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REPORTER EDITOR IN CHIEF Alyssa Jackson PRINT MANAGING EDITOR Gino Fanelli
ONLINE MANAGING EDITOR Alex Jones
COPY EDITOR Bryanne McDonough NEWS EDITOR Taylor Derrisaw TECHNOLOGY EDITOR Michel Zaken LEISURE EDITOR Gino Fanelli FEATURES EDITOR Mandi Moon SPORTS EDITOR Liz Peterson VIEWS EDITOR Jake Krajewski WRITERS Dominique Hessert, Gino Fanelli, Melissa Mendoza, Ryan Black, Bryanne McDonough, Alissa Roy, Alyssa Jackson, Courtney Smith
ART ART DIRECTOR Jordyn Carias ONLINE ART DIRECTOR Max Yeager CONTRIBUTING DESIGNERS Caleb Payne, Brandon Edquist, Dennae Makel, Halli Rosin, Olivia Konys, Jane Rosenthal, Annie Wong
CONTRIBUTING ILLUSTRATORS Kaitlyn Fitzgerald, Caleb Payne, Victoria Savka, Kelsey Skutnick, Ryan Kovar, Max Yeager, Alyssa Minko
PHOTOGRAPHY PHOTO EDITOR Kristen McNicholas CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS
GOLDEN CIRCLE Simon Sinek gives a great TED Talk about something he has named the “golden circle.” The idea, he argues, is that everyone thinks about something from the outside in. We explain the what, the how and then very rarely we explain the why of whatever it is that we are talking about. He applies this to great leaders and companies in business, citing Apple as a clear example. He argues that the reason Apple is so successful is because when they market a new product they start out by telling everyone why it is they do what they do, and then they explain that they have great computers, mp3 players and other devices that back up what they believe. The moral of his lecture is that people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it. At a Reporter general meeting recently, I asked everyone on staff why they were here. I wanted them to tell me what they believed in and how that got them to apply for jobs. What they had to say was heartwarming, and I wanted to share with all of campus why it is that we are here: • • • • • •
To present information in the best way possible To stand for something bigger than RIT and its administration To move someone with art and writing To reach people and make a difference To inspire our readers and be inspired by others on staff To create and leave a legacy for the students that follow us
WHAT HOW WHY
The above reasons, and many more that didn’t get mentioned due to space, are why we are Reporter. Reporter is here to present you information, to inspire you, to move you to some sort of feeling with our abilities and to leave a legacy here at RIT. These things are what we believe in and we hope you believe in them too.
Dominique Hessert, Lloyd McCullough, Cindy Roblero, Kristen McNicholas, Gino Fanelli
BUSINESS BUSINESS MANAGER Jaclyn Bergin AD / PR MANAGER Danielle Sanderson PRODUCTION MANAGER Ryan Walsh ONLINE SYSTEMS ADMINISTRATOR Nathan J. Lichtenstein WEB MANAGER Joe Jankowiak VIDEO EDITOR Sara Caruso
Alyssa Jackson Editor in Chief Letters to the Editor should be sent to rpteic@rit.edu. No letters will be printed unless signed. All letters received become the property of REPORTER.
ADVISOR Rudy Pugliese PRINTING EPi Printing CONTACT 585.475.2212 Reporter Magazine is published monthly during the academic year by a staff comprised of students at Rochester Institute of Technology. Business, Editorial and Design facilities are located in Room A-730, in the lower level of the Campus Center. Our phone number is 1.585.475.2212. The Advertising Department can be reached at 1.585.475.2213. “Better than most tabloids: Reporter Magazine.” NM The opinions expressed in Reporter do not necessarily reflect those of the Institute. Reporter is not responsible for materials presented in advertising areas. Reporter takes pride in its membership in the Associated Collegiate Press and American Civil Liberties Union. Copyright © 2014 Reporter Magazine. All rights reserved. No portion of this Magazine may be reproduced without prior written permission.
October 3
TABLE OF cover illustration by Kelsey Skutnick table of contents photography by Cindy Roblero
NEWS 6
SUGAR HEADACHES AND MORNING HANGOVERS
TECH 8
Reporter looks into alcoholism during one of the most popular holidays of the year
THE EVOLUTION OF HALLOWEEN DECORATIONS AND HAUNTED HOUSES Examining the tech behind the flashiest costumes and most chilling haunted houses
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SCARY APPS How scary can a game on a tiny screen be?
@REPORTERMAG 4 October
SPORTS 10
SCARIEST SPORTS INJURIES Beware: graphics may cause nausea and nightmares
CONTENTS LEISURE 12
THE CASTLE ON THE HILL: A STORY OF AMERICAN DECAY
FE ATURES 18
Inside Dansville’s iconic “Castle on the Hill”
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16
THE GENESEE RIVER KILLER A peek into the life of Rochester’s serial killer
AT YOUR LEISURE A ghastly stream of facts
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INSIDE THE CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY Just what are people like Tom Cruise and John Travolta up to?
SHOWING SKIN: THE ETHICS OF SEXY HALLOWEEN COSTUMES
VIEWS 26
THE POTENTIAL IN DIFFERENT MEDIUMS OF HORROR We explore the best ways to get spooked
28
WOTS Scare me in 10 words or less
Reporter investigates how Halloween stores are influencing young men and women
24
FREAKY FEARS AND FASCINATING PHOBIAS
30
RINGS Call or text us at: 585.672.4840
We know frighteningly little about why things frighten us
REPORTER.RIT.EDU October 5
SUGAR HEADACHES AN D MORNING HANGOVERS
by Dominique Hessert | photography by Dominique Hessert | design by Annie Wong
B “HAS ALCOHOL BECOME A COLLEGE STUDENT’S HALLOWEEN CANDY?” 6 News
eginning at an age of princess and ghost costumes with a goal of candy, Halloween was simple. Then came the painful transition to the infamous “awkward Halloween phase” awaiting us in middle school. Dressing up and going trick or treating? No way, lame! For many, those years meant a scary movie and handing out candy to the young princesses and ghosts with a dream of candy that we once had. As teens approach high school and college, parties occur and drinking starts to play a major role in enjoying the holiday. A study focused around the issue of Student Party Riots revealed that the highest drinking days in the first academic year of college include Halloween, New Year’s Eve and St. Patrick’s Day. According to Inside Higher Ed, many colleges such as Bates College, University of Cincinnati, Keene State College, West Virginia University and more prepare for Halloween with a team of police to handle a night that has a history of community complaints. In the past, University of Cincinnati has repeatedly ended Halloween night in clashes between students and officers. While police officers
of other Universities state that Halloween is a holiday peppered with alcohol-based disruptions, some students at RIT believe that these behaviors are a result of the social behavior in typical college life, regardless of this specific holiday. “I plan on going to more parties on Halloween weekend, but my intake of alcohol remains the same,” fourth year Journalism major Grace Guadagnino said. Guadagnino is not incorrect when suggesting that college is the main factor in the escalation of drinking in young adults in college. According to the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (ANIAA,) every four out of five college students drink alcohol, and half of those students consume it through binge drinking. ANIAA states that 1,825 college students between ages of 18 and 24 die each year from alcohol related injuries. “People drink for events,” continued Guadagnino. “I think people drink during holidays and occasions as a social activity to bring people together.” PRNewswire released alarming statistics in 2014 that show how binge-drinking and drunk driving rates increase remarkably during the holidays. According to the Center
“HORROR MOVIES AND GHOSTS ARE NO LONGER THE SCARIEST PART OF HALLOWEEN” for Disease Control and Prevention, 728 people will be injured or killed each day between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day in drunk driving accidents, a rate two to three times higher than the rest of the year. Even the familial holiday of Thanksgiving has earned a nickname for it’s eve, ‘Blackout Wednesday.’ The expectation for alcohol to bring a higher level of enjoyment has significantly increased the danger that accompanies high alcoholic intake. The expectation of holiday parties to be memorable brings it’s own level of pressure for alcohol, and danger for consumers. Although drinking proves to peak on all holidays, drivers kill more than three times as many people on Halloween as they do on New Years Eve according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The NHTSA states that 44 percent of national fatal crashes during Halloween weekend involve a driver or motorcyclist with BAC of 0.08 or higher. Thirty-eight percent of fatal crashes that occurred on Halloween night involved a driver or
motorcyclist and 23 percent of pedestrian fatalities on Halloween night included a drunk driver. “Compare Halloween to other holidays for college kids. Halloween is our holiday. Thanksgiving and Christmas are for the family,” Guadagnino said. “Halloween revolves around wearing costumes and getting drunk. For college kids specifically, Halloween is that holiday.” College students may have outgrown the trick or treating, but the energy and enthusiasm in Halloween is very much alive and well for college students. Although alcohol may play a role in many parties, the decisions that follow are vital. Horror movies and ghosts are no longer the scariest part of Halloween. The scariest part of Halloween are numbers: the numbers of car accidents, the numbers of deaths, the numbers of DUI’s.
