising. Strange and horrifying events begin to overtake everyday life, spreading terror through the once idyllic town. Determined to exorcize this ancient plague, Mike, Duane, Dale, Harlen, and Kevin must wage a war of blood—against an arcane abomination who owns the night One of the most frightening scenes of this novel occurs in the town's park, during the showing of a free movie. It is impossible to do more than to merely suggest the eerie, frightening quality of the scene's setting, but this excerpt will, hopefully, provide a slight indication:

“What's that?” whispered Lawrence, stopping and clutching his bag of popcorn.

“Nothing. What?” said Dale, stopping with his brother.

There was a rustling, sliding, screeching from the darkness in and above the elms.

“It's nothing,” said dale, tugging at Lawrence to get moving. “Birds.” Lawrence still wouldn't move and Dale paused to listen again. “Bats.” 

Dale could see them now, dark shapes flitting across the pale gaps between the leaves, winged shadows visible against the white of First Prez as they darted to and fro. “Just bats.” He tugged at Lawrence's hand. 

His brother refused to move. “Listen,” he whispered. . . .

Trees rustling. The manic scales of a cartoon soundtrack dulled by distance and humid air. The leathery flap of wings. Voices.

Instead of the near ultra-sonic chirp of bats scanning the way ahead, the sound in the motion-filled darkness around them was the screech of small, sharp voices. Cries. Shrieks. Curses. Obscenities. Most of the sounds teetered on the brink of actually being words, the maddeningly audible but bot-quite-distinct syllables of a shouted conversation in an adjoining room, But two of the sounds were quite clear.

Dale and Lawrence stood frozen on the sidewalk, clutching their popcorn and staring upward, as bats shrieked their names in consonants that sounded like teeth scraping across blackboards. Far, far away, the amplified voice of Porky Pig said, “Th-th-th-that's all, folks!”

“Run!” whispered Dale (52).

Summer of Night also presents harrowing scenes set in its characters' homes (especially Dale's basement!), the children's school, and a local church.

Another novel by Bentley Little, The Revelation (2014), recounts the evil deeds that ensue the arrival of a revivalist following the mysterious disappearance of a small-town preacher. According to Library Journal—

—In Randall, Arizona, portents signal a looming disaster of apocalyptic proportions: there are stillbirths, animal sacrifices, church desecrations, and mysterious disappearances. An ancient-eyed and omniscient preacher arrives and claims that Satan is collecting the souls of the stillborn infants and murdered townspeople, causing them to commit further grotesque crimes. He recruits the sheriff, the Episcopal priest, and expectant father Gordon Lewis, whose unborn daughter is, apparently, Satan's goal, but how this will cause the apocalypse is never explained. However, Little's story, is as typical of his novels in general, ends poorly, with no logical or believable explanation of the central conflict, and Library Journal contends, ill-defined and unmotivated characters, the lack of “revelations,” and a “flimsy plot” make “a forgettable book.”

Most of Little's books end the same way, unraveling toward their conclusions, which is more than frustrating. His faithful readers know this will happen and forgive him, because, until the end, he takes them on one hell of a scary, eerie ride and almost always includes some form of unconventional sex which is, although disturbing, titillating enough.

Stephen King also offers a novel set, among other locations, in a church, but Revival (2015), like The Revelation, has an unconvincing, theologically shallow—indeed, absurd— ending, suggesting that the author was writing from the hip, as it were, with no clear idea of the story he was telling. Would Little and King to take the advice Edgar Allan Poe offers in “The Philosophy of Composition,” and write their stories backward, with a solid, believable (within the context of the story itself) conclusion firmly in mind, their fiction would improve immensely.

A blurb summarizes the story, such as it is:

The new minister came to Harlow, Maine, when Jamie Morton was a boy doing battle with his toy army men on the front lawn. The young Reverend Charles Jacobs and his beautiful wife brought new life to the local church and captivated their congregation. But with Jamie, he shares a secret obsession—a draw so powerful, it would have profound consequences five decades after the shattering tragedy that turned the preacher against God, and long after his final, scathing sermon. Now Jamie, a nomadic rock guitarist hooked on heroin, meets Charles Jacobs again. And when their bond becomes a pact beyond even the Devil’s devising, Jamie discovers that the word revival has many meanings.

Sorry, I don't have a sample excerpt on hand, having tossed my copy a while back, which is just as well.

IMDb offers a succinct synopsis of director Robert Angelo Masciantonio's Neighbor (2009), a horror film in which “a mysterious new girl arrives in posh suburban neighborhood and quickly sets out to terrorize the town. As she starts breaking into homes and torturing the occupants, they begin to realize that she isn't just another girl next door.”

An oldie but goodie, The Stepford Wives (2004), directed by Frank Oz, involves a fraternal organization of wealthy men who have perfected a way to give their wives a complete makeover worthy of a modern-day Pygmalion who uses high tech rather than a hammer and a chisel to create his version of the perfect woman.

High schools and universities are frequent settings for both horror novels and horror movies. The Roommate (2011), directed by Christian Christainsen, is one of the latest to locate its eerie incidents in a university: “a college freshman who realizes that her new best friend is obsessive, unbalanced . . . and maybe even a killer” (IMDb). Disturbing Behavior (1998), director David Nutter's part-sci fi and part-horror movie, set in a high school, is a junior version of The Stepford Wives, in which “The new kid in town stumbles across something sinister about the town's method of transforming its unruly teens into upstanding citizens.”

