You know what? I was in such a good mood on Saturday night. Happy really. I'd had a tasty supper and very much enjoyed the movie on 3, Far and Away. I looooove stories set hundreds of years ago and am always fascinated at the way people lived. Tom Cruise was divine as usual and seeing him with Nicole Kidman and knowing their history just made the love story all the more intense. Also the Ultimate Pig gets whacked. All this left me feeling very content indeed.
Then ... the movie finished and Making Contact started and everything I had been feeling was replaced with the most hectic anger ever.
Have you seen the show?! Along similar lines to John Edward it features clairvoyant Belinda Silbert, who meets up with everyday people (South Africans) and gives them a 'reading' as a result of her ability to speak to the dead. There are usually three people who have the reading done and these are then followed up with reflections by them.
Firstly - let me just say that if this Belinda is clairvoyant then I'm Britney Spears's titties. Wowsville. She doesn't even have John Edward's tricks. Instead, through a series of psychological assumptions she tells the people who come to see her the things they want to hear.
It's not terribly difficult either. Someone comes to see you who says they've recently lost a mother and want to make contact with her. How many assumptions can you automatically make about this person, their state of mind and the things they need to hear? Gazillions.
We all do it everyday. Your best friend phones you and says she's having trouble with her boss. Even if you didn't know her well you could make a whole series of assumptions from the situation on how she's feeling, her relationship with him and her dilemma at the time. If he were dead and she wanted to make contact you'd tell her stuff like: "He says it wasn't personal, he was carrying a lot of stress and valued you more than you know and says you must forge ahead with your career plans and not allow him to hold you back." As far as I can see this is all this Belinda is doing.
Oh - she does give some extra info, like a couple of weeks ago when a woman came to see her whose brother had committed suicide and she was looking for reasons asking: "Why?" Belinda rambles on and then tells the woman that she's sensing he had issues with his sexuality. At this point the woman's face turns to complete and utter surprise. In her post-reading interview she said that she did not know how that could possibly be, because in all the time she'd known him she'd never picked up anything of the sort. She said her brother had been very manly. Also, it did not come across that she was trying to hide the truth and that she'd had suspicions she didn't want to face up to.
A good one that, I have to say. The sexuality thing. Is it true? Who will ever know except the guy himself? And now his family have had this thought planted. This idea that he was possibly gay, and they will never ever know the truth. Did she give them anything new or useful to take away with her? No. Instead she filled her head with what I can only presume is complete and utter nonsense, because she has never once given me a proper reason to believe her. The way it looks to me is she's just kinda going with the flow. Whatever pops into her head.
I would not mind if Belinda marketed herself only as an 'intuitive', who could sense how you were feeling and help you through it. Fine. But to claim to speak directly with people's deceased loved ones is going overboard. In one episode a woman who'd been spoken to by her mother said: "My father has also passed away," and Belinda turned her head to the side and true as anything said: "Oh, yes, there he is ..." Like in two seconds he was standing next to the woman's mother and chat-chatting to Belinda.
Not once have I heard her say anything that someone with any sort of understanding of human psychology couldn't have told these people. A guy came to see her in Saturday's episode in which he explained that when he went to bed at night he kinda felt a presence. Guess what she told him? He has psychic abilities. Ha! She also said if any of the entities made him feel uncomfortable he should instruct them to leave because no-one needs to let anyone or anything into their space that they don't want. Yes? And who doesn't know that? Pulp psychology from start to finish, if ya ask me.
Many of these shows try to stop us from doubting the clairvoyant's ability by explaining before the show that the clairvoyant hasn't practised anything and everything you see is real, etc, etc, which suggests they really want audiences to believe it's all real. And if it's not, which I believe is the case, then it's a lie.
Together with this question of their legitimacy comes another interesting question and that is - if they aren't legit or if they are not really making contact with someone's loved one and are just claiming they are but making people feel a bit better - is it okay? Are people feeling better? Are their lives changed?
My aunt wants nothing more than to hear from her daughter who died years and years ago. She was about seven or eight years old and was knocked over by a car. My aunt and uncle and her were going away on holiday and they sent her across to the shop downstairs to get something they needed. She went down and a truck drove into the flats parking area and knocked her down. My aunt has never been the same.
My aunt spoke to me recently and was asking my advice. Should she contact Belinda? Would she make contact with her child?
The answer to this question perhaps lies in this. My aunt wants many things and I think quite possibly the most important one is freedom from guilt. She wants her child to forgive her. Belinda would have probably explained that the child is okay and says she knows it has been difficult and that my aunt mustn't blame herself. Guilt is a very strong reason for people being unable to let go and hence adding up a situation of a young child with a mother who let her out of her sight: guilt's not a tricky emotion to see.
But ... I do not believe this would have helped my aunt, because for some reason she hasn't been able to forgive herself and she would have left feeling extremely raw and emotional but not really any closer to the truth. Going to see Belinda would have been a misleading, emotional waste of time.
This means these shows provide so many interesting questions:
1. Are these people really speaking to the dead as they claim to be?
2. If the answer to this is no, is what they're doing okay or wrong?
3. Why do we as people need so much reassurance from the other side?
And so, my opinion on Making Contact and Belinda? Very fake. Have you watched? If not I strongly suggest you do. Saturday 22h30 on SABC3. I'm very interested to see what you make of it all.