“As a senior, you mature and you realize you don’t have to get hammered because you have a costume on. You don’t have to get drunk because you’re at a party that’s bigger. You can have fun sober, and you can have fun with one drink,” Guadagnino said. Make Halloween a night to remember, not one you want to forget. R
News 7
by Melissa Mendoza illustration by Kaitlyn Fitzgerald design by Halli Rosin
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lthough the actors hired to jump out at you at haunted houses and Halloween attractions still want to creep you out, have you scream in terror and maybe even pee yourself a little, it’s no longer all about them. The tradition of Halloween began about 2,000 years ago, but every year new technology and effects make that scary haunted house even scarier. Halloween gadgets can range from the classic candy bowl with an automated hand to creepy, seizure-inducing light systems. Halloween costumes also play an important role in the thrilling holiday. Costumes can have fake blood pumps integrated into them, as well as lights that make butterfly wings more mystical. They can create illusions of chopped body parts and exposed internal organs. It may sound complex, but in today’s day and age you can check out any local Halloween store and they are bound to have these frightening gadgets that will make your Halloween go from a shriek and a laugh to pure horror. We always hear the words “there’s an App for that!” and Halloween is no exception. NASA engineer Mark Rober created ‘Flesh iWound,’ a fake wound latex insert that allows the user to insert their smartphone or iPod to create a the illusion of a palpitating heart. Apps can also be used to “try-on” Halloween costumes without physically having to do so, allowing consumers to decide on the costumes that will best contribute to their Halloween experience. Another application, “The Walking Dead: Dead Yourself,” gained its popularity among watchers of AMC’s “The Walking Dead.” This application allows users to turn pictures of themselves and friends into zombies using different effects. Similar apps allow users to convert photos of themselves into wolves, corpses and monsters that could be useful when looking for make-up ideas. There are also several apps that provide scary sounds, spooky music, horror effects and ghostlysounding voices. These sound effects can easily aid in dramatizing a haunted house or just terrifying a friend. If you are looking to design the best haunted house, but can’t
8 Tech
think of what decorations will help make it the scariest, there’s definitely an app for that. Websites, such as frightprops.com, ship all types of Halloween decorations needed worldwide. They feature a plethora of technologies that contribute to haunted houses all over the world. They sell products such as flash firecrackers, talking skulls, video effects picture frames and all pneumatic tools to create your own props. Haunted houses traditionally utilize lasers, strobe lights, fog, fake-bloody objects and people, as dark and crammed spaces, pneumatic ghosts and random limbs, just to name a few. It might not sound like much now, but put it all together and experience it on a dark, spooky night, and your heart will sink straight down to your butt in no time. A local haunted house, Dark Matter Scream Works, is Rochester’s only indoor scream park. Its major attractions include ‘Crimson Grove Asylum,’ ‘Zombie Shoot’ and ‘Dark Matter 3D.’ The owner, Joseph Naber, described the evolution of this grand haunted house. “We were a family home haunt for about 10 years, and it just grew too big for our house,” Naber said. “That’s when we rented Henrietta Moose Lodge’s pavilion in 2011.”
Their newer 2015 location, 2599 East Henrietta Road, has allowed them to expand from its origins at 2,300 square feet to now 10,000 square feet of hair-raising, spine chilling fun. They utilize laser effects for floor and walls, UV black lights, moving floors and even water features. “We have several pneumatic props such as tomb stone leapers and a female mourner that can leap up to 8 feet toward you,” Naber added. This Rochester attraction opens the weekend of October second and third, and visitor tickets are buy one get one free. R
SCARY APPS HOW SCARY CAN SOMETHING ON A TINY SCREEN REALLY BE? by Dev Sheth | illustrated by Ray Miller | designed by Jane Rosenthal
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aving grown up with horror films and slasher thrillers, this generation could presumably be too desensitized for horror apps to have an effect. Horror, as a genre, has generally been reduced to blood and gore, a rather crude departure from the rich history of haunted adventures and ghostly whispers. So what chance does a game played on a small LED screen have? Quite a good one, as it turns out!
LIMBO “Limbo” is a black and white 2-dimensional game about a boy in a dangerous forest teaming with giant spiders and assorted deathtraps. The basic gameplay involves the boy walking through the forest, facing deadly obstacles and trying not to get killed. Naturally, he does, over and over. Fortunately he can respawn, allowing the player infinite chances to figure the puzzle out. With clean graphics and a rich but subtle soundtrack, “Limbo” is remarkably fun to play, with its fair share of graphic death. Twisted and morbid, sure. Scary? Not quite.
FIVE NIGHTS AT FREDDY’S Hugely popular among Android users, “Five Nights at Freddy’s” is a game about possessed animatronics. The player’s vantage point is that of a security guard keeping watch over weirdly creepy toys. When his back is turned, the toys come after him. Despite the chilling special effects, “Five Nights at Freddy’s” relies on jumpscares to deliver the chills, neglecting any real story. You get over it once you’ve had a few of them, at which point the game becomes tedious. “The game graphics are not really good, and the gameplay becomes very boring,” second year Computer Science graduate student Harshit Shah said. “Actions are limited, and not that scary either. It is very childish.”
DEAD TRIGGER “Dead Trigger” is a first-person shooter (FPS) game, the goal being to escape from a horde of zombies. With a basic plot line of the zombie apocalypse variety, “Dead Trigger” is fiercely graphic without any particular fear factor. Though the zombies come in various shapes and forms, there is no real element of fear, but rather the staple blood rush of FPS games.
