3 students die after being hypnotized by principal

Originally posted by boondock-saint
Maybe to erase memories of what he did to them ??

What did he do to them? I must have missed that part in the article.

Originally posted by cluckerspud

Originally posted by boondock-saint
Maybe to erase memories of what he did to them ??

What did he do to them? I must have missed that part in the article.

it wasn't in the article.
that is why there was a question mark
following that phrase.
Makes it a question

Originally posted by boondock-saint

Originally posted by hillynilly
Yes alone.. One kid who played football was interviewed
and he said he was hypnotised to play better.
Said he had his best year.

so please do pray tell
why would a star QB with his best yr
and a bright future,
commit suicide ???

it still does not add up

Because he was hynotised to do it..

Not everything is a conspiracy.

1 dead kid i'll let it slide
2 dead kid's i'll let it slide
3 dead kid's I cannot let that slide

There is no such thing as coincidence
This is a pattern.

Originally posted by boondock-saint

Originally posted by cluckerspud

Originally posted by boondock-saint
Maybe to erase memories of what he did to them ??

What did he do to them? I must have missed that part in the article.

it wasn't in the article.
that is why there was a question mark
following that phrase.
Makes it a question

Ohhhhhhhh, right.

Originally posted by burntheships
My thoughts on the matter -

If a person is not licensed to treat a problem with non-hypnotic techniques,
he/she should not treat it with hypnosois.

edit on 1-7-2011 by burntheships because: (no reason given)

edit on 1-7-2011 by burntheships because: (no reason given)

On this we completely agree. What we don't see eye to eye on are the possible outcomes of such bad practice.

reply to post by Shamatt


He was a licensed hypnotherapist (per other sources).
And it seems he had parental consent for at least one of the students.
The source for the OP was lacking important details.
I wanted to clear that up, since it seems to be relevant.

Originally posted by hillynilly

Originally posted by boondock-saint

Originally posted by hillynilly
Yes alone.. One kid who played football was interviewed
and he said he was hypnotised to play better.
Said he had his best year.

so please do pray tell
why would a star QB with his best yr
and a bright future,
commit suicide ???

it still does not add up

Because he was hynotised to do it..

Not everything is a conspiracy.

1 dead kid i'll let it slide
2 dead kid's i'll let it slide
3 dead kid's I cannot let that slide

There is no such thing as coincidence
This is a pattern.

It is not possible, in a single, or even a couple of sessions, to hypnotise someone to kill themselves. This is the point you don't understand.
Hell, It is hard enough to get people to give up smoking in a single session (although it is possible, I heard just under 50% will go back for a seccond session) You think some high school teacher is going to have tequniques which are so powerfull? I think not.

It is possible that what he did added to existing emotional turmoil in a negative way as to push the kid over the edge. That is very possible, but the only consession I will make towards there being any link.

reply to post by matito


Thank you - pertinent, but not in relation to the missunderstandings I wish I could (But doubt I will) clear up here ! lol

reply to post by Shamatt

It is not possible, in a single, or even a couple of sessions, to hypnotise someone to kill themselves

.....I agree....


I personally do not think these students were intentionally induced to commit suicide through the use of hypnotism. Actually it's highly improbable and there isn't any evidence to support that hypnotic suicide is even possible in a clinical or stage scenario. Hypnosis is not mind control.

I do believe there are rare cases that aggressive psychologically conditioning (that includes hypnosis) can influence an individual to carry out acts (such as suicide) that would be against their moral feelings. Yet, this is not that case.

I think people have a valid misconception toward therapeutic hypnotism due to stage show hypnotism. Hypnotic stage shows induce susceptible people into behaving erratically and foolishly (by their own free will). Inducing someone to perform stage antics is not the same as inducing someone into committing suicide or any other life changing act.

His use of hypnotherapy may have exacerbated any preexisting mental health issues with these vulnerable students instead of helping to resolve them. Teenagers already have a high rate of suicide and depression.

Having therapeutic sessions with a student alone was highly inappropriate. Maybe he did perpetrate sexual abuse with these students that resulted in depression and their eventual suicide (that is more probable than a hypnotic command). Hopefully this will be clarified by an investigation. His treatment could also have bought out repressed memories of abuse (fairly common) that aggravated preexisting depression. This is why recording and documenting each session is imperative. This principle acted with gross negligence in that regard.

Here is an example of how hypnosis can indirectly trigger suicidal thoughts (still very uncommon though):
news.bbc.co.uk...
www.dailymail.co.uk...
www.independent.co.uk...

Hypnosis can 'provoke' suicidal thoughts under the right circumstances - which is very different than being given a hypnotic command under trance to commit suicide.

