Here's a website much like ours, Bad Psychics with their Fraud Files.
http://badpsychics.com/thefraudfiles/modules/news/article.php?storyid=483Doreen Virtue PhD -- it’s a name familiar to anyone who has delved into the world of clairvoyance, Angel Healing, Chakras, and similar paranormal hogwash. Anyone who has come across any of her books (she has written over 20) will know that the blonde doctor is often pictured on the back covers, dressed in colourful velvets and hanging around flower gardens, being psychic and so on. They’ll also know that "PhD" is always and forever appended to her name. And yes, it’s her real name, apparently. In the FAQ section of her official site (
www.AngelTherapy.com), she says "I wouldn’t have had the nerve to make up a name like ‘Dr. Virtue.’???.
Her PhD is in counselling psychology, by the way; from a seemingly unaccredited PhD programme.
The “spiritual doctor of psychology??? is most famous for her angel-oriented teaching; and has produced numerous publications on the subject. But it's not the only bee in her bonnet.
In this article, I want to focus on one peculiar tenet of Virtue's belief system, one which I think has provided her with a special corner in the current psychic market, and which is particularly exploitative and potentially damaging; her concept of "Indigo Children" / "Crystal Children", or child psychics.
Virtue believes that generations of paranormally gifted children have been gracing our planet in large numbers for decades; most famously in the form of “Indigo Children???, born in the 70s. These “Indigos??? are described in general as being rebellious, purposeful, highly intelligent; creative, intuitive, frustrated with authorities and bureaucracy; and psychically powerful. Oh, did I mention they have big “wise??? eyes, too?
Ever met a doting parent who noted that their child had beady, dumb-lookin’ eyes? Me neither.
It's important to mention that Virtue was not the creator of the Indigo Child concept, nor did she coin the term. Nancy Tappe, author of Understanding your Life through Color, 1982, ‘observed’ that certain gifted children have dark blue as their “life colour???. She claimed that these children tend to be intelligent, intuitive people with an ‘evolved’ consciousness (and wise ol’ eyes), etc.
Her idea was extended and made popular in 1999 by Lee Carroll and Jan Tober, in their collection, The Indigo Children, to which Virtue contributed.
Other believers in the Indigo phenomenon (like spiritual teacher Drunvalo Melchizedek) have gone so far as to make the claim that some special children have superhuman powers of immunity, and can rid themselves of the HIV virus. This is, understandably, one extremely dangerous claim which has never been uttered by the more mainstream psychic personalities.
Mainstream, Oprah-interviewee Virtue certainly is. She has eagerly adopted the original Indigo Child concept, extending the criteria of the gifted child so that almost everyone, of any age, can participate in the Psychic Child racket. To this end, she is responsible for adding the ‘generations’ of the “Crystal??? and “Rainbow??? Children to the mix.
These days, she’s probably the most famous proponent of the Indigo philosophy.
According to Virtue, the term "Indigo Children" applies to young psychics born since around 1975, until the early 90s. They're now aged between about 15 and 32 years old (although by 32 one would think an Indigo "Child" could have built up a clientele and scored a couple of lucrative book deals; hardly childsplay).
Due to their headstrong and energetic nature, Indigos are often “misdiagnosed???, Virtue claims, with ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) or ADHD (Attention Deficit & Hyperactivity Disorder), which Doreen terms "Attention Dialled in to a Higher Dimension". When such Indigos are medicated for their disorder, they sadly lose their “energy??? and "spiritual gifts". They also surrender their ability to save the world by eliminating “anything that lacks integrity".
That’s quite a task. Would you trust a 15-year-old with it? Or wish it upon them?
How about an 8-year-old?
The “Crystal Children???, according to Doreen, are the younger generation of psychics who are coming "in waves" since the mid-90s, often ‘choosing’ Indigos as parents.
In fact, the Indigos themselves were also born to special parents (Hey, we have to cash in on the over-30s!) – the ‘Lightworkers’: sensitive healers usually born in the 50s. And, like the psychic family tree, Doreen Virtue’s potential market grows.
