#stage hypnotist

Hypnobunny Reviews a Stage Hypnotist/A car accident you just can’t look away from

So, last night I went to the Georgia State Fair, and there happened to be a stage hypnotist performing that I maybe specifically went to the fair to see.

I’ve met some great stage hypnotists in my time, and obviously I’ve been doing…. *gestures vaguely* for years, so I had maaaaaybe a few expectations.

And i was also sooooo excited because I’ve never seen a black hypnotist before (honestly, shame on us for not cultivating them) and I wanted to support him.

But dear lord.

He was so ….

…monumentously bad.

I won’t post his name because I mean, good on him for living his dream. But Jesus.

I was at the fair with a coworker, who was also interested in the show and has also bee nawkwardly hitting on me for a month. But that didn’t keep me from saying “fuck it” and walking onstage to be part of the show, because I mean, come on it’s ME we’re talking about. And I’ve never done this before.

I’ve already vented to a couple of people about this. But it’s STILL so heavy on my mind, well, it’s gonna be a blog post now.

NUMBER ONE: He identified the people who weren’t “suggestible enough” and had them leave the stage. Why is this a mistake? Because being a hypnotist is all about bursting at the seams with confidence, and by doing this he’s starting his act by showing the rest of us that he’s already failed. Keep the people on stage! Just don’t interact with them. Who knows, maybe they’ll come around to it, or at least put on a good show. Unless they’re actively sabotoging you, it’s very disheartening to come out of the initial induction and see that half the seats on stage are now empty.

NUMERO DOS: He kept forgetting his own trigger word. There were two seperate times he had us react to the word “Hypnosis” (which is already annoyingly lazy in itself) and both times he did this, he kept trying to use the word “Hypnotist” to trigger us. To me this came off as dumb, and sloppy.

TROIS: His bits didn’t make sense. He promotes himself as a comedy hypnotist, but all his punchlines depended on us having explosive, comical reactions, which were in no way guaranteed and actually very unlikely to happen.

For example, he gave us all a suggestion that when we woke up we’d think we were at one of those carnnival games where they guess your weight or age, then no matter what he guessed we’d be extremely angry.

Now I don’t know about you dear reader, but when I’m angry I curse. A lot. But there were children in the front row, so I knew I could not do that. So what’s left? A…stern look? A waggled finger? I had nothing.

He then further sabotoged the joke by guessing things that were completely nonsensical, like guessing I was 50 years old. Like….dude that’s not even very funny. It would be way funnier if he guessed something very flattering, and then we got mad. Or even better, if he guessed something ludicrous or offensive, and we agreed no matter what and were totally flattered. Or even best, if WE had to guess his age/weight, and always got it exorbinantly wrong.

What ended up happening was a half dozen shy and embarassed people shuffling up to the mic and muttering polite disagreements. We’re not actors hon, if you change our reality you shoudl expect us to react in realistic ways. I’m not about throw verbal hands on a carnival barker, dickhead or not. I’m also relying on you to lead me, and “get angry” is not enough of a direction to follow.

FOOR: He was unorganized. He lept putting us under then going “When I wake you, you’ll- oh, waitno not that one let’s do a different one….ehh no not that one either let’s see….hmmm, ok when I wake you you will…”

If you’re going to hypnotize someone you need to exhibit control. If you can’t literallyget your act together, why would my subconscious want to listen to you?

FHIVE:His hypnotic suggestons were needlessly creepy. He told one guy that when he woke up, the pictures on his shirt would start talking to him and then try to attack him. That’s straight-up nightmare fuel. Not to mention potentialyl triggering for schizophrenics. If he’d said that to me I would have woken up immediately, screamed and/or slapped him, and walked off stage. But to make it worse, when I looked over, I saw that the boy was wearing a Black Lives Matter shirt, and the pictures on his shirt were faces of black men who had been killed by police. I mean…are you fucking kidding me. Dude. Do you not see how that might be inappropriate.

If you’re want people to follow you, you have to firmly believe that your suggestions will work in the most real way possible. Full stop.

Then at the end of the show he gave the suggestion that if you were a woman, when he said “Hypnosis” you’d feel the nearest man pinch you on the ass (consent much? yeesh) but if you were a man, you’d become one additional month pregnantevery time he said it.

………..

If someone made me feel pregnant, with no rapport or trust or even qualifiers like “you’re so happy you have a new life inside you”, I’d punch them in their fucking face. That’s an extremely traumatzing concept to me.

But oh-ho ho it’s so funny cuz this guy us just confused now and then…uh…gives birth?…..What is this a 1990′s irreverent comedy? 

IN CONCLUSION: Iditots are gonna idiot. There are PUH-LENTY of fun, lighthearted, humerous, safe, and creative things you can do with hypnosis. Being an edgelord is not going to help you unless you’re already a master and you’re playing to your audience. Perfect the basics first. Do things that work. And don’t be an asshole.

Also apparently the whole thing was filmed and will be on his website and he might even be selling it and I didn’t sign shit nor did he say that would be the case before we got up there…..sigh.