CultNEWS101 Articles: 11/20/2025
Patrick Ryan
Mental Floss: A Brief History of the Ouija Board
" ... Ouija boards have their roots in spiritualism, which began in the United States in the late 1840s. (Claims that ancient Ouija boards existed are unfounded.) The new movement was led by mediums, who claimed to be intermediaries between the living and the dead.
There were a number of ways mediums made followers believe that they were communicating messages from those who had passed. One, table turning, involved the table moving or knocking on the floor in response to letters called out from the alphabet. Another method used planchettes—heart-shaped devices with two wheels at one end and a pencil at the point. Users would place their fingers on the device, which would then be guided by spirits who would “write” messages.
In 1886, the New York Daily Tribune reported on a new talking board being used in Ohio. It was 18 by 20 inches and featured the alphabet, numbers, and the terms yes, no, good evening, and goodnight; the only other necessary object was a “little table three or four inches high … with four legs” that the spirits could use to identify letters."
Both methods were problematic. Table turning took too long, and planchette writing was hard to decipher. According to the Museum of Talking Boards, some mediums got rid of these methods altogether, preferring to channel while in a trance, while others built complicated tables, dials, and tables painted with letters that required people to use a planchette as a pointer. This method became the most popular—and paved the way for the Ouija board.
Yahoo: British fascists ‘trained by American white supremacists’
"British fascists are being trained by American white supremacists linked to a deadly terror attack, the Telegraph can reveal.
Members of Vanguard Britannica, a racist, anti-Semitic group based in the UK, travelled to the US in September to attend the first national conference of the Patriot Front, America’s most prolific neo-Nazi group.
The members returned to the UK “ready to apply what they have learnt in our home country”, leaked Telegram messages show.
During their trip to Texas, delegates took part in training “workshops”.
They also met with prominent American white nationalists including Jared Taylor, the editor of American Renaissance magazine, a publication associated with the movement, and Thomas Rousseau, the leader of Patriot Front.
Mr Rousseau formerly headed up Vanguard America, the American chapter of the group, members of whom were present at the march preceding the 2017 Charlottesville terror attack which left one person dead and injured dozens more.
James Alex Fields marched with the group at the Unite The Right rally before mowing down a peaceful crowd. Vanguard America has denied Fields was a member.
Mr Taylor is an academic who believes in voluntary racial segregation and has been credited with intellectualising the US white nationalist movement away from Klansmen and skinheads."
"I started to doubt all the teachings when one wife's vision was told that rape was 'God's love.' You had to agree, because saying no was frowned upon. I said no constantly and was asked to leave due to disobedience to God. I moved to another country with an older woman and a group of young people. We tithed regularly with our meager income but had no insurance. Anything with the banks and government was forbidden. I got sick with appendicitis and was told to trust God. The older woman put me in a taxi and drove to the hospital. I tried to make sense of it all, but the end came when my husband and I were told we needed to open our bed to others for the sake of unity. We were out of there in a few months." —Anonymous, 54, Hungary
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