“Blissful and even-tempered???, the Crystal Child possesses a significantly different personality to the fiery Indigo, according to Virtue.
So, not only is Doreen creating extra ‘generations’ to milk the phenomenon, but she’s also hedging her bets here. If your child is lively, energetic and headstrong, they fit the criteria of a ‘late’ Indigo Child as set out by Tober, Carroll (and now Virtue).
If your child is peaceful, quiet, and kind, they're a Crystal Child, as invented by Virtue! Whatever their nature, your child is extra special and there's a book about it! Nobody loses! (Or wins, really, since the whole thing is tosh).
While the Indigos are often thought to have ADD/ADHD, the silent ‘Crystals’ are often ‘wrongly diagnosed’ with autism. In The Crystal Children, 2003, Virtue describes a boy called Harry, who did not speak until he was five years old, and was diagnosed as having autism. Virtue vehemently dismisses this diagnosis:
"So why was Harry diagnosed as autistic? Does speaking or reading later than expected warrant such a serious diagnosis? Why not call these sensitive children "late-talkers" instead of pathologizing them with psychiatric diagnoses and making them feel ashamed of themselves?"
It seems to me that Virtue is the one who is stigmatising psychiatric diagnoses here….
Of course, not every late-talker has a disorder, but shouldn't the parents of children who are not speaking by 5, or even 2 years of age, be encouraged to seek advice from a doctor? It is a fact that many deaf children are not discovered to be deaf until they are beyond the toddler stage; their seeming inability to speak often being an important signal that there is a problem.
These children lose out on years of appropriate stimulation and effective education as a result of late diagnosis, and spend more valuable time having to catch up. Similarly, an early diagnosis of autism is better than a late one, and such diagnoses should be taken seriously.
Half-jokingly, Virtue refers to autistic children as ‘AWE-tistic’, before dismissively stating that instead of spending precious time discussing the condition, we should be identifying it as an indication of "humankind's evolution". What rot.
To glorify and mystify the silence of children, in the name of unproven “psychic powers???, is cruelly irresponsible.
Virtue trawls through ‘examples’ (i.e. anecdotes) of such ‘powers’ in her books; though ‘proof’ is clearly not something she considers her business.
Indeed, Doreen cites "empirical research" as her only base of evidence, and argues that she doesn't have the time or facilities to organise 'control groups'.
(Odd that she has enough time to churn out 24 books on Angels, Psychic Children, Chakras, etc, but no time to test the theories she writes about. She’s even written a self-help book called I’d Change my Life if I Had More Time...)
Virtue’s “empirical research??? uncovers, for instance, a mother’s claim that her daughter goes "into a trance" while looking at the TV as an example of the child's telepathic prowess.....Wait, isn't that called “watching" TV?!
Here’s a look at some of her other ‘findings’:
In her first chapter, Virtue recounts the story of a mother who had a “telepathic??? connection with her unborn baby. The woman claimed that her baby “told her??? that she was female and, sure enough, the baby was a girl.
I might be impressed by that, if there were 100 genders, but this woman had a whopping 50% chance of being correct. As an example of supernatural ability, this is cringeworthy.
We’re also presented with the story of 5-year-old Tyrique, who can psychically ‘read’ his mother.
One day, while his mother silently wondered whether Tyrique would spend the weekend with his father, Tyrique approached her and said “Dad’s picking me up on Friday???.
Obviously, this case demands that we believe what Tyrique’s mother claims (Doreen, as we know, has no time to test these things).
But even if we do believe the story, it is clearly one of coincidence, and unremarkable coincidence at that. I’d guess that weekends with Dad are a major part of Tyrique’s life, and his mother’s; so for him to mention his weekend plans (and for her to think about them simultaneously) is not all that unusual.
In Magda’s story, Magda’s mother telepathically transmitted the words “I love you??? at bedtime to her daughter, who suddenly said “I love you too???.
Again, this (if we believe the claim) is an unremarkable coincidence. We are not told whether Magda’s mother said “I love you??? to her daughter every bedtime, but it’s very possible. If so, the child simply expected the words, and pre-empted them.
