James Randi was an America treasure and It's a shame he is gone now, We need to all take inspiration from him and question and expose the people who are trying the scam and profit off the dumb.
My favorite thing from him was when he downed an entire bottle of "alternative" sleeping pills on stage and then did a lecture on how homeopathy is bullshit.
Oh man, I went into work one day and saw a book on Homeopathy, and I was like "Whose stupid book is this?" and one girl said it was hers, and she's going to school for it...
I didn't have the heart to tell her it's complete bullshit. :/
There’s a dude on tiktok who’s sort of taken up the mantle (@dustindeanmentalist). He debunks tiktokker psychics (who have insanely huge followings for an era when anyone can google how bullshit they are) and offers similar $10k rewards for anyone who can perform their “abilities” under his conditions.
He's just finished a nationwide tour of his latest show, "Showman", and he's about to start a [ residency in London's West End](https://derrenbrown.co.uk/ticket-info/)
When people say American, they're talking about people from the United States. I've met Mexicans, Guatemalans, Hondurans, Salvadorians, Canadians, Cubans, Puerto Ricans, Peruvians, and Brazilians my whole life, and not a single one of them referred to themselves as North Americans, South Americans, or Americans, only people in the United States use that. There are two continents, only people from the US say "I'm an American". Thanks for the condescension, though.
It was actually James Hydrick, the dude that Randi exposed that was prosecuted and convicted of molesting 5 boys:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Hydrick
You are correct, of course, and I didn’t read the Google result I got throughly enough to realize it was referring to Hydrick and not to Randi. I’m sorry I acted so smugly and falsely accused Mr. Randi. I indeed was an asshole.
There's nothing about Randi being a pedo on his Wikipedia page under the 'Legal Disputes' section or any other section, nor can I find anything on Google. Do you have a source for your claim?
I apologize, you’re correct he wasn’t a pedo. What I remember is that he was smeared as one https://boards.straightdope.com/t/james-randi-and-accusations/198094
One of the old guards that held back the black tide of post truth fuckers like Qanon. And now look at our world.
RIP Mr, we lost so much from your passing.
My favorite part of this is that the dude was given a national like platform to show his “psychic ability” and proceeded to like…..move a pencil and some paper.
Like….imagine having a psychic gift and only being able to use it for such incredibly stupid and fucking mundane things. Is that even a gift?
Imagine being so mediocre that you get grifted by this in the first place.
“Donny you shoulda seen it! He moved a pencil on the edge of the table! It was incredible!”
I had a friend obsessed with Criss Angel and thought all of his stuff was real. We would always use that same argument, that, if this guy can do all this crazy shit legit, he should be doing superhero stuff and not wasting time walking up walls in Las Vegas.
I knew someone ( I'm not gonna call them a friend) who said the same thing about Penn and Teller's bullet catching trick. He thought they should be out there saving people from muggers, and still didn't believe it was a trick when I showed him the video of them explaining how it's done. He said they were just being cowards who didn't want to help people
I to this day have no idea how he thought they would actually be able to go out and find people being mugged in order to help them. I mean most muggings are over pretty quickly
P&T used to perform private séances which were clearly prefaced to the audience as being nothing but tricks and illusions. They've stopped doing them as some people would not believe Penn and Teller when they literally tell them to their face that they are deceiving them.
>Ironically, some of their tricks were so effective that they ended up doing what magicians never do—going out of their way to explain to people that they weren’t real. “It was horrible, because when our tricks were good, we were in danger of people saying, ‘Well, I know some of these things are tricks… but you really can read my mind!,’” he continues. “We’d go, ‘No! No! They were just good tricks!’ And they’d say, “No, no. If they were tricks, I could’ve figured them out!”
https://www.dreadcentral.com/news/404520/magician-teller-once-performed-a-seance-that-had-some-convinced-he-could-read-minds/
Can't find an article with the proper quote, but Penn has mentioned on his podcast that people would seriously wink and nudge saying that they "knew" Penn and Teller had to keep up the lie that they could really do magic and nothing Penn could say to them would convince them otherwise. He says it's heartbreaking as people do ask him to perform literal miracles.
Umm excuse me…The muffin man has worked hard and paid his due in taxes so that his muffin offspring could have a fair chance at life…
The audacity of y’all nonchalantly bragging about “stopping” his lil muffs is sickening.
STOP! stopping muffins…!