INTO THE DEAD Like “Dead Trigger,” “Into The Dead” is a FPS game centered on a zombie apocalypse. However, it has the added element of being a line-runner as well, which basically simplifies the plot line: dodge zombieobstacles in your path, and pick up weapons along the way. Currently the most popular haunted world game on Android, “Into The Dead” has rich graphics and an awesome soundtrack, but, like “Dead Trigger,” it doesn’t really scare. “The only really scary bit about the game are the sound effects, and even that’s a little funny once you get used to it,” first year Mechanical Engineering graduate student Umesh Sojitra observed. “The gameplay is decently difficult, but it is more adventurous than scary.”
EYES - THE HORROR GAME “Eyes” is a first-person explorer game, where the player must explore a haunted environment by collecting resources while trying to escape from floating spirits. With graphics that resemble night-vision, “Eyes”
would be nostalgic for players familiar with “Paranormal Activity.” However, with a warning to run appearing on the screen before a spirit arrives, “Eyes” loses a little of its substantial fear factor.
SLENDRINA: THE CELLAR From one of the earliest horror game series on Android, “Slendrina: The Cellar” is a firstperson explorer game quite similar to “Eyes.” With graphics far inferior to “Eyes” in both richness of detail and depth, “Slendrina” is a closed first-person explorer game where players must walk through a cellar looking for keys to escape. Unlike “Eyes” “Slendrina” has no warnings, and with the limited vision of the player, it packs an incredible amount of fear into tiny little jump-scares. With a soft haunted soundtrack during regular play, “Slendrina” uses audio effects to push the chills to the limit, with every sighting of “Slendrina” accentuated by a sharp shift in the audio track. And that is why, despite being the shortest of the games on this list, “Slendrina” is by far the scariest, with a consistent and relentless capacity to scare the living daylights out of any player. Or at least shake them up a little. R
Tech 9
by Courtney Smith illustration by Alyssa Minko design by Brandon Edquist
N
early every sports injury is scary to the person getting hurt, but some go above and beyond in their ability to make other people squeal, pass out and even have heart attacks. Athletes can go through life-threatening injuries and still go out and play for their team in a matter of days, weeks or months. This can be a testament to their ability to overcome serious obstacles and their willingness to sacrifice for their love of sport. Hockey players can experience some of the most gruesome of injuries as they are consistently being hit and thrown around with sharp, razor-like blades on their feet. For example, Buffalo Sabres goalie Clint Malarchuk almost died on the ice after a skate cut his jugular vein. Linesman Pat Dapuzzo’s career was ended after a skate basically cut off his nose. A minor league goal tender had his fingers cut off after a player skated over them and several players have suffered from cut tendons. Even though Malarchuk was the one almost dying
10 Sports
on the ice, the horrifying sight of blood spurting out of his neck was enough to give a few audience members heart attacks. Thanks to quick action by the trainers and a ninety minute surgery with 300 stitches, he was able to recover quickly. Malarchuk only spent one night in the hospital, was back practicing after four days and was in the goal a week after the incident. A similar incident to Malarchuk’s happened in 2006, in the Frank Ritter Ice Arena at RIT. The U.S. development team was playing the RIT men’s hockey when one of the U.S. players’ ice skates came up and sliced teammate Chris Atkinson’s throat, cutting his jugular vein. “Blood started squirting out immediately and everyone in attendance (players, coaches and fans) was instantly horrified,” RIT men’s hockey team coach Wayne Wilson said. The RIT Ambulance and Strong Hospital were able to save his life in the small amount of time they had before he would have bled out.
“I was looking at the play, and after [Palm] got flipped I saw his skate coming toward me,” Atkinson recounted. “I closed my eyes, and the next thing I know, I’m going down. I thought my collarbone was broken because I couldn’t move my left arm. Then I felt the heat from all the blood pouring down.” It would take Atkinson over a year and a half to play in another hockey game as the incident also severed a nerve in his shoulder. Unfortunately, he was only able to get into minor league hockey and was never able to fulfill his dream of playing in the NHL. Concussions happen in nearly every sport and are not uncommon, but some of them can get very dangerous. According to Thomas McNulty, President of the RIT Ambulance, concussions are one of the scariest common injuries because of how bad they can get. Severe or multiple concussions can sometimes lead to memory loss, brain damage and psychological disorders triggered by the trauma. One example of a severe concussion happened
“SEVERE OR MULTIPLE CONCUSSIONS CAN SOMETIMES LEAD TO MEMORY LOSS, BRAIN DAMAGE AND PSYCHOLOGICAL DISORDERS TRIGGERED BY THE TRAMA.” during Super Bowl 1998 when Denver Broncos running back, Terrell Davis, got kicked in the head and went out cold. He told everyone he was fine when he woke, but was actually slowly going blind. Davis went back in for a single play and was unable to see a thing. The coach told him, “It doesn’t matter if you can see ‘cause we’re gonna fake it to you.” Thankfully, he survived the play without his vision and was able to see again after receiving migraine medication. Davis returned after approximately fifteen minutes and still holds the record he made that day by scoring three touchdowns in a Super Bowl. “We have been pretty fortunate over the years to not have anything too crazy,” RIT men’s lacrosse coach Jake Coon stated. “But
I would say the craziest one that we had was a player losing a testicle after being hit with a shot. I guess that was probably the weirdest of all.” A similar injury happened to rugby player Wayne Shelford who had his scrotum ripped open by a cleat, forcing him to jog off the field with a testicle hanging out of him. Shelford ended up getting stitched up by the trainer on the bench. The incident was broadcasted on French television. After receiving the stiches, he went back into the game to continue playing. In wrestling, dislocated elbows are fairly common, but that doesn’t stop them from being horrifying. Although RIT men’s wrestling coach Scott Stever has seen it happen often and has experienced it with
three of his wrestlers during his coaching career, he still considers them to be the scariest and the most gruesome. Dislocated elbows usually results in shock and can even be fatal if it begins hemorrhaging from an open wound. Dislocations only occasionally result in reduced range of motion, strength, pain or instability and most wrestlers continue to compete after healing. Nearly every athlete gets injured at least once in their career and these injuries range from minor to life-threatening. The most surprising thing about the most serious and scariest injuries is the ability of the athletes to spring back and continue playing regardless of their fear. R
Sports 11
THE CASTLE ON THE HILL:
A STORY OF AMERICAN DECAY by Gino Fanelli | photography by Gino Fanelli | design by Annie Wong
“THROUGH THE TREES, THE FACADES OF PEELING SIDING LEER OUTWARD; COTTAGES THE CULTURAL ELITE ONCE TOOK UP RESIDENCE NOW FALLING TO RUIN.” 12 Leisure
F
rom Health Road in Dansville, NY, you can hardly make out the decrepit bricks making up the structure of the former Jackson Sanatorium. Up a small incline, the sprawling structure rises above the trees, revealing an expansive, castle-like structure. The shell of a building that revels in structural beauty, reminiscent of an era long passed in the history of upstate NY. The once elegant arches and balconies are now caked with rust and crumbling away from the building’s face. The window panes, once delicately filling in the space of brick arches, now stand covered with decaying plywood, streaked with crude spray can obscenities at the lower floors, a foreboding sign to wayward explorers. The upper level windows provide a glimpse into the building’s interior; an endless, abysmal black. This was not always the case. The Jackson Sanatorium’s history provides a fascinating glimpse into a world of antiquated cult medicine that appears in
