More reiki high jinks: inducing confirmation bias

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Reiki annoys me. You may have noticed this. Anything that is based on mystical healing forces and spirit guides outside of fantasy literature and roleplaying games is bunk. Anyone who seriously promotes it as treatment for ills, real or imagined, is either a fool or a knave. I like the word ‘knave’, by the way. It goes well with my archaic nature, as revealed by November’s Searchindipity.

Anyhow, one thing that never fails to astound, amaze and totally flabber my gast is the number of people who claim positive benefits for such transparent WTFuckery as reiki. Or indeed, any other fringe therapy. Of course, if sCAM practitioners prime their marks to expect positive results, then the whole thing becomes much clearer. Let’s see what our good friend Alice Langholt of ReikiAwakening (remember her? The one who tried to sell me her book on Twitter?) has in the way of advice to novice reiquacktioners in this particular Way of The Consignment of Ancient Shoemakers:

Q: What questions should a Reiki practitioner ask the client?

A: Before a session, there are a few goals that the Reiki practitioner has. The questions the practitioner asks will relate to these goals. Here are the goals, and my suggestions for questions:

So far, so good. If you’re going to treat somebody for anything, you need some background, case history, that sort of stuff. Listen to them. Listening is very important: it’s not just what is said, but how it’s said. If the patient is describing pain, the hand gestures can give a clue as to the type of pain, if the person has trouble describing it verbally. So Goal 1 is to gain a better understanding of what brought the patient to consult?

Er, not as such… At least, not if the way the various goals are listed on the website is indicative of their importance to the Reiki consultant:

Goal: To make sure the client understands what Reiki is and may feel like

Questions:

• Have you had Reiki before?
• If yes: How did it feel to you/ how did it help you that time?

Well, I suppose those questions are fair enough, but ethics would normally require that you ascertain if the treatment you’re offering can, in fact, help before going any further. What happens if the mark has already had a reiki session and, predictably, didn’t get better?

• If no: Tell the client about the various clairs – ways in which people are naturally sensitive to energy – and how Reiki may feel through each.

The various clairs. This doesn’t refer to delicious creme-filled French pastries, or even a group of girls with the same forename. She means this (taken from the same site):

Clairs are different ways to receive intuitive information. Simply speaking, they are: visually, audiently (hearing), sentiently (sense of touch), and cognitively (knowing). If you see colors while energy is flowing, you are clairvoyant (visually sensitive to energy). If you hear music or a ringing or buzzing sound, you are clairaudient. If you feel tingles or changes in temperature, you are clairsentient, and if you get a gut sense of knowing the energy is flowing, you are claircognizant. Most people have one major clair and one or more minor clairs working for them.

I bet you feel better for knowing that. That paragraph is worth about a dozen WTF points just by itself. So, if the mark doesn’t feel anything, the above foaming bowl of Stupid can be dipped into freely, in order to tell the patient they’re doing it wrong. Yes, if reiki doesn’t have an effect, it’s the patient’s fault!

 If the recipient says that he “doesn’t feel anything” while you’re giving Reiki, try to help him find his own primary clair and observe it. I like to tell people new to Reiki, “Notice what’s different.” That helps them be tuned in to any sensations, rather than what they might be expecting.

In other words, you, as the reiki practitioner, insist and insinuate until the mark ends up imagining they can feel something. I wonder if shouting “I’m getting a candy bar!” falls under the definition of a clair? The goal evidently isn’t to make the patient feel better, it’s to get the patient to think they feel better. If you don’t notice an improvement until it’s pointed out to you, might I suggest that it’s not much of an improvement? All that the quack is doing here is pushing the mark to imagine something, anything. After all, they’re paying for this shit and they’ve been told it’ll help them. They’re really going to want confirmation they’re not making fools of themselves.

This next part is even more revealing. The last set of questions would, in any genuine healthcare setting, have been listed first because they are, after all, the most important. Why do they appear last here? I have my own theory: it’s because reiki isn’t about the client, it’s about the practitioner. It’s about giving the practitioner a false sense of importance and usefulness. It’s about fantasising that you have some kind of special psychic power that requires much practice and study to strengthen and hone.

Goal: To help the client be aware of improvements from the Reiki session

This starts before the session. You need to find out the client’s “before” state so you can compare it with “after.”

Questions:

• How are you feeling now? (Ask before and again after the session is complete).
• Are there any physical, emotional, or health-related issues you would like the Reiki to address?
• Are you receiving other treatments for this condition? (Reiki is not a substitute but considered complementary to any medical or other treatment one may be receiving. One never tells the client to discontinue any current course of treatment, nor does one diagnose the client or suggest other routes of care – ever – unless the Reiki practitioner is also a licensed medical professional.)

I will not yield to the temptation offered by the first bullet-point to reel off a few “how was it for you?”-type jokes. Aren’t you proud of me? By the way, that final aside in the third point, while legally obligatory in any sane country, does rather beg the question: since reiki is merely an add-on to real medical treatment, why is it so fucking expensive? These people charge a dollar a minute for the laying-on of hands. It’s faith healing: no more, no less. How can its proponents deny this with a straight face when they tell their clients that if they feel nothing, it’s their fault not the priest practitioner’s? Have faith, my child, and you shall be healed.

When you receive answers to these questions, you can follow up with other questions regarding scheduling another session, (…)

Yes, well, of course, it all boils down to getting your hooks into them for repeat sessions. The whole thing is so creepy and unethical it’s scary. Even more scary, it’s being hard-sold as health – beg pardon – wellness, when it’s really just para-religious bullshit using the ‘special mystical knowledge’ ploy to entrap the unwary.