Do you believe that Sylvia Browne is bright and eager?
She has always came off to me as rather trailer trashy dull.
I have seen bag women talking to themselves as they push their shopping cart that look and act just like Sylvia Browne.
It makes no difference if they shine a light on an empty chair (claiming the spirit of Sylvia is there) or have her idiot kid babble on stage.
Those fools will still wait in line with money in hand.
It's not so much how smart Sylvia is but how stupid her victims are.
Brattus, you didn't know her 20 years ago. I've discussed this in other places so I won't bore everyone with my opinion on this again, but Sylvia now is much different. She's in her 70s, her voice is shot, she seems tired and like her thinking processes have slowed down. I sat through one of her lectures in 2003 and I was really surprised by how old she seemed and how she just covered the same old tired material. It's not at all the way it was when she was in her 50s and passionate about what she was doing. She had charisma and she was funny and she seemed to put her whole heart into what she was saying. She didn't come off sounding cruel or short-tempered the way she so often does now.
It IS about how smart Sylvia was. She was clever. IIRC she was nominated Business Woman of the Year at one point. She was charismatic and determined to start her church and get the message out to the world and make a name for herself (I have no idea which of those motives was stronger) by landing a spot on a show like Montel, and she succeeded. We could go around in circles all day, speculating about whether she's got some sort of narcissistic personality disorder or other way of justifying what she's done, but she didn't get as far as she did by being the way she is now.
Please can we stop referring to her fans as stupid?
Again, by claiming she had a direct connection to the other side through her spirit guide, Sylvia Browne manages to set herself up as the next best thing to being able to talk to God. Is that not clever? Diabolically so, perhaps, but clever.
Chris hasn't done that. I'm not sure Chris is even capable of it. I really do think he'd give himself away if given half a chance, and I just don't think he knows how to hide his ego. I think he's passionate about the idea of being seen as having psychic ability, spending the money and getting to bask and share in the glow of his mother's fame. That's just one person's opinion, of course.
I could be wrong. Maybe he will suddenly step up and pretend to be in contact with his mother or with his own spirit guide, maybe he will suddenly develop a sense of humor and a showman's presence like his mom had, maybe he will suddenly be able to convey a passion and a presence the way she did in her 50s. He's always seemed to be into his looks, and maybe he's attractive enough to build a fan base on that (I never thought so, but maybe that's just because I didn't like his personality).
So, yeah, seems doubtful to me but who knows.
But I really don't think all of these people are stupid. I won't argue with you about this anymore since you seem pretty determined to disagree. I think Sylvia Browne was talented (in a show biz sense) enough to sell Montel on having her on as a regular guest, and she'd been talented enough to set herself up as having a unique connection to the other side.
People have all sorts of reasons that set them up to believe in someone like Sylvia Browne, from the way they are raised to personal paranormal type experiences to sheer desperation, that have nothing to do with level of intelligence.
What I don't sympathize with is when people have seen the evidence as presented on Robert Lancaster's web site and still insist on believing. Now
that seems stupid to me. And if I had done that and later seen the light and someone called me stupid, I'd probably have to agree. But still I think there's hope for them, too, and I can't know their motivations. Maybe they think it's all concocted by Robert Lancaster to be biased against Sylvia Browne from the start and refuse to even read it. Maybe they think the ministers who've contributed to the articles had grudges against her. Who knows.
I hope that's helped to shed more light on the Browne situation overall and will help you understand why I don't think it's right to over-generalize the whole population of believers into "stupid."
Note: In case anyone here is curious, I don't feel humiliated or stupid for having been a Sylvia Browne believer. I did feel that way to some extent at first, though mostly I was mad at her and felt betrayed since I'd considered her a friend. I felt a strong obligation to try to make it up to people in general for having shared her philosophy in trying to help people, knowing now that it was all made up. One way I tried to do that was by helping RSL. But I now see that I had my reasons for believing and they were decent enough reasons at the time, based on my lack of awareness of the level of deception in the world and my own personal background. When I found out the truth, I dropped it and moved on and let it be a learning experience. I think that's all any of us can be expected to do.