These films and others of these types reflect many individuals' fears as well as societal insecurities. If one's home is not inviolate, what place is? If we are not safe in our homes, are we safe anywhere? Dangers often come without, in the form of stalkers, serial killers, or murderous burglars, but they can also come from within, in the form of abusive parents, deviant children, or, as in Stephen King's novel Cujo, and the film adaptation of the same title, the family pet. 

Resorts are supposed to be places at which we can get away from all the petty concerns of everyday life and enjoy ourselves as we pursue pleasures we don't usually have the time to indulge, but, when things go awry, these retreats can become anything but a place of refuge; they can be transformed into places from our worst nightmares or from hell itself.

We often visit city, county, state, or national parks to picnic with family or friends. Companies may treat their employees to picnics in the park. We go there to walk our dogs, to ride horses, to visit nature (but on our own terms, in comfort, maintaining communications with the outside world at all times), or to witness wonders we can't imagine in our backyards back home. When earthquakes, flood, fires, landslides, or wildlife threaten us, we realize just how alone we are. If we're not well versed in the techniques of survival, we're not apt to live to tell of our adventures. 

Horror novels and movies, such as Stephen King's 1999 novel The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, director Adam MacDonald's Backcountry (2015), and Maurice L'Heureux's Into the Back Country (1982), director Keith Kurlander's Cold, Creepy Feeling (2010), and a slew of others show that human beings, no matter how much they might like to believe they've tamed nature and domesticated animals, are definitely not in control of their destinies.

Millions of people around the world believe in God, although their concepts of the divine sometimes differ widely. What is common to the majority of the world's great religions, however, is faith in Providence. God, the members of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam believe, not only created the universe but also takes a direct, personal interest in its operations, including the affairs of the men, women, and children He created. God loves and protects humanity, adherents of these religions believe, although He is also a God of justice and righteousness. That doesn't mean sinners and God's own greatest adversary, the devil, won't resist, defy, and disobey their Creator. Many exorcism films, such as William Friedkin's The Exorcist (based on William Peter Blatty's 1973 novel of the same title), director Scott Derrickson's film The Exorcism of Emily Rose, and director Mikael Håfström The Rite (2011) explore the conflict between the divine and the diabolical, with humans as their battlegrounds.

It's not a neighbor, but a landlord, who represents danger for the young married couple in director Victor Zarkoff's voyeuristic thriller 13 Cameras. The problems with neighbors today is that they're not very neighborly. We don't really know them, and they don't really know us. Occasionally, when we chance to meet, we exchange pleasantries with them, smile, and wave, but they are essentially strangers to us, and strangers are unknown quantities. What we don't know could get us killed, horror novels and movies insist, so it's best to avoid them, as much as possible. Such movies as director Craig Gillespie's Fright Night (2011), director Mac Carter's Haunt (2013), director Rodney Gibbons's The Neighbor (1993) remind us of some of the dangers neighbors can represent, including vampirism, murder victims' ghosts, and adultery.

Bentley Little's novel The Association (2017), Peter Straub's novel Ghost Story (1979) and the 1981 film adaptation by John Irvin, suggest, respectively, that homeowner's associations and men's clubs are evil or possess evil secret that can destroy or end lives.

Are our children safe at school? (The spate of school shootings since 1999 suggest, quite clearly, the answer is no.) Are they being taught what they need to learn, or, worse yet, are they learning lessons no child should be taught? Are the teachers helping or hurting my child? A lot of parents are uneasy about school staff and educational curriculum. More than a few teachers, at every level of public education, except, perhaps, preschool and kindergarten, have had illicit sex with students, some of whom have, indeed, been raped. Not every parent wants young children to learn about every sexual practice imaginable. Novels like Little's The Association play on this fear, while King's novella Apt Pupil, examines the threats that students sometimes pose toward faculty members. Other novels and movies explore themes associated with colleges and universities: Little's University ( 2017) and such films as director Mark Rosman's The House of Sorority Row (1983), The Dorm That Dripped Blood (1982), directed by Stephen Carpenter and Jeffrey Obrow, Black Christmas (1973), director Fred Dekker's Night of the Creeps (1983), and a host of others depict college and university days as something much less nostalgic than most graduates are likely to remember them.

Many horror novels and movies are also set in workplaces: director Tobe Hooper's The Mangler (1995) (one of the silliest premises for a horror movie ever!), Psycho (1960) (a classic Alfred Hitchcock set largely in the roadside Bates Motel), The Funhouse (a carnival setting, courtesy of director Toby Hooper) are only a few of the myriad. Novelists, too, favor such settings, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child do in Relic (2003) and as Bentley Little does in The Consultant (2015) and The Store (1998), and as Dean Koontz does, in part, in Watchers (2003) and several of his other novels, including his Odd Thomas series (2007-2015), to mention but a few. We all have to work, but few of us truly enjoy our jobs, some of which are dangerous in themselves. On top of that, we may have a diabolical manager, monstrous colleagues, and crazed clients. These books and movies tap into these daily frustrations and annoyances, exaggerating them to the point that our jobs don't look all that bad, after all. At least, no one's trying to kill us (as far as we know).

