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Sarah Samkari
Professor Batty
Eng113B
28 April 2015
Face the Fear
According to statistics, there are over 2000 haunted attractions charging admission fees to
their events. Also, there are over 300 amusement facilities producing some sort of Halloween or
haunted house event such as an amusement park or family fun center. These statistics are
showing that people are enjoying being afraid. Because they can express their feelings in a fun
way and ease the fear that people have. On other hand, people can go to certain scary haunted
house on Halloween, but they cannot go to the same exact place when it is haunted for real. The
question is: what if someone wakes up one day and finds out that his house is really haunted?
What will anyone would do or feel? And why is it scary this time? In my opinion, the right
answer for this question is the fear that the media instills in people, the fear of the unexpected or
unknown from the paranormal, fear of sins and punishment, and fear that comes from childhood.
The media has a bad influence to our thoughts and life. In the article Investigating the
Relationship between Exposure to Television Program and Beliefs in Paranormal written by
Glenn Sparks and Will Miller they discuss the relationship between the media and peoples
belief. The article states, we believe that paranormal beliefs and the medias role in cultivating
or discouraging them is a critical topic for mass communication scholars to understand well.
Society is shaped by what people believe. If the media play a central role in encouraging people
to adopt beliefs about reality that are unsubstantiated, there may well be widespread implications

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for future society that are incalculable at the present time(Sparks 111). I totally agree with
Sparks and Miller that people do not have enough understanding of supernatural, which make
them believe what the media produces, especially because its unfamiliar to the audience. For
example, Paranormal Activity is one of the movies that has had a bad effect on peoples minds.
The only goal the producer wants to achieve is to make people paranoid and let the viewers have
disturbed sleep with nightmares or in some cases insomnia. They are representing the ghost as a
violent creature, which is not necessarily true. Media also represents the supernatural as powerful
and human as helpless and incapable to defend themselves. The main character is always tries to
save his life but he cannot because the monster or supernatural is way stronger than him. As a
result, the idea of how helpless we are toward these creatures absorbs in our minds. So, it is
normal to feel desperate and afraid when it happens in real life, when actually there is hope of
survival.
Human beings are often fears of unusual or what is new to them especially when it comes
to something they are not familiar with and they do not know how to deal with it. People tend to
not accept anything new. They keep denying it, instead of face it or be more aware of it. I
personally scared of anything looks unusual whether it is a sound or a person who act in strange
way, because I cannot predict what this person is up to. Why does he act in this kind of way? Is
he going to do something harmful? Or is he going to do something stupid? But when it comes to
something we do not see in everyday life like supernatural events. We only know it from a horror
movie this will definitely evokes the fears to us because people feel bunch of feelings and I
believe the first thing that would cross our mind, is what happened to the girl in that movie is
going to happen to us. So we are expecting the same scenario we saw in the movies, for example
we expect them to hurt us and kill us. Maybe if we know more about them we would be less

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stressed. So I think we should be more educated like reading and searching about who they are,
what they do, and how to protect ourselves.
Some people may think that their house is being haunted because of their own sin. The
idea of haunted house is scary but what is more scary is to think that the house is being haunted
because of their sin and it is a way that god is punishing them. Actually there are a conservative
churches that are making haunted houses to frighten people to make them get back to the right
path. More importantly. They use everyday life evidence to frighten people such as AIDs death,
abortion, date rape, and fetal drunk driving accidents. In the article In These Haunted Houses,
the Scares Come from Sin Keenan Roberts, the suburban Denver minister who has pioneered
the Hell House concept, sums it up: "It gets the job done. Kenan illustrate that haunted houses is
actually works when their manipulating peoples feeling. Moreover, those people who makes
haunted houses wants to make sure that the lesson is learned through other people sanitary
Marshall, Ill. "Linking sins and consequences might come off as being judgmental . . . that there
would be criticism with regard to the overemphasis on sin, the overemphasis on evil and the
power that evil has. So, the feeling of guilt and sins could be a reason why haunted house is
scary.
The biggest fear comes from our childhood stories. Our belief plays an important role in
making us fear. Traditional belief of ghost can pass through generations especially children and it
grows over time so it controls the childs mind from the beginning this could led to control a
whole community. In the article Dont Let a Good Scare Frighten You: Choosing and Using
Quality Chillers to Promote You. Written by Patricia O Richard, Debra H Thatcher, Michelle
Shreeves, Peggy Timmons, and Sallie Baker suggest that children should read scary book to
make them face their fears as a way to attract them to read. For example, the article state

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Reading scary stories does not appear to harm and may instead provide them opportunities to
explore conquer their fear children can develop reading fluency and can learn to read for
entertainment and enjoyment through these stories.(Richard893) I disagree with author because
I would never let my child read a scary book one day when he grow up he will explore the fear
by himself and be more able to face it instead of ruin his childhood with fears. I myself
experienced the fear since when I was little. My brother tells me a story about thief that stole
children every night and I could not sleep that night because it was the first night I felt afraid and
now fears of everything is one of my traits.
In conclusion, the fears of unusual, unknown, guilt, and the fears that comes from our
childhood it all comes from inner self specifically from our thoughts. There is a quote says
nothing to fear but the fear itself. there is no shame to be scared of something, fears is a way to
survive on this earth. However, People should control their thoughts in order to stop being afraid
of any place or creatures. We have to blame ourselves first before the media, we are the one who
choose to watch a scary movie, and of course we are the one who can control our thoughts and
fears. We have to be more responsible about we watch and read, because it will affect our minds
whether in positive or negative way. Yes, supernatural is real but we have to be more aware and
educated of supernatural acts and consequences and know how to deal with it instead of being
afraid.

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Work Cited
Ellen Warren, Tribune Staff Writer. "In These Haunted Houses, the Scares Come from Sin: North Sports
Final, CN Edition." Chicago Tribune, (1998): 1.
Miller, Will, and Glenn Sparks. "Investigating the Relationship Between Exposure to Television Programs
That Depict Paranormal Phenomena and Beliefs in the Paranormal." Communication
Monographs, 68.1 (2001): 98-113.
Richards, Patricia O. Thatcher, Debra H. Shreeves, Michelle. Timmons, Peggy. Barker, Sallie Dont let a
good scare frighten you: Choosing and using quality chillers to promote you. May99, Vol. 52 Issue
8, p830. 11p. 1 Graph.
Haunted houses Association