Page 80 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - February 2023 Edition

80 Secret Sting to Expose Celebrity Psychic

Inside the Secret Sting

Operations to Expose

Celebrity Psychic

Continued from Page 79

“We want the target to see dollar signs,
not question marks,” said Mark Edward,

a mentalist and magician who
collaborates with Gerbic in organizing
these operations.

When the Facebook pages have aged
enough to look real and the target psychic
is in a town where some of Gerbic’s crew
lives, she will call upon others of her
SWAT team to leave their screens, don

undercover identities of these Facebook
sock puppets and head out into the mean
streets of the corporeal sphere. The sting
somewhere around the mid-19th century. And throughout this rise of interest, there
intends to catch the hustlers working their
Of course, there has always been a was a parallel rise in debunkers. The poet
tricks, but Gerbic’s strategy also includes
general sense that there exists a Robert Browning once exposed the mid-
luring these most susceptible of
supernatural gift for seeing into the 19th century Scottish psychic, Daniel
audiences back into the ways of logical
future, the present (sometimes called Home, who claimed to conjure the spirit
thought. To do this, she sends four or five
“remote viewing”) or the past (that is, of Browning’s infant son, who died
of her shills to a show under these sock-
communicating with the dead). The hope young. Except Browning hadn’t lost a
puppet names and has them record the
that this power exists reaches back to son. Worse, the poet lunged at the
psychic when he approaches and spews
some of the earliest civilizations — the apparition to unmask it and found himself
all the made-up stories of life and death
court seers of the Egyptians, the Oracle of clutching Home’s bare foot. Helen
from the fake Facebook pages.
Delphi just north of Athens, the bone- Duncan was found to swallow a length of
reading shaman of ancient China. Among cheesecloth, which she could produce
Once the psychic has been stung, the
the more recent big shifts in how we dramatically from her mouth as
team will write up an account and then
conceive of supernatural communication ectoplasm. During an early-20th century
post the evidence — video or sound —
occurred around the time of Charles séance, Frederick Munnings deployed a
onto a website dedicated to a particular
Darwin, when there was an explosion of long voice-altering trumpet across the
debunking mission, which Gerbic gives a
secular interest in the numinous, called room — a clever tactic undermined one
memorable name. In future events, other
spiritualism. night when someone accidentally
skeptics can simply slip into
switched on the light.
performances and just leave cards with
This new popular pursuit found an
these odd operation names printed on
audience across all classes and The idea of talking with the dead is one
them.
denominations. While the poor sought of those stubborn hopes that’s difficult
out their corner soothsayer, the smart set for a culture to move beyond. Famous
“That’s why I do my stings with names
was happy to ponder the works of a skeptics like Harry Houdini left precise
that are ridiculous: Operation
Russian mystic named Madame instructions with his wife and friends as
Bumblebee, Operation Ice Cream Cone,
Blavatsky, whose “theosophies” were a to just how he would reach out, if it were
Operation Pizza Roll,” she said. “They’re
kind of modern mash-up of religion, possible, after his death. Stanley Kubrick,
all easy to spell and easy to remember. So
science and philosophy. In fact, a lot of in talking about his movie “The Shining”
even if you throw the card away, you
this interest took the form of science — with Stephen King, confessed that he
might remember ‘Operation Pizza Roll.’
people trying to measure these various found optimism in stories about the
And you’ll say, You know what, I’ve got
powers or to discuss the supernatural in supernatural. “If there are ghosts, that
a couple of minutes before the show
sober, logical tomes. These were the days means we survived death,” he explained.
starts; I’m going to see what this
when you might read the other books
Operation Tater Tot is all about.” Then
written by Sherlock Holmes’s creator, Gerbic got into the sting racket because
you’ll work your way to Gerbic’s write-
Arthur Conan Doyle, a member of the of her mentor, James Randi, the famous
up about the psychic you are about to see
London-based Society for Psychical skeptic who started his career as a
and, just maybe, find yourself in a thicket
Research who died insisting that he magician, the Amazing Randi.
of contradictions so intense, you can
would rather be remembered for his
escape only by thinking.
paranormal works such as “The New
Revelation” and “The Vital Message” (Continued on Page 83)
Busting psychics has a history almost as
than for his Sherlock Holmes detective
rich as the rise of modern psychic belief,
stories.