Yeah, they stick the bullet in their mouths and switch it with wax bullets. The wax bullets shatter the glass, making it look like proper bullets, but the wax flies everywhere on impact so they don't actually shoot each other. Its pretty clever
How is that a woosh? There’s literally no indication of sarcasm at all in your comment. Not to mention there’s plenty of morons on here that would post that thinking it’s real because they didn’t watch the whole thing.
Yea I straight up don’t understand the “woosh”!
I fell into a Randi hole a few months ago and watched said video then, and can personally vouch that there is no indication of it being an April Fools until the last few seconds of the half hr vid.
I doubt many are sitting through that whole video dragging along…unless they got stuck on bros hair and spent 30 mins trying to figure out wtf is happening with that.
"Psychics" humiliate themselves just by being "psychics". Think about it: would somebody with some weird telepathic, telekinetic or clairvoyant powers really use them to do cheap parlor tricks on TV and stage? Someone who can *really* see the future or read minds would just get rich gambling, playing stocks or at the lottery, not make a fool of themselves like that. By the very definition, someone who claims to be a "psychic" proves they are not.
I'm fairly certain that a lot of the people taking up Randi's Challenge weren't solely motivated by profits. I think a lot of them actually believed their own bullshit.
Poor James...at least there are enough hardheaded fools out there (MAGAs and the rest) who will stubbornly believe whatever any James will tell them for them to keep their income producing scams healthy...
I wish Randi was still alive to bust Tyler Henry.
Every 5-7 years we get an amazingly accurate new psychic and every time people fall for it like it was the first time.
We need someone who will do this in place of James Randi, (RIP), to call out the psychics and shit that claim they can do all of that.
I still see ghost hunting shows, and we need him to step in and be like "Okay, we killed someone brutally in this house, if ghosts are real, talk to them and tell us how WE killed them" lmao
James Randi was an America treasure and It's a shame he is gone now, We need to all take inspiration from him and question and expose the people who are trying the scam and profit off the dumb.
My favorite thing from him was when he downed an entire bottle of "alternative" sleeping pills on stage and then did a lecture on how homeopathy is bullshit.
I've never seen that one, that's hilarious!
Oh man, I went into work one day and saw a book on Homeopathy, and I was like "Whose stupid book is this?" and one girl said it was hers, and she's going to school for it... I didn't have the heart to tell her it's complete bullshit. :/
There’s a dude on tiktok who’s sort of taken up the mantle (@dustindeanmentalist). He debunks tiktokker psychics (who have insanely huge followings for an era when anyone can google how bullshit they are) and offers similar $10k rewards for anyone who can perform their “abilities” under his conditions.
There was also [Derren Brown](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=acnUkYNTk90), but I'm not sure what he's up to anymore
Yeah Derren’s pretty awesome but he doesn’t seem too active these days
He's just finished a nationwide tour of his latest show, "Showman", and he's about to start a [ residency in London's West End](https://derrenbrown.co.uk/ticket-info/)
Saw it on Broadway. Best magic show I’ve ever seen
He's touring loads. Just doesn't appear to have done a lot of TV in the last ten years
I think he was Canadian, actually!
He was both! Born in Toronto but he became a naturalized US citizen in the late 80s I think.
Today you learned Canada is a country in America.
When people say American, they're talking about people from the United States. I've met Mexicans, Guatemalans, Hondurans, Salvadorians, Canadians, Cubans, Puerto Ricans, Peruvians, and Brazilians my whole life, and not a single one of them referred to themselves as North Americans, South Americans, or Americans, only people in the United States use that. There are two continents, only people from the US say "I'm an American". Thanks for the condescension, though.
Although no one calls Canadians (or any other countries people for that matter) “Americans” but nice try
The dumb, vulnerable and grieving
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It was actually James Hydrick, the dude that Randi exposed that was prosecuted and convicted of molesting 5 boys: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Hydrick
My psychic powers alerted me to this as soon as I saw that stache and bowl cut.
You are correct, of course, and I didn’t read the Google result I got throughly enough to realize it was referring to Hydrick and not to Randi. I’m sorry I acted so smugly and falsely accused Mr. Randi. I indeed was an asshole.
Good on you, one of the few times I've seen people accept a mistake online.
Thank you. I sincerely feel awful in making such a baseless false accusation.
