Bad Luck for Fortune Tellers

Astrologers' predictions of the future have been a feature of the print media for many decades but in the 1990s the fortune telling industry expanded rapidly through psychics, tarot card readers and astrologers providing services by telephone and on the Internet. The increased use of fortune tellers' services by the wider community has raised questions about the accuracy of predictions and in response to complaints from consumers. A regulatory body, the Future Prediction Association of Australia, will be established to provide official accreditation to astrologers, psychics and those who read palms, tea leaves and crystal balls.

Some predictions by fortune tellers have had devastating effects on the lives of the people they are supposed to help. Brenda Smyth, a young single mother from Western Sydney, contacted authorities after she had spent almost $1,400 on lotteries and poker machines after a Tarot card reader assured her that she would come into some money within a month. The anticipated monetary windfall failed to appear and she lamented, "I did all I could to make what Madame Mystery said come true but all I found was a lousy five dollars under the seat of my car." When Lois McDonald, an Adelaide grandmother, visited a psychic in late April she received ominous news of a death or serious illness to an immediate family member. After three weeks of sleepless nights worrying about the health of her family, she won first prize in a lottery and her family continue to be in good health.

The Future Prediction Association of Australia will regulate the industry by requiring any person or organisation purporting to predict the future to undergo a year long process of accreditation during which their ability to predict the future will be tested. Candidates will be required to submit predictions for the coming year which will be evaluated at the conclusion of the accreditation process. Correct predictions which are specific and easily measured will be rated highly while predictions which are vague and open to multiple interpretations will receive a low rating. In addition, failure to predict important events will receive a penalty score. Accredited fortune tellers will be able to advertise their status in TV, print and online advertisements to give consumers peace of mind in their choice of service.

After a hastily organised meeting of fortune tellers, none of whom had any idea that these changes were afoot, their spokesman, Magikal Merylin, responded to the Federal Government announcement with a statement to the media, "on behalf of Australia's psychics, astrologers and other fortune tellers, I am appalled that the Federal Government has seen fit to regulate our industry. They are sending a clear but false message to our clients that we are an untrustworthy industry preying on the insecurities of the general public to make money."

Despite these protests, the formation of the Future Prediction Association of Australia will go ahead and begin the accreditation of fortune tellers in late 2006 after which the number of complaints from customers is expected to decrease dramatically.

 

 Now Synkro (P) you had me going for a minute then I thought I'd either have a new job with the FPA regulatory body or start getting persecuted and burned at the stake for the readings that I've been doing..h teehee

Eleni, June 7, 2006 8:48

 This is a really cool artical!

Samantha, June 7, 2006 6:12

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