various periods of American history. It all started in 1854 with Dr. Caleb Jackson, a proponent of a popular nineteenth century medical fad known as psychiatric hydrotherapy. Hydrotherapy itself has roots in Ancient Greek and Roman medicine, and was later brought back into the public eye by Belgian writer Franciscus Mercurius van Helmont in 1694. Helmont believed that all human mental distresses, such as laziness, anxiety, depression or insanity, were due to an imbalance within the human spirit, which could be treated by “shocking” with water. In this case, Helmont proposed hanging patients by their ankles and submerging them up to the waist in cold water until they lost consciousness. If the patient was revived, Helmont postulated that the spirit would be tamed and sanity restored. These techniques were not limited to the truly insane, but often to to those who were simply jobless or lazy. One could argue the
technique worked more as a punishment rather than a cure for mental maladies. By the nineteenth century, running water had become more accessible, and thus hydrotherapy made a resurgence. However, the treatment methods were much less severe than Helmont’s, instead opting for systems including mineral baths, cold water shocking (known as “douching”) and whirlpool baths. Based around beliefs of the Seventh Day Adventist Church, practitioners of hydrotherapy preached a policy of refraining from drugs, tobacco, alcohol and red meat, with a diet emphasizing fruits and unprocessed grains. While stress, nervous breakdowns and mental illness were all symptoms that hydrotherapy practitioners proposed to be able to cure, alcoholism became a main target in treatment, a fundamental teaching by both Jackson and his main competitor, JH Kellogg. With a diet emphasizing heavy consumption of unprocessed grains, a meal most patients found unpalatable, Jackson produced Granula in 1863, the first commercial cold cereal. Granula was made from graham flour, twice baked and broken into small nuggets that had to be soaked overnight prior to being eaten. Meanwhile, Kellogg produced a similar product with the identical name. In order to avoid a lawsuit, Kellogg renamed the product “granola,” soon taking off as a pioneer of the cereal industry. Jackson’s “Our Home on the Hill” remained successful throughout his life, becoming a popular destination for figures including Frederick Douglass, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and, perhaps most notably, Clara Barton. Founder of the American Red Cross and devout believer in the Sanatorium, Barton would settle in Dansville, establishing the first local chapter of the American Red Cross there. But the glory days of hydrotherapy would come to a close as medical and pharmacological advances moved ever forward. Thus, the Sanatorium would file for bankruptcy in 1914, reopening briefly as a psychiatric ward for World War I soldiers. The Castle would experience a revival under former professional wrestler and magazine mogul Bernarr McFadden as the Physical Culture Hotel in 1929. Emphasizing body building and fitness, the hotel became a resort for celebrities up until McFadden’s death in 1955, where it was reopened again by William Fromcheck as “Bernarr McFadden’s Castle on the Hill.” Popularity
steadily declined for the next two decades, and on Labor Day in 1971, the Castle on the Hill would permanently close its doors. The rich history is dampened by the lingering dust in the air, floating over the opening into the Castle’s blackness. Strewn across the ground are piles of brick rubble, empty Busch Light cans and charred bits of refuse left behind from a 2011 arson. Through the trees, the facades of peeling siding leer outward, cottages the cultural elite once took up residence... now falling to ruin. Inside, the Castle takes on an eerie silence, blocking out the echoes of frogs, birds and crickets running through the woods. To say this is a place time forgot would be a misnomer. Rather, from the thick coating of dust and ash on every surface, to the rust lingering on forgotten equipment and the satanic graffiti plaguing the walls of the interior, this is a place time has ravaged. It is a place where the trials of nature and teenage delinquency have torn this fragile piece of forgotten history asunder.
The main hallway, lined with decaying pillars which seem ever nearing the verge of collapse and the soft echoes of one’s own footsteps floating down the corridors resonate as a piercing reminder of just how empty this place truly is. Reaching the center of the hallway, a massive staircase creeps upwards, illuminated by the setting sun creeping in through the collapsed rear wall. The depths of darkness reach in either direction away from this spot, yet here, through the ever depleting sunlight, one can catches glimpses of the once regal engravings in the railings, slowly fading beneath dust and peeling enamel paint. All in haunting, unnerving silence. From the castle’s face to its interior, The Castle on The Hill presents a story all too common in Upstate NY; an opulent, sprawling legacy rich with elements of signature Americana, now left to linger and rot in the September sun. To see a video of Reporter staff exploring the Jackson Sanatorium, visit reporter.rit.edu.
“THE UPPER LEVEL WINDOWS PROVIDE A GLIMPSE INTO THE BUILDING’S INTERIOR; AN ENDLESS, ABYSMAL BLACK”
A view of one of the stairwells inside of the asylum. Leisure 13
t he G ENE SSE E RI VE R
K IL L E R by Alyssa Jackson | photography by Cindy Roblero | design by Halli Rosin
A view of the Driving Park Bridge, one of Arthur Shawcross’s dumpsites,from Lower Falls in Rochester, N.Y.
tt
"
he first body we found was a woman named Dorothy,” said Charles Siragusa, a senior United States District Judge for Western New York. “Then there were a series of bodies found, so it became apparent that it was the work of one individual.” This one individual was Arthur Shawcross, although law enforcement
14 Leisure
didn’t know this at the time of their 1988 investigation and wouldn’t know it for two more years. Between 1988 and 1990, Shawcross was responsible for the murder of at least 11 victims in the Rochester area, though there is speculation that there may be more. The man struck fear in the heart of Rochester as the “Genesee River Killer.”
Siragusa was one of the main men who helped put Shawcross away for the murders. During the time, Siragusa served as the prosecution on the case, battling insanity pleas so that Shawcross wouldn’t get away for the second time in his criminal career.
the beginning of it all Shawcross was born in 1945 in Maine before his family moved to Watertown, New York, according to Crime and Investigation. Shawcross claimed during his trial to have had a terrible childhood with an abusive mother and sexually abusive extended family. Members of his family denied these claims and there were no reports of abuse during his childhood filed, so it became a hearsay argument. There were, however, several reports of bad behavior in school before he dropped out of the ninth grade. Shawcross later claimed to have been an Army sniper in Vietnam, resorting to cannibalism during the war. “We interviewed his supervising officer and found out that he wasn’t a sniper, he was in supply,” said Siragusa with a chuckle. These claims were an attempt to plea insanity at the time of the murders, a strategy that would end up failing. Shawcross by and large flew under the radar despite his erratic behavior. Written off as a troubled boy, Shawcross’s claim to fame didn’t begin until after he had left the military and returned to Watertown. It was at this time he killed his first victim: ten-yearold Jack Blake.
a taste for murder Blake was a child from Shawcross’s neighborhood. He was missing for five months before his body, which had been sexually assaulted and suffocated, was found. It wasn’t long after this that eightyear old Karen Ann Hill’s body was found in Watertown as well. Shawcross was eventually caught and found guilty for the murder of Hill. He confessed to both crimes, but was not charged in Blake’s death due to a plea deal. He was sentenced to 25 years but was released on parole after serving less than 15. Some sources claim that Shawcross was released despite warnings by psychologists not to. Many sources blame an overcrowded prison system for the oversight. Whatever the reason, Shawcross went free and was run
out of several towns for his criminal record. Authorities eventually decided to seal his record to prevent public outcry before relocating to Rochester. Twenty-seven-year-old prostitute Dorothy Blackburn’s body was found in March of 1988. It is unclear whether Shawcross targeted prostitutes for being unlikely to be missed, or to to highlight his sexual inadequacies. “The point clearly came where law enforcement believed we had a serial killer; and despite efforts by the police, we weren’t finding who this was,” said Siragusa.