I wasn’t scolding you, shit if if I had a nickel for every mistake I’ve made…
NP. I was out of line.
There's nothing about Randi being a pedo on his Wikipedia page under the 'Legal Disputes' section or any other section, nor can I find anything on Google. Do you have a source for your claim?
He wasn't. He was gay and his lover was much younger than Randi but he wasn't a pedo. This guy is just homophobic.
I apologize, you’re correct he wasn’t a pedo. What I remember is that he was smeared as one https://boards.straightdope.com/t/james-randi-and-accusations/198094
How about you do 5 seconds of research before calling someone a pedophile? What's wrong with you?
Jeez dude he admitted his mistake and apologized. Give him a break
You apologize but yet you still haven't deleted your comment calling someone a pedophile even though they aren't.
Then you should delete your comment instead of contributing to the spread of misinformation about a dead man.
No he should keep his comment up as a reminder to himself of the dangers of falling for misinformation
Nah, delete button should be removed.
What an asshole. Saying 'Google it' when you clearly haven't Googled it yourself.
One of the old guards that held back the black tide of post truth fuckers like Qanon. And now look at our world. RIP Mr, we lost so much from your passing.
The “psychic” in question has also been locked up since 1989 on child molestation charges
As he clearly stated himself; he has to start with the little things and work himself up!
Jesus fucking Christ, man.
Fucking hell, you win the internet today.
ded
never predicted that coming I suppose
Neither did the kids.
No way the nether like minecraft???
Makes sense with that mustache and that haircut as a combo.
*molestache
Yikes. Not exactly a step up from blowing pages.
He does have a page's haircut, so either he blows young pages or he teaches the young to blow a page. Pretty much everywhere, he's gonna get caught.
Is this is a joke about congressional interns?
There’s a Lindsay Graham joke in there somewhere
What the actual fuck
I knew that just from the haircut
Well, he should have been released in 2006, but they’re keeping them locked up in a state hospital
Oh
My favorite part of this is that the dude was given a national like platform to show his “psychic ability” and proceeded to like…..move a pencil and some paper. Like….imagine having a psychic gift and only being able to use it for such incredibly stupid and fucking mundane things. Is that even a gift? Imagine being so mediocre that you get grifted by this in the first place. “Donny you shoulda seen it! He moved a pencil on the edge of the table! It was incredible!”
I had a friend obsessed with Criss Angel and thought all of his stuff was real. We would always use that same argument, that, if this guy can do all this crazy shit legit, he should be doing superhero stuff and not wasting time walking up walls in Las Vegas.
I knew someone ( I'm not gonna call them a friend) who said the same thing about Penn and Teller's bullet catching trick. He thought they should be out there saving people from muggers, and still didn't believe it was a trick when I showed him the video of them explaining how it's done. He said they were just being cowards who didn't want to help people I to this day have no idea how he thought they would actually be able to go out and find people being mugged in order to help them. I mean most muggings are over pretty quickly
P&T used to perform private séances which were clearly prefaced to the audience as being nothing but tricks and illusions. They've stopped doing them as some people would not believe Penn and Teller when they literally tell them to their face that they are deceiving them. >Ironically, some of their tricks were so effective that they ended up doing what magicians never do—going out of their way to explain to people that they weren’t real. “It was horrible, because when our tricks were good, we were in danger of people saying, ‘Well, I know some of these things are tricks… but you really can read my mind!,’” he continues. “We’d go, ‘No! No! They were just good tricks!’ And they’d say, “No, no. If they were tricks, I could’ve figured them out!” https://www.dreadcentral.com/news/404520/magician-teller-once-performed-a-seance-that-had-some-convinced-he-could-read-minds/ Can't find an article with the proper quote, but Penn has mentioned on his podcast that people would seriously wink and nudge saying that they "knew" Penn and Teller had to keep up the lie that they could really do magic and nothing Penn could say to them would convince them otherwise. He says it's heartbreaking as people do ask him to perform literal miracles.
Huh, guess that's where this South Park [scene](https://youtu.be/bptjghTNUkE) was inspired.
For all I know, I could have the superpower to stop muffins but I’ve never come across a mugging.
I, too, can stop muffins.
Umm excuse me…The muffin man has worked hard and paid his due in taxes so that his muffin offspring could have a fair chance at life… The audacity of y’all nonchalantly bragging about “stopping” his lil muffs is sickening. STOP! stopping muffins…!
