The Quest For Exposure

A look at media addiction in the paranormal field

I guess it would be a good idea to inform my readers just how well I know the media environment. There was a time when I actually worked for a newspaper, and through that work learned a great deal of the inner workings of such a market. I also did a great deal of work with the media in my various endeavors into music and my passion of professional wrestling. Yes, yours trully was not always Sam Little, at one glorious time I was Darkside, the most destructive force in indy wrestling, but let's not get into that just yet.Our field is growing in leaps and bounds but a great deal of that growth is negitive. New teams are no longer so concerned with quality work as much as how much media exposure they can gain. They contact the internet radio broadcasters and plea for time when in reality these broadcasts are no indicater whatsoever as to the work a team is able to do, it is simply another bragging right. I have seen teams pump up to 100 bucks into a newspaper publisher to run a single article on them but then you pay a visit to their site and you get floored by the lack of any real knowledge toward our field. It sadens me at the way some teams have for a lack of a better term, and again I will issue a pre-emptive appology for this, whored themselves out to the media just to gain recognition. The general public needs to be informed that teams of this nature are not a good choice to come into your home. They seek fame and fortune at the cost of you and our field as a whole.

It has always been policy of every team I have worked with to keep media exposure to a minimum. I would rather have Johny Nobody tell his pals about the great work we did than have a spread in the paper describing how great we are with no real evidence or testimonies to back that up. Dravenstar has been offered time, and lots of it on various internet radio broadcasts, even local stations have entertained us with offers of 30 minute and hour long spots on air. We decided collectivelly to decline the offers because we felt that to brag and toot our own horn so to speak would violate certain aspects of our field. In all honesty we were approached several times about TV exposures and even the possibility of a weekly show but after failure of the network to allow s creative control we backed out. Fame is great but for the sake of our field do not seek it above quality work. I do not are how much I hear a groups name on the radio, if I can not see creditials that stand up to the claim of greatness I consider them hacks who are more of a bother to the field than a help. Sure some teams can ack up their media claims with a great deal of work and that is great. TAPS obviously are a team who can literally stand strong in the work they have done.

Locally I am often asked why teams come and go so frequentally in his area and DPRT remains so constant after over a decade. Most teams here are all about being seen and heard regardless of the work they do. ome teams, and for the record a very popular team in this area fall right into this dilemna, will dub a home haunted with or without a single piece of evidence to back that statement on. I know of a home owner who contacted this team and gave them a tale straight from hollywood and their investigation yielded nothing but scrathy EVPs and they told of remarkable first hand accounts of paranormal activity and were thriled to say it was the most haunted place they had ever been. Funny to some but to me our field just got knocked down a few steps by some rookies. Yet at another time this team made a statement that a home one of them occupied was horrably haunted. They would investigate and be unable to even enter at night, yet the owner lived there and the activity only seemed crazy in the presence of the team. Even the most foolish grenhorn in our field knows that activity is not limited to night. Yet despite these very obvious problems this team has plastered it's name on the net, over internet radio and even gone as far as to attemp TV exposure, why? Is it the persuit of the truth that draws so many of us to the darker side? Is it the quest for true experience that fuels the masses of paranormal mania? Nope! It's the journy of self obsession and narcissism that fuels these new media driven teams. They really make the rest of us look like morons.

Of course as with most of these tpes of people they generally fade into oblivion shortly after forming and that is the true blessing thay bring to the table. In time people forget their attempts at stardom ad move on to more furtile grounds of thought but for that brief moment they are in the spotlight the rest of us suffer their ignorance. My feelings are that we has a group of enlightened individuals should not allow such stupidity to dictate how we act. Just cause the Society For Everything Trivial Being Paranormal is plastered on bilboards and TV screens does ot mean we have to do the same. We are searching for the truth. Now let's get back to the wrestling portion again. Truth. What a word. These teams who hound us with media exposure claim to have the truth, but ask yourself this, does the truth sell? Is the media after truth? Absolutally not! If Sam Litle, mild guy with glasses and a love for reading ad writing and the search for ghosts jumped in the ring the cams would quickly try and find some fat guy in the crowd eating. They would care not for that guy in the ring, and why is that? He's real. I had to wear face paint, yell at the crowd and be the villian I am not to put people in the seats. My TV exposure was amazing and fans flocked to see the Darkside destroy some guy who seemed more real than I. The point I want to make is, teams who get so much exposure have to keep that heat going and will do so at the cost of integrity. Evidence starts to get faked, suggestibilty starts to play a factor, even the most mundane occurance becomes a tale of supernatural glory backset against a stage built on lies and powered by the drive to keep the eyes of the public on them. The locals teams here that have maintained this grasp of media mania have fallen short of any real achievment in our field. I have seen no less than 10 fall under the force of trying to be what they could never be, and I would care to say I will see 10 more fall just as easilly wen all is said and done. It is just the way this type of attitude works in our field.

As with all my articles before this one, this is an ongoing topic and by no means is this the last word on it. In fact I plan to write an article in the very near future that describes the positive aspect the media can play, for now, happy hunting!!!!