the genessee river killer The case gathered national media attention as police searched for the Genessee River Killer. Rochester Police interviewed prostitutes and the homeless, searching for a man that they believed to have a military background based on the kills. State police were called in and help came in the form of an FBI profiler and other federal agents. It wasn’t until a helicopter was patrolling the North Hampton Park that a new clue came into the case. Searching for the body of missing prostitute Felicia Stephens, law enforcement instead saw the frozen body of June Cicero near a silver car with Shawcross in it, according to Siragusa. “It came out that he frequented the Genesee River where a lot of the bodies had surfaced,” Siragusa said. “Up to this point eight bodies had been found, including one in which the head was missing.” Despite this evidence, police had nothing to charge Shawcross with until the next day, when another prostitute claimed that he had solicited her services. Police brought Shawcross in for questioning based on this charge, and eventually obtained a confession.
the trial Siragusa explained that Shawcross could not fall back on an insanity plea because his attempts to cover up the bodies clearly showed conscious intent. “It’s important to understand that to plead insanity, you have to claim that you didn’t know what you were doing,” Siragusa said. The defense attempted to claim that he
suffered from disorders such as multiple personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder and labeled him as a schizoid psychopath. Linday Schenkel, an associate professor in the Psychology department at RIT, explained that while serial killers share traits with those who suffer from antisocial personality disorder, there is an important difference between the two. “Serial killers are psychopaths,” she said. “Not just someone who’s antisocial or breaks the rules, it’s really a lack of empathy. Many [serial killers] suffer from antisocial personality disorder, but they also have no ability to feel for other people.” It’s uncertain what types of mental disorders that may have been at the root of Shawcross’s disturbing problems. “If you look at any of the tapes of the trial you’ll notice he just sat there and didn’t show any emotion,” Siragusa explained. “The guard told me that he was animated once he was out of the presence of the jury, I don’t know if it was just an act to get the jury to believe an insanity defense.” Either way, the jury dismissed his insanity plea and Shawcross was charged with all ten counts of second- degree murder in Monroe County, later being charged with one count of murder in Wayne County for Elizabeth Gibson. He was sentenced to 25 years for each count, totaling 250 years of imprisonment. He died in prison on Nov. 10, 2008 due to cardiac arrest. You might be asking yourself at this point why you read an entire article on a serial killer that killed a few decades ago and is now dead. ‘What does this have to do with me?’ you may be wondering. The answer is simple, actually: no one ever believes it will happen to them. “A couple of things stand out about the case,” said Siragusa. “First of all, if you ask someone where a serial killer will strike, they won’t say Rochester. New York City or Los Angeles, but definitely not Rochester. If it happens in Rochester, it can happen anywhere.” The other thing that continues to stay with Siragusa, years after putting away the monster of anyone’s nightmares, is that he was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. “If I were to ask you what a serial killer looks like, you would describe someone crazy looking, drooling, something like the Nightmare on Elm Street movies. Shawcross didn’t look like that, he looked like someone’s grandfather,” said Siragusa. “Bad people come in all sizes, and he was as bad as they come.” R
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by Gino Fanelli | design & illustration by Caleb Payne
In 2012, Colombian police reported 1,200 cases of druggings by Scopolamine, or “Devil’s Breath,” a drug which sends users into a susceptible, zombie-like state.
The term “zombie” comes from the Haitian “zombi,” referring to those who were dosed with tetrodoxin to the point of seeming death, only to be revived in a trance-like state, often as slaves. In 2013, Ohio man Anthony Yahle was revived after 45 minutes of no heart activity.
Members of the La Familia Michoacana and the Knights Templar cartels have recruits eat human hearts as a part of a ritualistic induction ceremony.
The Santeria ritual of Eyebale requires the sacrifice of a live farm animal, including chicken, goats and pigs.
Maryland’s “Goatman” is a local legend believed to be a mad scientist who accidentally spliced with the genes of a goat, and now runs wild with a thirst for blood.
Elizabeth Bathory, contrary to popular belief, is not believed to have bathed in the blood of her victims.
Colombia’s Luis Garavito is the most prolific serial killer of the past 100 years, with 138 confirmed victims and estimates of over 400, all young boys. R
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the cure for awkward silence 585.672.4840
INSIDE THE CHURCH OF
SCIENTOLOGY by Gino Fanelli | illustration by Max Yeager design by Dennae Makel
I
t’s noon on Sunday, September 6 in Buffalo, NY. I’m sitting in a waiting room mulling over a copy of L. Ron Hubbard’s “Dianetics” while a man in his late 20s named Francois banters cryptically into his phone with a thick French-Canadian accent. The wooden rafter above him is adorned with three brass insignias: a cross with a star in its center, two interlocked triangles with an “S” running through them and a single triangle sporting an infinity symbol across its center. This is the Buffalo Church of Scientology, an official chapter of the international Scientology religion. Today it calls a historic church in Buffalo’s Allentown District, opened on June 30, 2012, home. Scientology, in short, is a belief system founded by twentieth century science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard. Fundamentally, Scientologists 18 Features
believe that all of mankind’s bad feelings, faults, emotions and mental illnesses are caused by bad memories, or baggage, carried on by our immortal souls, or “Thetans, from life to life. Through a counselor, or “auditor,” a person is able to cleanse themself of these faults and acknowledge their Thetans, which in time, can lead to a person becoming smarter, more socially conscious, more agile and — at the higher levels — develop abilities such as ESP or telepathy. Perhaps the concept seems a bit far-fetched, but not much more so than other religions. With a modern decor and a relatively inviting atmosphere, the interior of the church doesn’t differ much from that of any other religion. Rows of texts that could be be Bibles or Qurans are replaced with copies of “Dianetics,” the walls are consistently adorned with symbols reminiscent of
traditional religions and the staff has the typical energetic, smiling exuberance expected of young parishioners. From the waiting room, it’s difficult to truly see anything fundamentally different about this church from any other modern institution. “’Dianetics’ means ‘Through the mind,” Francois said. “That was the first book in 1950 that Mr. Hubbard wrote regarding his discoveries about the mind, about how these past negative experiences and accidents have emotional charge in it, and how that affects a person on a daily basis.” Francois led me into the main chamber of the church, a large, open area occupied by screening booths fitted with flat screen televisions, each playing videos discussing different facets of the religion. Each booth focused on a different topic of Scientology, from the fundamentals of Dianetics to the
pathway to ridding yourself of addictions to nicotine, drugs and alcohol, all of which were explained as burdens a Thetan puts on the body. In other words, an addiction is essentially a physical manifestation of a Thetan’s natural negative energy. It often comes off as convoluted, with strange false equivalencies made throughout the videos. “If you were to have a kidney removed,” the narrator in the video on the basics of Dianetics questions, “Would you feel as if you were a different person afterwards? Of course not, and that is because your being is
much more than a body, but rather a host for your immortal soul.” Again, the philosophy of any religion can seem absurd from an impartial, objective observer’s standpoint. Is our free will being the result of Christ’s sacrifice truly that much more of a logical conclusion than the idea that we are all immortal beings floating from host to host? It’s a belief that many religions have already postulated in theories of reincarnation. Faith doesn’t have to be based in rationality, but the very construct of how the Church of