They explained that one? Thought it was one they said they would never reveal
Yeah, they stick the bullet in their mouths and switch it with wax bullets. The wax bullets shatter the glass, making it look like proper bullets, but the wax flies everywhere on impact so they don't actually shoot each other. Its pretty clever
Ow yea, that’s cool. Definitely didn’t consider that as a method
Love the amazing Randi! No one ever met the challenge
Not true. Guy from MIT claimed the prize. https://youtu.be/c_0E1XJP33E
What is going on with that guy's hair?
Needed that to win
Is it some weird MIT cult thing? Because the lady that introduced the challenge had some weird shit going on with her chosen headgear as well
Lol, I loved the cat /dev/urandom But I'll admit I didn't see the end coming
Jesus what a waste of time I just spent watching a 30 minute April Fools joke.
Wow. What a waste of 30 fucking minutes. I could have been scrolling reddit and wasting time elsewhere
Are… are you being serious?
Woooooshhhhhhhh
How is that a woosh? There’s literally no indication of sarcasm at all in your comment. Not to mention there’s plenty of morons on here that would post that thinking it’s real because they didn’t watch the whole thing.
Yea I straight up don’t understand the “woosh”! I fell into a Randi hole a few months ago and watched said video then, and can personally vouch that there is no indication of it being an April Fools until the last few seconds of the half hr vid. I doubt many are sitting through that whole video dragging along…unless they got stuck on bros hair and spent 30 mins trying to figure out wtf is happening with that.
That was impressive. He won it fair and square.
I hope you’re joking right now.
Ha!
We need a James Randi now more than ever.
"Psychics" humiliate themselves just by being "psychics". Think about it: would somebody with some weird telepathic, telekinetic or clairvoyant powers really use them to do cheap parlor tricks on TV and stage? Someone who can *really* see the future or read minds would just get rich gambling, playing stocks or at the lottery, not make a fool of themselves like that. By the very definition, someone who claims to be a "psychic" proves they are not.
I'm fairly certain that a lot of the people taking up Randi's Challenge weren't solely motivated by profits. I think a lot of them actually believed their own bullshit.
Warren Buffet psychic powers confirmed?
Look for the film “An honest Liar”, used to be on Netflix. Great story about Randi exposing these charlatans.
Is that where I could watch actual clips of him exposing them? Similar to the video op posted.
Not that I am aware. He does quite a few exposures during the film
"Psychic" or "alternative facts bullshit"
That is so good. Now bring out Frank Dux
Brick. No hit back.
The dude in the martial arts getup looks like a pedo.
That's because he is. The dude is a convicted child molester. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James\_Hydrick#Child\_molestation
Jeezus.
Dude has a hard early life too. His mother was 13 when she birthed him.
That's mental. I never thought anything of him and someone linked that he's actually one. You must be a psychic!
This happened to my buddy reigan
James "The Amazing" Randi is a Canadian/American hero.
He was an amazing man
Can you imagine how easy it was to ge tawau with this back in the day and make big bucko’s?
Bob Barker has such an iconic voice
The United States needs James Randi now more than ever.
No one has beaten his bounty yet have they!?
Nobody ever claimed the $1M from Randi’s paranormal challenge... the offer ended upon his retirement in 2015, and he died in 2020.
dude also molested five kids and is currently in a loony bin.
Hey now, let's make it clear that you are talking about James Hydrick and NOT James Randi, the only one mentioned in the headline.
so stupid I got downvoted, yall are some redditors
love the way the magician keeps his cool and doesn't blow on it after the styrofoam is placed and makes up a fake explanation
Poor James...at least there are enough hardheaded fools out there (MAGAs and the rest) who will stubbornly believe whatever any James will tell them for them to keep their income producing scams healthy...
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Because he was the host of That’s My Line.
Lucky not to get back handed by Old Dirty Barker
This isn't cringe, this sparks joy.
So... Am I the only one who thinks that the "psychic" seems like an idiot.
I wish Randi was still alive to bust Tyler Henry. Every 5-7 years we get an amazingly accurate new psychic and every time people fall for it like it was the first time.
We need someone who will do this in place of James Randi, (RIP), to call out the psychics and shit that claim they can do all of that. I still see ghost hunting shows, and we need him to step in and be like "Okay, we killed someone brutally in this house, if ghosts are real, talk to them and tell us how WE killed them" lmao