Of course, urban fantasy novels in the horror mold, including my own A Whole World Full of Hurt (2016) have cities as their settings, but that's the topic for a different post.

Monstrous Signs

Copyright 2011 by Gary L. Pullman

Haunted houses are easy. Well, the signs that a house may be haunted are easy to spot, anyway. Things seem to move of their own accord. Last night, your car keys were on the dresser; this morning, they’re on the kitchen counter, beside last night’s leftover Chinese takeout meal. You hear strange noises. Slime oozes down the walls. There’s a foul stench--and it’s not coming from the leftover Chinese food. Ghosts are seen--or something that could be ghosts.

The signs of the presence of a monster are not so easy to spot. But there are some, for those who have the eyes to see them. In his short story, “The Damned Thing,” there are signs aplenty of a monster’s presence. Invisible, its presence is known by its effects upon vegetation and, indeed, human beings. During a fishing and hunting expedition with his friend Hugh Morgan, Harker, who witnessed Morgan’s death, says the two men heard “a noise as of some animal thrashing about in the bushes, which we could see were violently agitated.” Morgan aims his shotgun in the direction of the noise, and when Harker asks what has made the commotion, Morgan replies, “That Damned Thing.” Harker then sees a peculiar sight, which he describes, to the coroner’s jury investigating Morgan’s death, in the following manner:

"I was about to speak further, when I observed the wild oats near the place of the disturbance moving in the most inexplicable way. I can hardly describe it. It seemed as if stirred by a streak of wind, which not only bent it, but pressed it down--crushed it so that it did not rise; and this movement was slowly prolonging itself directly toward us.

A few moments later, Morgan is attacked, and, as he looks on in horror, Harker hears

“. . . Morgan crying out as if in mortal agony, and mingling with his cries were such hoarse, savage sounds as one hears from fighting dogs. Inexpressibly terrified, I struggled to my feet and looked in the direction of Morgan's retreat; and may Heaven in mercy spare me from another sight like that! At a distance of less than thirty yards was my friend, down upon one knee, his head thrown back at a frightful angle, hatless, his long hair in disorder and his whole body in violent movement from side to side, backward and forward. His right arm was lifted and seemed to lack the hand--at least, I could see none. The other arm was invisible. At times, as my memory now reports this extraordinary scene, I could discern but a part of his body; it was as if he had been partly blotted out--I cannot otherwise express it--then a shifting of his position would bring it all into view again.

"All this must have occurred within a few seconds, yet in that time Morgan assumed all the postures of a determined wrestler vanquished by superior weight and strength. I saw nothing but him, and him not always distinctly. . . . “

One way to recognize the presence of a monster, then, is by its effects upon its environment. Other stories in which invisible or nearly invisible monsters may be recognized by such signs include the short stories “The Horla” by de Maupassant and “What Was It?” by Fitz-James O’Brien and the motion picture Predator, directed by John McTiernan.

Monsters are sometimes recognizable by their unique signatures, or distinctive marks. For example, vampires are often suspected when it is discovered that the throats of human corpses bear puncture wounds such as those that a large snake--or a bloodsucking fiend--leave as a result of slaking their thirst. There are a number of other ways by which to recognize vampires, according to The Vampire Hunter’s Guide, including:

• Fangs
• Red eyes
• Long nails
• Paleness
• Reluctance to enter house without invitation
• Hairy palms
• Aversion to bright lights
• No appetite
• Never seen during the day hours (not always true with some species)
• Possesses remarkable strength
• Has quiet footsteps
• Possesses knowledge about botany, with a large collection of soil in a house or in a vicinity
• Resides in an abode deemed evil by others
• Strange clothing habits
• Evidences enormous sexual appeal
• People who know him/ her frequently die
• Rarely, if ever, discusses religion
• Really bad breath

It’s hard to miss a demon: the claws, horns, tail, and cloven hooves are sure giveaways. However, a demon that takes up residence inside a person, possessing him or her, may be more difficult to detect, especially when he or she can be confused with the effects of organic or mental illnesses. In fact, until quite recently, the mentally ill were often considered to be people possessed by demons. A movie, The Exorcism of Emily Rose, makes it clear how difficult it can be, even for a priest who has been trained as an exorcist, to make the distinction between madness and demonic possession. This film also makes it clear how tricky the terrain becomes, legally speaking, when one seeks to exorcize demons that may or may not actually exist and the mad (or possessed) person dies in the course of the exorcism. It’s best to leave exorcisms to the exorcists or psychiatrists, but, for those who are too willful or stubborn (or stupid) to do so, these may be signs, according to the website Demonbuster, of the presence of an indwelling demon:

1. Disturbances in the emotions which persist or recur.
2. Disturbances in the mind or thought life.
3. Outbursts or uncontrolled use of the tongue.
4. Rcurring unclean thoughts and acts regarding sex.
5. Addictions to nicotine, alcohol, drugs, medicines, caffeine, food, etc.
6. Many diseases and physical afflictions are due to spirits of infirmity (Luke 13:11).