Scientology presents these beliefs can, at times, become unnerving. As previously mentioned, these videos are played in screening booths, each focused on a different topic. However, the booths themselves are designed in a manner reminiscent of Alex’s brainwashing in Stanely Kubrick’s “A Clockwork Orange,” though of course to a lesser degree. The benches are set with a small space between them and a cubicle wall divider at their back, leaving approximately 12 inches between the viewer’s face and the screen playing the Features 19
video. Thus, the videos, which consist often of rapid shifts in landscapes, colors and brief skits, create a disorienting visual effect, accompanied with a soothing narrator stating bizarre, pseudo-scientific statements about what the church can do to help you. I developed a migraine that lasted for several hours after watching an hour’s worth of videos in the screening booths. Secondary is the actual content of the videos, which are generally extremely positive insights about life and how the church can help you live it to the fullest. However, they are riddled with strange logical inconsistencies. Notably, one video, which featured a bevy of young, beautiful people talking about why they were Scientologists — akin to Reporter’s “Word On The Street” segment — provided a strange juxtaposition to another video which featured several of these same people acting in skits. Behind the booths sits a plastic box featuring a needle gauge and several dials hooked up to two electrical cables attached to aluminum cylinders. “This basically helps a person to locate a thought,” Francois said. “A person will hold onto these two sensors, and the needle will move. The person’s who’s helping can say ‘What about right now?’ Pictures can go fast, and this machine can help a person track down the memories they didn’t know they had, and then the person can talk about it.” This machine is called an electropsychometer, or “e-meter.” Invented by chiropractor Volney Mathison in the 1940s, the e-meter essentially puts an extremely small electrical charge into the two handles held by the user. The meter calculates the resistance of the current, which is then displayed by the needle. While the Church maintains that these changes in resistance are measurements of “the mental state and change of state in individuals,” or stress, the reality is that the slightest change in moisture, involuntary muscle contractions or nerve activity can cause a change in resistance and cause the needle to move. Also of note is that the auditor has the full ability to manipulate
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the machine to produce different results, as well as the fact that the Church must legally declare that this is not a medical device due to a 1963 FDA raid on the grounds the Church was attempting to treat mental illness without any medical authority. My guide to the e-meter, a soft-spoken 30-something person dressed in a white button up and black tie named Max, had me place the two cylinders in my hands, instructing me to hold them gently. “You’re not going to be able to see exactly what the guy is thinking,” Max said. “You won’t be able to read minds or anything like that necessarily, but based off of the question, they can help you locate the cause of your stress, and also indicate when that stress has been resolved.” I held the cylinders in my hands and patiently studied the meter. “Think of different people and situations in your life,” Max asked. I stood in the same position, picturing friends and family. The needle jumped. “You thought of something, that’s for sure,” Max said. We continued to go through a series of mental images and pictures. Each time the needle jumped, though sometimes after a momentary pause. But this is not to give credit to the e-meter. When asked to picture my mother, I mentally pictured Tom Hanks. The needle jumped. I was asked to picture my girlfriend, who is a work of fiction I developed on the spot. Again, the needle jumped. I began to understand that no matter what I thought, no matter what lies I fed to the auditor or the machine, the needle would jump all the same. This was a surreal experience, but one that played into my growing understanding of how Scientology attracts people. It’s a very simple concept of perpetuating the belief that something beyond your control — or that of traditional medicine — is wrong with you, and only they have the technology to fix it. It is why the e-meter is a device patented to the Church, and presumably why Max continued to be intentionally vague when describing what the readings actually meant.
This interpretation, that Scientology is essentially a self-help community under the guise of religion, was seemingly confirmed by my testing experience. I was given two tests over the course of an hour, a personality test and an IQ test, each with 200 questions. The personality test was simple enough, though odd in its own right. A seemingly endless list of questions which challenged me to agree, disagree, or maintain uncertainty on topics such as “Do you enjoy working by yourself more than in the company of others?” or “Do you believe that all people are inherently good?” The IQ test consisted of simple multiple-choice logic questions, asking
me to complete series of numbers or interpret patterns in shapes. All of the questions were relatively simple, though some impossible to answer due to typos. The experience was a tax on my patience, but I still managed to answer the questions thoughtfully and thoroughly. Upon completing my test, Max sat down with me in a cubicle off of the edge of the main church floor. My personality test results were displayed as a line chart, displaying my results on various spectra, such as “depressed” and “happy,” or “composed” and “nervous.” At the center, a thick grey marker represented the levels for “normal.” “These are actually pretty good from
most people I’ve seen,” Max said. “You’re critical, you easily find fault in the things that you do, while this shows lack of accord, meaning you don’t necessarily get along with others the best. Those are the two main points, but you’re also manic in regards to happiness. Which means you’re not necessarily suicidal, but you fluctuate a lot.” These results come from the Oxford Capacity Analysis Test, and though the name rings with legitimacy, the test itself has been widely panned by psychologists for being inaccurate and used by the Church for facetious, unethical reasons. It became apparent that Max’s intent was not to tell me what was right with me, but instead to make a point as to what needs to be fixed, in a way that was so undeniably vague that I could not help but agree with some of his points. Yet, could any person truthfully make the statement that they don’t criticize themselves? Or that they don’t have conscious moments of self-doubt? All religions provide a promise of salvation or peace of mind. Yet where Scientology detaches from traditional religion in this regard is in the statement that medicine, or any traditional means, cannot help you, only the Church can. And help does not come cheap. Max urged me to enroll in courses through the Church, all with layouts that dictate what portion of your life they’re going to help you fix. For example, a course on “Personal Efficiency” runs with a $50 price tag. A two-day seminar on “Dianetics,” which promises to help you achieve self-respect and confidence, runs $100. Yes, a lot of churches accept tithes and donations, but few, if any, explicitly charge for what the religion offers. Looking past the apparent cash grab, the promotion of any belief system that shuns traditional medicine can be harmful. Take the 2003 death of Elli Perkins, a senior auditor at the Church of Scientology of Buffalo. Perkins subscribed to her Church duty to shun psychiatrists, instead attempting to treat her schizophrenic son Jeremy through Scientology, which
eventually lead to him stabbing her to death. The Church’s reaction was to take strides to distance themselves as far from Jeremy Perkins as they could. Faith is challenging, and from the outside looking in any religion can look absurd or surreal. But as I strode down Main Street in Buffalo away from The Church, I began to wonder about what the true goal of such a church could be. Was it hope for the desperate, or simply a flytrap for those desperate for hope? R
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S howing Skin by Alissa Roy illustration by Ryan Kovar design by Halli Rosin
The Ethics of Sexy Halloween Costumes
“H
alloween is the one day a year when a girl can dress up like a total slut and no other girls can say anything else about it.” This seemingly insignificant quote from the popular movie “Mean Girls” opens up a whole floor of ethical debate surrounding the murky topic of sexualization of Halloween costumes for young women. “Sexy” costumes are a tradition for modernday Halloween celebrations; in 2006, a costume store owner told the New York Times that 90-95 percent of her female costumes had a “flirty edge.” Going “sexy, not scary” to a party is not a new concept. However, in more recent years, this tradition has increased exponentially, and it has started filtering down toward younger and younger generations of women.
