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Daily Poll: Should Ouija boards be sold as toys?

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Ouija Queen - CC

The Daily Catch - published on 10/18/16

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As far back as I can remember, my mother told me to stay away from Ouija boards. With the success of the 2014 movie Ouija and

, Phil Kosloski gives us a warning not to bring our popcorn home looking for more entertainment with these nefarious instruments:

After the release of the first film “the Ouija board [was] number five in the Top Trending Toys on Google. Google also reported that online searches for the ‘board game’ [were] up 300 percent since the film’s release.” What was most disturbing about Google’s report was that the Ouija board was categorized right next to toys like “American Girl, My Little Pony, Paw Patrol, Lego Friends, Peppa Pig, Shopkins, Nerf Guns, and Zoomer Dino.” The Ouija Board can often be purchased at places like Wal-Mart or Toys ‘R Us and is on the shelf right next to games like Monopoly. In the eyes of the board game business, the Ouija board is just one entertaining game among many. What is so sinister about the Ouija board? The premise of the Ouija board is that a living person can communicate with a soul or spirit and the spirit will communicate back by spelling out answers on the board. Many children (and adults) will play this game saying they don’t “believe” in it and think that one of their friends is playing a joke on them when the pieces move on the board. It is often viewed as a “spooky” game to be played in a dimly lit room in the basement during a teenage sleepover.

Given the low cost to produce board games, we “get” the business model; is it right, however, to market a spiritual conduit as a game to be explored so carelessly by children? What do you think?

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