PJCNET

The UK government has proposed a change in the law that would replace the Fraudulent Mediums Act 1951, but the new law could mean that Spiritualist Mediums and/or psychics would be forced to prove their claim to avoid criminal prosecution. The original 1951 law only stated that it had to be proved that a psychic was purposely trying to commit fraud before any successful prosecution could be made against them, but the new law could mean that anyone who doesn’t believe in a Spiritualist Medium or psychic could make serious criminal acquisitions against them, forcing the Spiritualist Medium or psychic to prove that they’re genuine, perhaps in a court of law.

My Personal Opinion:

Well many Spiritualists have been protesting outside Downing Street to try and stop this law being passed through parliament and I am inclined to agree that a new law to this effect would be extremely unfair as it would put genuine Spiritualist mediums and psychics at serious risk of criminal prosecution.

If a Christian Preacher or Priest stood up and preached stories from the Bible, would he be arrested and prosecuted for not proving his claim? Well I’d like to see some parts of the Holy Bible proved, like for instance Noah building a massive Ark, rounding up 2 of each and every animal from the entire planet onto it and then surviving a massive flood that swept across the whole planet. Can preachers prove this really happened? Well of course not, but they are entitled to their religion and their belief.

So if a Christian Preacher or Priest doesn’t have to prove their claims, why should a Spiritualist Preacher or Spiritualist Medium / psychic? The ONLY difference is a different belief and religion to Christianity. Also who are they expected to prove their claims to as some people believe in spirits while other people are hardened sceptics? It would be almost impossible to convince a hardened sceptic that a Spiritualist Medium or psychic is genuine and they could well make a complaint against a genuine Spiritualist medium or psychic purely on their alternative religious beliefs, but under the new proposed law, the Spiritualist medium or psychic could then be criminally arrested and ultimately told to prove the impossible in a court of law.

Bringing in this new law will make it extremely difficult for Spiritualist Mediums to operate in the UK at all as in UK law, spiritual entities aren’t proven to exist at all, so how can a Spiritualist Medium possibly prove to a court of law their claims? In other words, to prove that a Spiritualist medium is picking up on spirits, they would have to first prove that spirits actually exist in a UK court of law and this has never been done. Because of this, the new legislation would be ludicrous and just wrong. Many genuine Spiritualist mediums and psychics would in my opinion end up prosecuted and would be punished for practising the Spiritualist religion.

The UK is supposed to be a free and multi-religious society, yet if this law actually goes through parliament, it will stop Spiritualists practising a very important part of their religion without fear of arrest and criminal proceedings against them. Are we going back into the dark ages here? The law then wouldn’t be classing Spiritualism as a religion at all because a religion is defined a a belief taken by a group of people, note the word belief which means it’s NOT proven, so why should Spiritualist mediums have to prove their claim on a religious belief?

In my opinion the only thing that’s fair is to crack down on the few fake spiritualist mediums who are caught cheating, E.g. using trickery or other fraudulent techniques as these con artists give the majority of genuine spiritualist mediums a very bad name.

Why is the UK government trying to make practising Spiritualism more difficult? Could it possibly be that they believe that the knowledge gained from being in contact with spirit should only be available to an elite group of people at the top of society? Maybe it’s just because the government thinks there are too many con artists taking advantage of vulnerable people, pretending to be spiritualist mediums when they’re really only fraudulently conning people out of hard earned money? What-ever the real reason, I will let you decide.

Please see an article from The Guardian newspaper or an article from The BBC for more information about the proposed changes to the law. I will say that most articles available are dated back to the first half of 2008, so hopefully the government has put this plan on the back burners for the time being due to the protests, although I wouldn’t be surprised if this proposal re-shows it’s ugly head again in the not too distant future as it’s likely to remain on the UK government’s long term agenda until it’s ultimately passed through parliament. That in my opinion would be a very dark day for Spiritualism and the right to practice the religion in the UK in what’s meant to be a free multi-religious society.

Legal Disclaimer:

The above article is my own personal opinion only and cannot be declared as definite fact, PJCNET cannot be held responsible for any mistakes made. It is without prejudice to Christians, Christian Preachers, Priests, Spiritualist Mediums, any other religious people / practitioners or any other people or organisations. The full legal disclaimer applies to this article and all other articles on this website.

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