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Inside Run-of-the-Mill Costume Shops Walking into a Halloween store, women smile on the packages of endless scanty costumes. To a certain extent, this is basic consumer demand. According to Forbes Magazine, $2.6 billion is spent on Halloween costumes annually in the United States, and over half of that comes from adults. A consenting adult deciding to spend her money on “sexy” costumes is one thing. Many adult women find the freedom to dress however they like empowering or see it as a rare chance to explore their sexuality
without others passing judgement. The problem is that this defense does not work with young girls and teens. While adults have the ability to consent, girls age 13 and younger do not — and the increasing sexualization of Halloween costumes is beginning to affect them more and more. Looking at the boy’s costumes, the picture on the front of any one will show a boy, perhaps 11 or 12, wearing what looks like a replica of a policeman costume except in miniature. Not surprising; that might be what is expected in the “career costume” section. It holds true for one side of the store, but when you venture into the girls’ side, it’s a very different story.
The picture on the front of the female police costume shows a girl, also around 11 or 12, also dressed in a police uniform — except they are wearing high heels and the uniform isn’t really a uniform, but rather a fluffy police-blue miniskirt with a badge pinned against her developing chest. Costumes such as this spanned across more than half of what is available for young girls. Going through Party City’s selection of career costumes, you might notice another strange phenomenon: almost all of the young girl’s “career” costumes show girls twisting themselves into suggestive poses for costumes such as cop, car hop and pop star. This is in stark contrast to the boys, all of whom are smiling toothily as a cop, admiral, king, construction worker, racecar driver, SWAT member, duck hunter or fireman, among other jobs. Are you beginning to see a pattern? Switching over to the adult “career” costumes, the women are all wearing the same types of career outfits as the younger ones, but even more scantily-clad than their younger counterparts. Some of the men had skin exposed, but not nearly as much as any of the women, despite the fact that there were many more careers for men to choose from. So you begin to wonder: what is really happening here? Is Halloween being marketed to sexualize women from a young age? Is society making young girls feel as though there isn’t much of a choice other than to dress “sexily?” Is this making it seem as though society is valuing looks over intellect, ethics, character, etc.? And what are the long-term implications?
The Effects of Sexualization on Young Women “Little girls are taught that there is value in their appearance from the very beginning … Little girls’ costumes are pretty, no matter what they are,” said Darci Lane-Williams, the director for the Center for Women and Gender at RIT. “That goes with the bigger societal problem that women are to be judged by their appearance and their looks. When you get to the women’s costumes, everything is sexy.” An American Psychological Association study performed in 2007 said that “the proliferation of sexualized images of girls and young women in advertising, merchandising and media is harmful to girls’ self-image and healthy development.” This statement refers to the views society has of women in general and isn’t just referring to Halloween; however, Halloween can be seen as the one day a year on which these problems are more noticeable. “It’s a reflection of our larger society,” said Lane-Williams. “So much is placed on us being attractive.” Lane-Williams went on to explain that even though women are gaining larger traction in society and it is socially acceptable for them to perform more roles than just homemaker, they are still expected to be sexy while doing so. “Young women better have a really strong sense of self to exist in this world right now,” she said.
What Can We Do About It? The over-sexualization of young women cannot be summed up in any easy way, and it is difficult to quantifiably test how these costumes will affect girls in the years to come. Some may feel that they have little to do with this problem. Dressing up sexy one day a year, what can be the harm in that? It isn’t wrong to express sexuality, and if anything, why should this be limited to only one day a year? Others may see this one day as a larger problem in our society. Are girls being taught that their sexuality and looks should be valued above other traits from a young age, and do sexy Halloween costumes play a significant part? These questions don’t yet have definitive answers. However, this is an issue that should be acknowledged, and not ignored. What an ethical conundrum. Now that’s one way to terrify the mind. R
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by Bryanne McDonough Photography by Dominique Hessert Illustration by Kelsey Skutnick Design by Olivia Konys
I
t’s an ordinary, blissful day, until you see it: a spider, glaring at you menacingly. Your heart starts racing, hands start sweating. Your breath gets shorter. Every instinct is telling you to run far, far away. You can’t think rationally, can’t calm down to see that it is not really a threat. This is not an ordinary fear; you have a phobia. 24 Features
F
ear, to a certain extent, is necessary for survival. It stops us from jumping off cliffs and approaching wild animals, and tells us when we should be wary of a threat. At a certain point, however, fear becomes crippling and inconvenience. Jessamy Comer, a lecturer at RIT who holds a doctorate in psychology, defined what differentiates a phobia from a fear. “A phobia is an irrational fear. When you have a phobia, it’s out of proportion to the threat of the object or situation,”said Comer. Flying in an airplane can be a rational fear, as you are putting your life into the hands of an unseen person; however, commercial airlines fly thousands of people every day who can overcome this fear. Someone who has a phobia of flying, on the other hand, will refuse to get on a plane. If they were forced to be on a plane, they would likely have an anxiety attack.
someone with a fear of spiders may have been bitten by one as a child, which eventually led to a phobia. This is only speculation, as psychologists are not sure what causes specific phobias. All phobias appear the same in brain scans, which makes research about them difficult. According to Comer, there are five different categories of phobias: animal, blood injection injury, situational, natural environment and other. Animal phobias include insects, snakes, spiders and other creatures. Blood injection injury includes everything from physical blood to needles. Fear of confined spaces, flying and any other fear that has to do with setting or location falls under situational phobias. Natural environment phobias cover earthquakes, thunderstorms and other natural phenomena. The other category covers phobias that don’t fall into the other categories, like a fear of choking or vomiting.
WHERE DO PHOBIAS COME FROM?
DIAGNOSIS
Scientists know surprisingly little about this very common psychological disorder, especially when it comes to how they develop. Phobias are categorized under anxiety disorders, similar to Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Anxiety disorders tend to be caused by a part of the brain called the amygdala, according to the American Psychological Association (APA). The amygdala deals primarily with emotions; when something goes wrong, it can affect emotional behavior, like fear. Most of the available information on phobias comes from what scientists know about other anxiety disorders. There is very little research that focuses on phobias in particular, which means that researchers have yet to discover the exact biological mechanisms that cause phobias.
DIFFERENT PHOBIAS Phobias usually appear in late adolescence or early adulthood. Phobias that develop in children tend to go away on their own, while those in adults usually need treatment. Comer speculates that phobias could stem from incidents during childhood. For example,
Psychiatrists don’t usually use words like “claustrophobia” or “arachnophobia” when describing phobias, Comer says. Instead, they will use terms more friendly to their patients, of which there are many. “Phobias are the number one psychological disorder in terms of frequency,” Comer explained. Although it is difficult to get a good estimate, Comer says that approximately 10 percent of the population is afflicted with phobias. Other estimates, such as the National Alliance on Mental Illness, go up to 20% percent. The statistics are difficult to calculate because of the reluctance of those who suffer from phobias to seek treatment. Those who do seek treatment work with psychiatrists to see if their fear qualifies as an irrational phobia. Comer stated that there are certain criteria that must be met before a fear is declared a phobia. Some signs the psychiatrist will look for is if the fear causes extreme distress or anxiety and if the fear interferes with everyday functioning.