 Of course, when a writer finds it difficult to determine the signs of a particular monster--perhaps the fiend is one of a kind--the author can just make up an invention that has the amazing capability of detecting monsters, somewhat as Professor Xavier’s Cerebro can detect the presence--and, indeed, the location--of mutants among the human population centers of the world. Indeed, a machine isn’t even necessary id a writer becomes desperate enough. On Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Buffy (often aided by Willow Rosenberg, a witch, or her mentor, Rupert Giles, a practitioner of the mystical arts) often identified or located various monsters and demons through the use of supernatural spells. Buffy also has a sort of “Spider sense,” which enables her to detect the presence of vampires the way homosexuals are sometimes alleged to identify others of their kind by using “gaydar.” In one episode, in which Giles was turned into a demon, she is even able to recognize, by his look of utter exasperation, the man in the monster! Still, it’s kind of cool, one must admit, to develop a mythos concerning demon spoor and how to detect it.

The Metaphysics of Horror

Copyright 2010 by Gary L. Pullman

From a religious point of view, the problem of evil, as philosophers call the idea that a loving, omniscient, omnipotent, and eternal God allows evil and suffering, seems to suggest one of these possibilities:

• There actually is no God.
• God is less than he is believed to be (for example, not loving, omniscient or omnipotent).
• God does not intervene in nature or human affairs.
• The devil (or chief evil entity) is equally as powerful as God.

Sooner or later, if only implicitly, horror fiction must grapple with this philosophical conundrum.

Dean Koontz wrestles with the problem of evil in The Taking, Stephen King in Desperation.

In the former’s novel, the arrival of Satan and his minions, mistaken for an extraterrestrial invasion of alien spacecraft, occurs when these dark forces seek to usher in Armageddon. The nature of the problem of evil is not directly assessed, although Koontz’s novel suggests that, despite its opposition to God’s goodness, evil does have a divine purpose, unintended though that effect may be on the part of the devil. Rather as in the book of Genesis (crossed, perhaps, with the Norse concept of Ragnarok, in which a man and a woman, surviving the destruction of Middle-earth, repopulate the planet at the beginning of a new age), a remnant of humanity is preserved against the wholesale destruction that ensues the hellish invasion. In place of Noah’s ark, the protagonist, having been impregnated by her husband, bears the seed of humanity’s hopes for the future within her womb. The old world dies that a new one may be born.

If Koontz’s novel is informed (by way of Norse mythology) by the Genesis account of the flood and the survival of Noah and his family (and two of every other species on the planet), King’s story seems to take, as its foundation, the Old Testament story of Job.

In King’s novel, God has summoned protagonist David Carver and several others to stop the demon Tak, who has recently escaped from a caved-in mine. In the process, David loses his entire family and concludes that “God is cruel.” However, another character, writer John Marinville, gives the teenager a note that he, Marinville, found while he was in the demon’s lair, a get-out-of-school-early pass that David had left nailed to a tree in his backyard, hundreds of miles away, before he and his family undertook the vacation that ended in Desperation. On the note is a message that wasn’t on the note originally, a message that, presumably, is from God himself: “God is love.” To effect the greater good, love must, at times, take a harsh and unbending stand toward evil, even at the cost of great sacrifice. David is too young to know the ways of God, but, King suggests, like longsuffering Job, the protagonist must trust in the goodness of God and take the deity at his word that he is a God of love who intervenes in human affairs for purposes which are inscrutable to human beings but are just, nevertheless, and, on some greater scale, probably merciful as well.

Koontz, a Roman Catholic, and King, who grew up in the Protestant tradition but claims to subscribe to no “traditional” religious faith and to have a non-traditional idea of God, both offer a view of the problem of suffering which is rooted, at least in part, in the Judeo-Christian faith (and, in Koontz’s case, perhaps Norse mythology), as it is expressed, respectively, in the book of Genesis (and the Eddas) and the book of Job. Although neither author presents an original thesis concerning the problem of evil, each draws attention to the issue in an entertaining and inventive fashion. (A recent film, The Exorcism of Emily Rose, also enquires as to the basis of evil and suffering, leaving the answer open.)

The mystery of iniquity is perhaps unsolvable, but it clearly still retains a powerful interest upon the imaginations of writers and readers today, just as it has for several millennia now.

A Dictionary of the Paranormal, the Supernatural, and the Otherworldly (D - F)

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

Note: Unless otherwise noted, definitions are courtesy of dictionary.die.net, an Internet dictionary in the public domain.

D

Daniken, Erich von--author of Chariot of the Gods and other books which allege that the ancient or prehistoric earth was visited by extraterrestrials who may have manipulated human evolution (the author).

Déjà vu--the experience of thinking that a new situation had occurred before.

Demon--one of the evil spirits of traditional Jewish and Christian belief.

Deport--an object that vanishes during a séance (the author).

Determinism--a philosophical doctrine holding that all events are inevitable consequences of antecedent sufficient causes; often understood as denying the possibility of free will

Dianetics--the psuedo-scientific doctrine that engrams (traces on protoplasm caused by stimuli) cause mental problems that can be cured by the elimination of such traces from one’s “bank” of such engrams (the author).