I dont know about this whole hypnotism and quite frankly I dont think it works. Now to be fair I dont know much about it or seen very much about it, but I dont buy into it, and I really think this just may have been a coincidence.

Originally posted by Jess_Undefined
I dont know about this whole hypnotism and quite frankly I dont think it works. Now to be fair I dont know much about it or seen very much about it, but I dont buy into it, and I really think this just may have been a coincidence.

Although I unltimately agree with your conclusion, it is interesting that you are comfortable expressing aan opinion on a subject you yourself admit to knowing nothing about, and having no experience of. This seems unwise.

reply to post by Shamatt


I may not be an expert at it, but I have read a bit about it, and what im saying is from the little bit that I have read and seen, it just doesn't seem to work. Now it may actually work sometimes and could be caused by placebo effect.

But out of the whole school being hypnotized, and only three dying, im sorry this seems coincidence.

reply to post by Jess_Undefined


I was only commenting on the structure of your sentence: "I don't know anything about it but I don't beleive it" is never a sensible statement, my friend, just some advice for you!

On to topic: Do read some more about the subject, especialy anything you can get your hands on by or about Milton H Erikson. I promise you if you look at this subject with an open mind you will be amazed. The power of hypnotism is amazing,. Having said that, it is only this powerfull with the concious agreement of the subject, it really is a case of concious/subconcoius working together.

That is why it is not possible to just hypnotise someone to kill themselves. Most of don't want to. Of course, if I did want to kill my self and was too scared a hypnotists could really help me with that..... lol

See, there needs to be an underlying desire within the subject. That is what a hypnotherapist will try to work with using the subconcious.

Originally posted by Tharsis
It's a high school.

Kids kill themselves and die in car accidents.

Hypnosis is a false science, I truly doubt this caused any deaths.

At my high school, we had 5 members of our wrestling team die in 3 separate freak accidents.

Wrestling did not cause these deaths...

you are not trained in the knowledge of the subconscious mind, i do not believe you have the right to say hypnosis is false.

en.wikipedia.org...
www.hypnosis.me.uk...

have a read, hypnosis is used on you everyday and you have no idea!

reply to post by boondock-saint


post hypnotic suggestion is very real, and dangerous. Trigger words are also real, and very dangerous. Its possible that he caused it.

Havent you guys seen the "conspiracy theory" episode about the manchurian candidates?

Hi..btw im new and this is my first post:
The Principle makes it sound as though he was actually helping people. He says it is to help motivation,but then why hypnotize teachers too? Also hypnosis will not help those students when they get older. When theyre 30+ years old, whos gonna tell them what do then?
This Principle is another ignorant human who believes their are shortcuts in life and believes that there is no bad side to it.

Originally posted by BanMePlz
reply to post by boondock-saint

 

post hypnotic suggestion is very real, and dangerous. Trigger words are also real, and very dangerous. Its possible that he caused it.

Havent you guys seen the "conspiracy theory" episode about the manchurian candidates?

Post hypnotic suggestion is indeed very real.

It is not possible he caused these deaths using that though. Beleive what you will about the manchurian stuff, if you read up on it you will see that the techniques required to acheive such results would take months of intense work.

It is not like on the TV when a stage hypnotists uses trigger words to make someone cluck like a chicken. I know how that works, and I can say with 100% certainty that these techniques do not work in the "real world".

Trust me - and the other trained hypnotists on this site - this is not possible.

reply to post by Korndawg


Hi Korndawg and welcome to ATS community...

I agree. There are other, less invasive ways to motivate someone. It's scary for me to imagine him having hypnotherapy sessions with such young teenagers in an unsupervised setting. Counseling is more appropriate for minor motivational issues. Yet, based on some statements, he was obviously attempting to alter everyday behavior.

I think the question is why. Why did he take the time to hypnotize so many people. What was his real motive? I seriously doubt his motive was selfless.

I think this principle, at minimum, was using the school to "play around" with hypnosis. Maybe he was planning to retire and start practicing hypnotherapy and decided to use students and staff to increase his hands-on experience. I personally feel that these students were test subjects. For this he should be fired whether or not he contributed to the student deaths.

reply to post by neonitus


I second the coincidence hypothesis. According to the report this principal hypnotized 75 students only 3 died. I'd say that's pretty statistically negligible. Now if a good percentage of them died there might be more reason to suspect something sinister here but teen suicide and teens dying in car crashes really isn't anything new, hypnotism or not.

Originally posted by matito
I personally do not think these students were intentionally induced to commit suicide through the use of hypnotism.

I don't think so either. I think they killed themselves for another reason.

I wouldn't rule out the hypnotism was used to make them forget that reason.