The sentiment is one so commonly spoken between parents and children, that a simultaneous expression of it can’t really be seen as anything more than a cute coincidence.
On page 72, we’re told the story of a little healer, Colin, who “intuitively knows??? how to comfort a person in need. His mother describes how her young son sat vigilantly with an ill relative, bringing her cold drinks until she recovered.
But what’s so supernatural about this? Perhaps Colin remembered how he was treated when he was ill; perhaps he caught a glimpse of a TV hospital drama; perhaps he learned about nurses during a When-I-Grow-Up session at school. Perhaps he played ‘Doctor’-themed games with other children.
This is called “learning???, not “intuition???. It’s also a case of human (not superhuman) compassion.
Another story features 4-year-old Adam, who suddenly informed his mother one Monday that “Your father didn’t go to work today. It was stormy out, so he went for a walk instead???. Adam’s grandfather lived in America, a 6-hour time difference away, where it was still Sunday. And, sure enough, the grandfather didn’t work on Sundays!
Another weak example here. Firstly, Adam’s words imply that his grandfather didn’t go to work because of the stormy weather. This is not the case.
We’re not told whether it was stormy, or whether his grandfather did go for a walk (but in any case, don’t we usually walk somewhere, every day?).
We’re told that the grandfather didn’t work on Saturdays either, but even if Sunday was his only day off, it means Adam knew that people can have a day off, and had 1 in 7 chance of being right by guessing the day. The odds are hardly stacked.
Doreen doles out more ‘impressive’ tales of children who can make objects levitate, or cause candles to light spontaneously, but without any evidence (not even so much as a blurry photo), a belief in these stories is a blind leap.
Obviously, Virtue’s primary market consists of parents who want to ‘see’ powers in their darling children. These are the die-hard believers, who fall for cold readings by fitting vague descriptions into their own agenda, and will interpret their children's ‘deep’ or coincidental statements as indications of psychic gifts.
To feed the delusions of these eager parents, and to tug at the consciences of parents of children with certain disorders, Doreen’s Crystal Children deals partly with ‘Diet’, ‘Schooling’ and other parenting issues, which dominate The Care and Feeding of Indigo Children (Virtue, 2001). You need only check up the readers' reviews of this book on Amazon.com to see that it has disgusted some families of children with ADD/ADHD/autism. In it, she implies that parents who have trouble communicating with their child, and seek medical help, are basically small-minded. They are failing to understand their gifted son/daughter, and are ridding their child of special powers by medicating them. Virtue gives these parents/carers an ultimatum - either communicate telepathically with your child (i.e. make believe that you can), or accept that you are failing as a parent: You are the one with the disability, not your child.
Nothing like a guilt trip to make people dig out their money for your books, I suppose.
And Virtue doesn’t just target parents. Her ‘workshops’ are open to the children and adolescents themselves, with whom she spends “a lot of time???.
This claptrap is quite harmful. It's one thing to target adults with psychic propaganda, and it's another to reel in children, particularly those who possibly have behavioural disorders which might have already isolated them socially. Virtue and Co are blessing these young people with nothing but a ticket to further alienation, or anger at their brainwashed childhood.
Unfortunately, Doreen’s not done yet. The "Rainbow Children" are her latest addition to the Psychic Kids mumbo-jumbo. In 2004, Virtue said that these children were "just beginning to come to earth", and are usually born to Early Crystals (a.k.a "Scouts", from the late 80s/early 90s). While only a few have been born already (and I should hope so; “teen pregnancies??? and “wise??? don’t really gel), Virtue predicts an influx of ‘Rainbows’ between the years 2010 and 2030.
Just when we thought this bunkum might blow over, eh?
Something tells me Virtue should stick to Angel Card readings for her adult peers...It's still a con job, but at least everyone involved should know better, and each pays for their own gullibility. Let's allow children to be children, allow their parents to "care and feed", and allow their doctors to medicate, if needs be.
Clare D.