Dinosaur

Dinosaurs, surviving--the belief that dinosaurs survive in some remote parts of the world (the author).

Divination--prophecy (or the pretense of prophecy) by supernatural means.

Divine, encounters with the--the belief that people have encountered God or angels and may again encounter them, either face to face or through messengers or other media (the author).

Divine fallacy--an argument from incredulity that posits God as the author of inexplicable phenomena (the author).

Dixon, Jeanne--(1918-1997) an astrologer and self-proclaimed psychic witch.

Double-blind test--a test in which the controls (standards of comparison) are unknown to both researcher and subject (the author).

Dowsing--searching for underground water or minerals by using a dowsing rod.

Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan and Cottingley fairy photographs--Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the Sherlock Holmes stories, believed that photographs of cutout cardboard fairies posed by the Cottingley girls were real beings (the author).

Dreams, interpreting--the interpretation and explanation of dream images according to philosophical, theological, psychological, or some other system (the author).

Dreams, prophetic--the foretelling of future events through dreams (the author).

Druid--a pre-Christian priest among the Celts of ancient Gaul and Britain and Ireland.

Dryad--a deity or nymph of the woods.

Dualism--the doctrine that reality consists of two basic opposing elements, often taken to be mind and matter (or mind and body), or good and evil.

E

Earth, flat--the belief that the Earth is flat.

Earth, Flat Earth Society--an English organization that endorses and promotes the view that the Earth is flat and challenges the belief in a spherical Earth (the author).

Earth, hollow--the belief that the Earth is hollow and houses the lost tribes of Israel and/or extraterrestrial aliens (the author).

Ectoplasm--in spiritualism, the substance supposed to emanate from the body of the medium during a trance.

Electromagnetic field--a space occupied energy derived from ions; some claim that such a field indicates the presence of ghosts (the author).

Electronic voice phenomenon--tape-recorded messages of sounds taken during the investigation of an alleged haunting that were nit heard on the scene and resemble human voices and are used as evidence for the existence of ghosts (the author).

Elf--in folklore, fairies that are somewhat mischievous.

Enfield poltergeist--an alleged haunting of a London residence by poltergeists (the author).

Empiricism--the doctrine that knowledge derives from experience.

Energy--the capacity of a physical system to do work; the units of energy are joules or ergs; "energy can take a wide variety of forms."

Enneagram--a pseudo-psychological test that identifies personality types according to nine ego-archetype patterns, as (1) reformers, critics, and perfectionists, (2) helpers, givers, and caretakers, (3) achievers, performers, and succeeders, (4) romantics, individuals, and artists, (5) observers, thinkers, and investigators, (6) loyalists, devil’s advocates, and defenders, (7) enthusiasts, adventurers, and sensationalists, (8) leaders, protectors, and challengers, and (9) mediators, peacemakers, and preservationists (Wikipedia).

Evil eyes for sale

Evil Eye--a look that is believed to have the power of inflicting harm.

Exorcism--freeing from evil spirits; dispossession.

Extrasensory perception (ESP)--apparent power to perceive things that are not present to the senses; clairvoyance; second sight.

F

Face on Mars--Martian rock formations which, from space, resemble a human face and which are, for some, evidence of the past or present occupation of the planet by intelligent life (the author).

Fairy--small, human in form, playful, having magical powers.

Fakir--a Muslim or Hindu mendicant monk who is regarded as a holy man.

False analogy--a set of similarities between two items that are neither strong enough nor numerous enough to warrant the conclusion that one derives from them (the author).

False dilemma--the error in reasoning that occurs when a person does not consider all possible alternatives or outcomes; also known as the either-or fallacy (the author).

False memory--a fantasy thought to be a true memory or an actual memory that is distorted in recall (the author).

Familiar--a spirit (usually in animal form) that acts as an assistant to a witch or wizard.

Fata Morgana--a mirage or other optical illusion, such as the reflection of a city in the sky, caused by a temperature inversion; named for Arthurian sorceress Morgan Le Fay; the phenomenon may explain the legend of the Flying Dutchman and some UFO sightings (the author).

The girls to whom the Virgin Mary appeared at Fatima

Fatima--Fatima, Portugal, is the site at which the Virgin Mary reportedly appeared in a vision to three children, delivering a prophecy concerning the reality of hell; a second, believed to refer to World War I and World War II, and a controversial third, the meaning of which is still debated (the author).

Feng shui--a system by which natural energies are balanced in specific environments to maximize their benefits (the author).

Fetish--a charm superstitiously believed to embody magical powers.

Feral children--children allegedly reared by wolves or other wild animals (the author).
Fire walking--the ability to walk over live coals, hot stones, or fire, as a test of one’s faith (the author).

Flying Dutchman--a ghost ship condemned to forever sail the sea; the Fata Morgana may explain this supposed apparition (the author).

Flying saucer (unidentified flying object, UFO)--an (apparently) flying object whose nature is unknown; especially those considered to have extraterrestrial origins.

Foo fighter--UFO’s described, usually as a ball or ball of light, seen by fighter pilots during World War II (the author).

Ford, Arthur hoax--American psychic who claims to have channeled messages from a spirit guide named Fletcher concerning the deceased magician Harry Houdini, which were subsequently proven to have been fraudulent (the author).

