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  • 2004-11-14 (xsd:date)
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  • The Ghost Under the Bed (en)
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  • Responding to readers who forward us photos purportedly showing ghosts is always problematic — those who don't believe in ghosts need no assurance that such pictures are phony, while believers demand proof that ghosts don't exist, a standard impossible to meet: Suffice it to say that the item reproduced above is nothing more than a common type of chain letter (the luck or prayer letter), a form that has been around since at least the 19th century and promises dire consequences (or at least bad luck) to recipients who fail to forward a message to the requisite number of people. (Such letters often include anecdotes explaining the disastrous fates that supposedly befell some recipients who didn't heed the enclosed warning and unwisely broke the chain.) That such a letter may now be disseminated via e-mail and social networking rather than through the postal service and includes a fabricated photograph of an avenging spirit doesn't make it any different than century-old versions — only the style has changed, not the substance. The various backstories accompanying the image of the woman included with this item claim that a number of people in different locales have died via accidents or homicides for failing to pass the haunting picture along. The truth has far less to do with murdering ghosts than it does with movies: the picture came from a 2003 Thai horror film variously titled The Mother or The Unborn or Bangkok Haunted 2: The Unborn. The spooky image was used as the DVD artwork for the film. The sleeping person in the photograph is not (as the e-mail would have it) a man, but rather Thai actress Aranya Namwong. (en)
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