British Psychics & "Healers" Claim "Persecution"

[educatedindian]

Somehow I can't work up much sympathy. Part of me wishes there were a law in the US like that. But then I think of how that law could be used against NDN traditionalists also.

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http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080418/od_nm/britain_psychic_dc;_ylt=AsPtn5sZv.TpenYOXDqLwyMEtbAF
Psychics see big trouble over new laws By Peter Griffiths
Fri Apr 18, 1:12 PM ET

LONDON (Reuters) - Fortune-tellers, mediums and spiritual healers marched on the home of the British prime minister at Downing Street on Friday to protest against new laws they fear will lead to them being "persecuted and prosecuted."
 
Organizers say that replacing the Fraudulent Mediums Act of 1951 with new consumer protection rules will remove key legal protection for "genuine" mediums.

They think skeptics might bring malicious prosecutions to force spiritualists to prove in court that they can heal people, see into the future or talk to the dead.

Psychics also fear they will have to give disclaimers describing their services as entertainment or as scientific experiments with unpredictable results.

"If I'm giving a healing to someone, I don't want to have to stand there and say I don't believe in what I'm doing," said Carole McEntee-Taylor, a healer who co-founded the Spiritual Workers Association.

The group delivered a petition with 5,000 names to the prime minister's office, although Gordon Brown is away in the United States.

With the changes expected to come into force next month, spiritualists have faced a barrage of headlines gleefully suggesting that they should have seen it coming.

But many don't see the funny side. They say the new rules will shift the responsibility of proving they are not frauds from prosecutors and onto them.

"By repealing the Act, the onus will go round the other way and we will have to prove we are genuine," McEntee-Taylor told Reuters. "No other religion has to do that."

The government said the new regulations form part of a European Union directive that is meant to harmonize unfair trading laws across the EU. It will introduce a ban on traders "treating consumers unfairly."

The British Humanist Association, a charity which campaigns against religion and supernatural beliefs, said stricter regulations were overdue because the current laws don't work.

"It is misleading for spiritualists to claim that, as religious' practitioners they should not be regulated under consumer laws," said Chief Executive Hanne Stinson.

"The psychic industry is huge and lucrative and it exploits some very vulnerable, and some very gullible, people with claims for which there is no scientific evidence."

[zoi lightfoot]

See my reference under Melvyn Johnson thats what they are bent out of shape about.

[Barnaby_McEwan]

There have been lots of jokes about the psychics failing to see this coming. That aside I don't think this legislation will be used against any but the greediest, most cynical frauds.

It'll probably be down to overworked local government Trading Standards departments to bring prosecutions in civil courts. These people already have to work in an insane number of other areas like retail weights & measures, car clocking, animal health, road haulage, commercial fraud, the list is practically endless.

I'm not saying it's not worth building a relationship with TS officers but let's not hold our breath for a successful prosecution against someone in Britain claiming to channel an "Indian chief".

I also have little sympathy for people who seem to feed on people's grief and fear of death but I can also see this guy's point of view:

With my tiny brain, I can’t see how anyone is going to rationally police this kind of thing, given that the whole industry is, by definition, based on nonsense, and it’s plainly undesirable to ban things simply because they’re stupid.

His very funny article mentions the British Advertising Standards Agency (remember them?) and also the entertaining fact that Britain's premier loony-right outfit, the British National Party, is fielding a professional psychic in the imminent London Assembly elections.

[zoi lightfoot]

Sadly your words are true Barnaby,however in our favour is one sizable ex pat community
who are tired of being dismissed as a stereotypical joke, one hell of a 'Race relations act'
and of course the UN indigenous rights declaration to which European countries ARE signatories.
Add a protection act to the mix and its not beyond the bounds of impossibility that the community
out here will take it on head first.
For everyone we've shut down in the last thirty or so years,five more spring up,now with communications
tightening between ex pat community,their Nations of origin and sites like NAPFS,we are on top of them
quicker,its not perfect,its not rocket science but we focus on the worst offenders,the whack jobs run
scared if they see you going after their heros.

[crazyeagle]

Agree with you both, it is hard and frustrating when for everyone we see off 5 more pop out of the woodwork, but we all keep on top of it and the message is out there that we wont stop. The ex-pat community in Europe is being both felt and heard loud and clear.Of course there is also the support we get from the Nations back home too.