Fort, Charles--a collector of anecdotes concerning bizarre and inexplicable phenomena, such as rains of toads or blood (the author).

Fortean Society--an American organization, founded by Tiffany Thayer and various writers, including Theodore Dreiser, Booth Tarkington, Ben Hecht, Alexander Woolcott, Dorothy Parker, and H. L. Mencken, to promotes the theories and views of Charles Fort (Wikipedia)

Fortean Times--a British magazine published monthly to promote the theories and views of Charles Fort; its “general content” includes “general Forteana, anomalous phenomena, apparitions, bizarre deaths, conspiracy theories, crop circles, crypto zoology, cults and would-be messiahs, fringe science, hoaxes, mutants (animal and human), parapsychology, religious phenomena (stigmata, appearances and simulacra and miracles. . . ), natural simulacra, UFOs, [and] urban legends” (Wikipedia).

Fortune telling--divination by various means (the author).

Fox, Kate and Maggie--sisters who claimed to be victims of poltergeist activity who later confessed to perpetuating a hoax that, ironically (or maybe not so ironically) helped to establish the credibility of spiritualists’ claims and of spiritualism in general (the author).

Francis of Assisi, St.--Roman Catholic saint who could supposedly levitate and communicate with animals; according to legends, he actually preached to birds (the author).

Frankenstein--novel by Mary Shelley (the author) in which an alchemist assembles a monster from parts of corpses and brings it to life with electricity (the author).

Freemason (Mason)--a member of an international secret society, the Free and Accepted Masons (the author).

Freud, Sigmund--founder of psychoanalysis, dream analysis, and related psychological views which are no longer generally recognized as valid (the author).

Alternative Explanations, Part I: Demons and Ghosts

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

In most horror stories which involve paranormal of supernatural forces or entities--which is to say, most horror stories--there’s a skeptical character whose purpose is to explain--or to explain away--the story’s apparently paranormal or supernatural incidents. To be convincing, such a character should know what he or she is talking about, at least as far as the science used to refute this or that apparent extraordinary incident. This article offers some tips concerning the type of debunker’s knowledge that skeptical characters ought to know and the sources in which the creators of these characters--namely, you--can find such information on tap, alas, not alongside the house brew.

The type of info you’ll need to know depends upon the type of paranormal or supernatural force or entity that is (allegedly) involved. Is it a demon? A ghost? A clairvoyant or a telekinetic person? Someone who’s adept at levitation whom other characters just don’t want hanging around all the time? Vampires? Werewolves? Zombies? An extraterrestrial species? Cthuthlu? Something else entirely?

Let’s take a look at some of the paranormal and supernatural classics and mainstays of the horror genre and the alternative explanations for them.

Okay, demons. First, what are they supposed to be? Evil spirits, right? But spirits of what? Dead animals? Dead people? Hats and shoes? Or are they a breed apart? Biblical traditions maintain that demons are fallen angels--angels, in other words, who rebelled against God, perhaps under the leadership of Satan, and were punished by being cast out of heaven and into hell. From time to time, they may visit the earth to tempt human beings for fun and profit (their victims’ eternal damnation, which would swell the population of hell).

Apparently, demons--or, quite a few of them, anyway--can possess people, and they may do so either individually or in groups. William Peter Blatty’s novel The Exorcist and the movie based upon it are supposedly based upon a true exorcism. The movies The Possession of Emily Rose and Requiem are both allegedly based upon another real-life case. They are interesting to study because each suggests a different approach that the skeptic character in your story could take in debunking the existence of demons--at least those who possess people.

The case upon which The Exorcist is supposedly based is nothing more than the result of exaggerations of the incidents that are alleged to have occurred in the actual case or sheer inventions, some contend. According to “The Real Story Behind the Exorcist,” “virtually all of the gory and sensational details were embellished or made up. Simple spitting became Technicolor, projectile vomiting; (normal) shaking of a bed became thunderous quaking and levitation; the boy’s low growl became a gravelly, Satanic voice.”

The Exorcism of Emily Rose and Requiem rely upon mischaracterizing mental illness and its effects as being demonic possession and its effects, critics argue. Adopting this approach to debunk diagnoses of demonic possession, the horror story’s skeptical character would say that the supposedly possessed person is mentally ill and susceptible to suggestions on the part of the exorcist:

“. . . exorcisms have been (and continue to be) performed, often on emotionally and mentally disturbed people. . . . Most often, exorcisms are done on people of strong religious faith. To the extent that exorcisms ‘work,’ it is primarily due to the power of suggestion and the placebo effect. If you believe you are possessed, and that a given ritual will cleanse you, then it just might.”

Mark Opsasnick’s thorough, detailed debunking, “The Haunted Boy: The Cold, Hard Facts Behind the Story that Inspired The Exorcist,” explains the exaggeration-invention approach to creating demons and demonic possession. The Skeptic’s Dictionary lists it and numerous other books and articles that question, evaluate, and reject spurious claims to demonic possession. (The Skeptic’s Dictionary, by the way, is an excellent basic source for all alternative explanations of allegedly paranormal and supernatural and, indeed, otherworldly, or extraterrestrial, phenomena).