stimulus. While the stimulus is absent, patients will be taught how to force their bodies to relax through breathing techniques, meditation and going to their “happy place.” “Before they even start to treat the phobia, they teach you how it feels to make yourself relax,” said Comer. After learning this, patients practice these techniques while being presented with a picture of their stimulus, eventually building up to exposure to the stimulus itself. Typically, treatment takes about six weeks, according to Comer. Occasionally, the anxiety is so intense that it is necessary to use medication to aid the treatment. In these cases, antianxiety medication is used to help patients learn how to relax in the presence of the stimulus. The medication is not intended to be permanent; instead, it is only used until the patient can learn to relax for themselves. Comer says that phobias tend to be the most easily treated among the psychological disorders, but that there are still instances where the phobia is so severe that patients cannot be cured, although this is not common. As with most mental illnesses, the hardest part about getting cured is seeking help. A large portion of people with specific phobia will go untreated, and of those only 20 percent will be fully cured. In contrast, a large majority of those that seek help will be cured. If you are concerned that you or someone you love has or is developing a phobia or anxiety, please contact the RIT Counseling Center. R
TREATMENT After a phobia is categorized, most patients can be fully cured after Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT). CBT focuses on teaching the brain how to think rationally and change behaviors. The cognitive aspect will focus on relaxation techniques; the behavioral part of the treatment involves slowly building exposure to the
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by Ryan Black Illustration by Victoria Savka Design by Olivia Konys
L
ike any genre, horror has gone through several permutations as it has been adapted from medium to medium, changing with the times as well as the platform. Horror in perhaps its most recognizable form, film, was itself the next step after the gothic writers of the 19th century, like Edgar Alan Poe and Mary Shelley. Within the past 30 years, the concept of horror has seen re-imagination yet again within video games, incorporating new as well as existing concepts from film. This is a trend that could see a new spark with the advent of virtual reality (VR) technology. While each of these re-inventions play upon similar elements of the genre, they are each unique in their methods to frighten and create horror. Being a static and more concise experience, film can exert a great degree of control when conveying its vision. While 12 Leisure
games are certainly capable of this, they have to consider player agency and the variety of possible inputs a player could make as well. A film, as something that is consumed passively, can concentrate on its presentation without having to be changed or altered based on the audiences’ whims. Every element that goes into the cinematography of a horror movie can be controlled to more precisely facilitate the creator’s intent; they always have charge over the camera angle, camera movement, pacing, timing of musical and sound cues, etc. Even when a game tries to implement cinematic stylings -- often in the form of a cutscene -- there is a limit to what the designers can do. No two players are going to reach a cutscene at the same point or having played exactly the same way. Everyone’s experience -even if the difference is only slight -- can vary from another, affecting the ability
such a cutscene might have on scaring the player. Compare that to a film like “Alien,” where the pacing of the story is pivotal towards building up suspense until just the right moment; without that timing, the payoff in the second half of the film would not be as rewarding. Even as technology allows games to embrace increasingly cinematic cutscenes, such moments can feel contrived compared to the rest of the game. The most effective horror in games stems from situations where your own decisions and actions matter. Survival horror games like 2014’s “The Evil Within” -- as well as it’s spiritual predecessor the “Resident Evil” series -- stimulate panic from the player by tasking them with their own survival; even a well done and horrific cutscene can seem to miss the point. There can be a place in horror games for cutscenes and elements of cinematography, but the most genuine scares and excitement are triggered by situations where a player’s input is required. The recently released “Until Dawn” is designed to play with the expectations one might have from only watching horror. Ripe with all the cliche characters and tropes of a teen slasher movie, the game is set up in a way for the player to expect it to inevitably play out like every such story, to have only one character -- “the final girl” -- survive. The twist however is that the player’s actions and decisions can determine whether none or all of the characters survive. A game like “Until Dawn” may garner similar feelings of fear and excitement to that of a horror movie, but the way it engages with the player highlights how the methods to conjure such feelings differ between mediums. An often cited rationale for the appeal of horror in film is the excitation-transfer theory: the more fear one feels will ultimately result in greater relief once the credits have rolled and the ‘danger’ has passed. Professor of psychology at Naropa University, Susan Burggraf discovered it was not fright and disgust that was enjoyable, but the excitement it generates that is. She also found that “excitation transfer” happens throughout the experience, instead of at the end. I would argue that the same excitement is present in horror games as well. The mechanisms may differ, but the intended reaction is the same. Perhaps for some, the fact that
they rely on your input may counteract the common desire to shut your eyes and cover your ears, hiding from the experience. With consumer virtual reality technology on the horizon, there may soon be a new platform for the horror genre to explore. It remains to be seen if it will catch on with consumers, but experiences have already been crafted that take advantage of the immersion VR provides. While VR experiments in film, like Director Guy Shelmerdine’s “Catatonic,” have been developed, a lot of the focus in VR horror seems to be in games at the moment. Tech demos, like that of “The Kitchen,” and Oculus Rift build for games like “Alien Isolation,” have shown just how powerfully people can be scared. While impressive, outlets like The Verge and IGN have noted being so immersed may be too intense of an experience for many. VR has an ability to mess with one’s self awareness in a 3-D space, including toying with one’s peripheral vision, that for some might be too overwhelming. The experiences that can be crafted in VR
may prove to be more engrossing than those in other mediums, but they may be increasingly niche and isolating. Each new medium ushers a different interpretation of the horror genre. While the intended emotional response may remain the same, the limitations and strengths of each platform has spurred the creation of new instruments for frightening both players and audiences alike. Film’s fixed nature allows for creators to express an unadulterated version of what ever horrific nightmares they have imagined, while games’ ability to involve the participant can draw one into the experience unlike other works. Similarly, VR has brought such engagement to previously unthought of -- and for some, undesirable -- levels. Like any genre or form of storytelling, be it passive or active, the creation of works that purposely terrify has transcended any one medium. R
EACH NEW MEDIUM USHERS A DIFFERENT INTERPRETATION OF THE GENRE. Leisure 13
WOTS photographed by Lloyd McCullough designed by Dennae Makel
Jessica Adams
Kyle Laidlaw
K.J. Moore
Michele Kuras
3rd Year – Illustration There is a picture in my phone of me sleeping. I live alone.
4th Year – Industrial Design There is a solid chance that Donald Trump might be our next president.
2nd Year – Visual Media Picking your phone up after you drop it facedown.
4th Year – Advertising Photography I ran out of episodes on Netflix.
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Tristen Armento-Irvin
Sam Handrick
2nd Year – Psychology Thousands of spiders raining down from the ceiling.
3rd Year – Game Design and Dev. The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. He heard a knock.
Simran Makker
Geoffrey Sasaki
Sean Sun
Claire Finnerty
3rd Year – New Media Marketing and Advertising Photography I was possessed when I was seven years old.
2nd Year – Photographic Technology Bad things await you.
1st Year – Computer Security iPhone, out of its case, fell flat on its face.
2nd Year – Biomedical Science & Public Policy Dark woods, a scream, try to run, it grabs you. R
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compiled by Jake Krajewski | design by Dennae Makel
AUGUST 29, 2015 10:32 PM
SEPTEMBER 1, 2015 9:54 PM
“I’ve got like eight Club Penguin accounts floating out there so I’m never really going to be off the grid.”
“There is no substitute to being hit in the face.”
SEPTEMBER 10, 2015 9:26 PM
SEPTEMBER 11, 2015 4:11 PM
“The best part about working alone on the night shift is farting whenever I damn well please.”
“If you get an engagement ring with multiple stones, I feel like you should be a polygamist.”
SEPTEMBER 12, 2015 12:18 PM “I smuggled bulk candy from Wegmans into a movie in my pants, tore the bag trying to get it out, and spent the rest of the night picking smashed sour patch kids out of my crotch.” R
CALL CALL US US OR OR TEXT TEXT US US AT: AT: 585.672.4840 585.672.4840 30 Views