Thus, the horror story’s skeptical character can explain demons and demonic possession by suggesting that demons and demonic possession are concocted out of exaggerations and inventions, the misdiagnoses of mental illness as demonic possession and susceptibility of the apparently possessed religious victim, or both.

What about ghosts? How might our fictional skeptic debunk them and their ghostly deeds? Supposedly, a ghost is the spirit of a dead person. Over the years, ghosts have collected quite a list of characteristics:

• They’re made of ectoplasm.
• Their presence is discernable by psychics.
• They make the air cold because they’re energy magnets, and thermal energy is energy. (One might say that ghosts were once environmental threats, except that, with global warming underway, they may now be ecological heroes.)
• They tend to be rather camera shy, but other equipment seems to register phantom phenomena.
• They sometimes haunt places or people or both with which or whom they were associated in the days of their incarnation, perhaps for revenge or for no other reason that they don’t know they’re dead (hard to imagine) or how to get to the great beyond.
• They can walk through solid objects, such as walls or your Aunt Betty.
• Some, known as poltergeists, are especially noisy and destructive.

What’s our skeptic’s likely answers to such claims? Ghosts may also be products of hallucinations, especially during sleep paralysis. Most ghost stories rely upon anecdotal evidence, which is “always incomplete and selective.” (For a critique of anecdotal evidence, check out “anecdotal [tensional] evidence”.)

According to The Skeptic’s Dictionary, skeptics have found cheesecloth an excellent “ectoplasm” material for use at séances conducted by mediums (sort of psychic midwives), especially if the medium who delivered the ghosts, so to speak, was a woman. Scientific American established a committee to investigate one medium’s psychic abilities, Harvard psychology professor William McDougall summarizing one of his group’s findings: “There is good evidence that "ectoplasm" issues, or did issue on some and probably all occasions [from] one particular 'opening in the anatomy' (i.e., the vagina).” She refused to be strip-searched before séances and would not “perform in tights.” Another skeptic “offers a much simpler explanation for the production of ectoplasm. Have your husband sit next to you during the séance. Make sure he has stuffed his shirt or pants with stuff to slip to you under the table when the lights are out.”

According to The Skeptic’s Dictionary, the big chill that is said to accompany the presence of ghosts is likely to result from drafts of air. Some noise may also be attributed to such ventilation. The activity of mechanical equipment, such as extraction fans, may also create air currents that produce odd sounds. Ghosts supposedly prefer night to day and darkness to light because it’s easier to see them in the dark than in daylight, since their ectoplasm is supposedly see-through. Our skeptic might counter this claim by suggesting another reason for ghosts’ alleged preference for darkness: it’s much easier to deceive others under conditions of darkness, too, than it is in broad daylight or in a well-lighted room.

While few ghosts worthy of the film have appeared on camera, some ghost hunters claim to have caught evidence of them on such equipment as “tape recorders, EMF detectors, video cameras with night vision, metal detectors.” Skeptics might question whether this--or any--equipment has been designed to detect ghosts, noting that, just because such equipment may look scientific, doesn’t mean that it is, and that certainly “tape recorders, EMF detectors, video cameras with night vision, metal detectors.” are not designed to detect the spirits of the deceased. Live Science finds ghost hunters’ supposedly scientific equipment questionable and challenges the claims its users have made concerning the equipment’s detection of ghosts. After pointing out that “the equipment is only as scientific as the person using it,” Benjamin Radford, the author of “The Shady Science of Ghost Hunting,” queried an equipment supplier as to the “scientific rationale. . . behind the equipment he sold” and received this surprisingly candid answer:

“At a haunted location," Cook said, "strong, erratic fluctuating EMFs are commonly found. It seems these energy fields have some definite connection to the presence of ghosts. The exact nature of that connection is still a mystery. However, the anomalous fields are easy to find. Whenever you locate one, a ghost might be present.... any erratic EMF fluctuations you may detect may indicate ghostly activity. . . . There exists no device that can conclusively detect ghosts."

Radford observes, with logic fatal to ghost hunting, “The supposed links between ghosts and electromagnetic fields, low temperatures, radiation, odd photographic images, and so on are based on nothing more than guesses, unproven theories, and wild conjecture. If a device could reliably determine the presence or absence of ghosts, then by definition, ghosts would be proven to exist.”

As Radford points out in the same article, statistics also cast doubt upon ghosts who are said to haunt their murderers: “If murder victims whose killings remains unsolved are truly destined to walk the earth and haunt the living, then we should expect to encounter ghosts nearly everywhere. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, roughly a quarter of all homicides remains unsolved each year,” and “There are about 30,000 homicides in America each year.”

He also questions how it is that ghosts wear clothing: “Do shoes, coats, hats, and belts also have souls? Logically, ghosts should appear naked.”

“On the Subject of Ghosts,” an article by Michael LaPointe, the “laws laid down by Sir Isaac Newton” make it “impossible for a non-physical entity to simultaneously walk upon surfaces and pass through solid objects, such as doors and walls; if a being is applying force to the ground in order to propel themselves, they therefore can’t pass through other solids without falling through the floor.” One has a choice, it seems. He or she can believe the anecdotal evidence of a haunted soul who sees ghosts do such things or the eminent scientist Isaac Newton, who says that neither ghosts nor anything else in the universe can perform such impossible feats. The party with whose claim one sides suggests much about his or her faith, whether it’s in the supernatural or the scientific.

As The Skeptic’s Dictionary points out, poltergeists generally turn out to be not mischievous, noisy nuisances of the spirit world but, rather, flesh-and-blood pranksters of a juvenile nature, whose antics are coupled, perhaps, with “perceptual misinterpretations, e. g., seeing things move that never moved or attributing sounds or movement of inanimate objects to spirits when one can't detect the source” or air drafts and other natural causes.

In one case, a woman named Mrs. Connolly found:

“A imitation fireplace and a couple of chairs overturned in the living room. Such things went on for four days. A building inspector suggested the problem might be coming from the fireplace, so Mrs. Connolly hired someone to put a protective covering over the chimney top. "From that moment on, the objects stayed put". . . . Mrs. Connolly was not a superstitious woman and attributed the events to powerful drafts swirling down the chimney and disturbing objects in their path. When confronted with poltergeist activity one should not rule out such natural factors as drafts of wind.”

Children are the poltergeists in another account of alleged poltergeist activity that is recounted in The Skeptic’s Dictionary:

“William Roll investigated the Resch case and declared it authentic. In 1984, Tina was 14 years old and living in Columbus, Ohio. Newspaper reports testified to her chaotic household where telephones would fly, lamps would swing and fall, all accompanied by loud noises. James Randi also investigated the case and found that Tina was hoaxing her adoptive parents and using the media attention to assist her quest to find her biological parents.

A video camera from a visiting TV crew that was inadvertently left running, recorded Tina cheating by surreptitiously pulling over a lamp while unobserved. The other occurrences were shown to be inventions of the press or highly exaggerated descriptions of quite explainable events. (Randi 1995).”

Even mere forgetfulness can explain the movement of objects by ghosts. People sometimes move an object, such as a set of keys, from one location, such as their bedroom dresser, to another, such as the kitchen counter, and, forgetting having done so, attribute the object’s relocation to the ghost that they believe must be haunting their homes.

But what about well-known accounts of ghostly visitations and haunted houses, such as Amityville? A couple of articles have appeared on the Live Science website that debunk Amityville: “The Truth Behind Amityville” and “The Truth Behind the Amityville Horror.” They’re a bit too involved and lengthy to summarize here; that’s why you’re directed there.

In Part II of “Alternative Explanations,” we’ll consider how your horror story’s skeptical character might debunk claims about other paranormal and supernatural phenomena.

Dream Monsters

copyright 2007 by Gary L. Pullman

People may disagree as to whether the idea of dream analysis or interpretation has any real value or significance, as such psychologists as Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Alfred Adler, Frederick Perls, and others contend they do, but, even if one determines that the idea is without foundation, he or she may benefit from the work that dream analysts or interpreters have done with regard to defining the symbolic significance of specific dream images, for the associations these researchers have compiled have longstanding parallels in literature and language that doesn’t depend upon psychological theory.

• Alien (extraterrestrial) - unknown parts of the personality
• Angel - moral qualities and values
• Blackbird - bad omen; lack of ambition or motivation
• Blood - life, passion, disappointments
• Cannibal - energy drain upon others
• Castle - recognition; self-esteem
• Cave - unconscious mind
• Caveman - uncivilized, instinctive aspects of the self
• Cemetery - end of a habit or behavior; sadness concerning the death of a loved one
• Corpse - discontinued or repressed aspect of the self; unresponsiveness
• Demon - socially undesirable or unacceptable aspects of the self; negative behaviors
• Devil - temptation to do or to continue doing socially undesirable or unacceptable actions
• Dragon - unbridled passion; wild behavior
• Exorcism - attempt or desire to regain control
• Fog - confusion; worry
• Ghost - aspects of the self of which one is afraid; memories; past deeds; alienation
• Giant - overwhelming obstacle or adversary
• God - perfection; higher self
• Goddess - feminine side (females); fear of women (men)
• Gorilla - extreme or wild behavior
• Grave - unconscious mind; death; feelings about death; uneasiness
• Graveyard - discarded aspects of the self
• Halloween - death
• Haunted house - unresolved childhood trauma
• Idol - false values
• Island - relaxation, comfort, leisure; boring routine; isolation and aloofness
• Lightning - revelation; awakening[ insight; purification; shock
• Mausoleum - illness, death
• Monster - grief, misfortune
• Ogre - self-criticism
• Poltergeist - lack of control
• Rabies - anger, hostility, lack of control
• Rat - doubt, worry, fear
• Rot - wasted opportunity, potential
• Satan - evil, wrongdoing
• Serpent - intelligence, deception, temptation, sexual freedom
• Skeleton - undeveloped potential or opportunity
• Skin - ego defenses; superficiality
• Skull - danger, death, evil
• Spirit - death
• Storm - overwhelming experience or emotion
• Thunder - rage
• Tomb - hidden aspects of the self
• Torture - feelings of victimization or need for punishment
• Vampire - sensuality, sexuality, death, drug addiction, dependency
• Werewolf - posturing, insincerity, hypocrisy
• Witch - destructive power of women
• Zombie - emotional detachment