Banshee

I do not believe that the banshee exists.

I don't know what your family members may have seen, but is there a fire escape outside their window? Do they have any friends who may have set this up as a hilarious 'joke'? Is it possible that they're making it up or mistaken (foxes screech like you wouldn't believe)? Barring this I would think that it's most likely a case of one of them having a nightmare and waking the other to describe it. The second person, being half asleep, then integrates this into their own dream and believes that they've seen it too, as is believed to have happened in the Barney and Betty Hill 'abductions' in the 60s.

Morpheus

so in an hour and ten minutes they never thought once of phoning anyone else up or taking photos or some other method of finding out what the f**k was happening?

Morphéus wrote: »

so in an hour and ten minutes they never thought once of phoning anyone else up or taking photos or some other method of finding out what the f**k was happening?

I too find it odd that they didn't so much as take a photo. I know that if I woke up to see an elderly lady apparently floating outside my window I'd be out like a shot to see how she was doing it, or at least call the police.

Zombrex

I am very sceptically of anything people experience in the middle of the night because when you just wake up your ability to determine reality and imagination is quite diminished. I'm constantly waking up convinced there is someone in my room. I'm perfectly wake but what ever bit of my brain that is supposed to say "that is a shadow not a man" isn't working.

My guess would be what your brother-in-law experienced was a fire alarm going off and in their sleepy state interpreted shadows and shapes outside the window as a woman.

sensibleken

i was woken up only a few nights ago by the sound of someone walking up my stairs followed by soemthing casting a shadow accross the ceiling. i got up, armed myself and carefully walked around the house checking for a burglar.

nothing there. completely made it up but i was absolutely convinced of what i saw and heard before checking and confirming it wasn't. when youre half asleep you can take a sound and a sight, put them together and a quick reference to the deep references of your memory usually results in a false positive

Elbi

If they were so scared why didnt one of them go in and get the baby..

I dont believe it was a banshee at the window but whatever it was did frighten them but if I was that terrified first thing i would do is go get the baby to make sure it was safe.

Senor Willy

He must have been watching too many horror films.

munsterdevil

All I know is, if there was somebody outside my window roaring into me, I would open the window and tell them to f*ck off, and if the window was wide enough punch them in the gob:D

Just going to go through a possible explanation:

A fox cub has found itself alone and is crying like mad for its mother, who is off hunting.
This crying half wakes a woman who, being mother to a young baby, is used to waking at obscene hours due to a similar sound.
Not being quite fully awake the woman is confused to see it was not her son that woke her.
She returns to bed, still half asleep.
Stangely the screaming continues, the woman notices the movement of a branch/light/insert-random-object-here at the window, she does as i often have, and sees a person.
She grabs her boyfriend to tell him. He sees what hes told (interestingly enough this is exactly what people do, look at this picture. calcite formation you say? why no its a face! look again, you'll see it now i've told you to look for it)
The girlfriend hid her face from this point, now regardless of whether or not shes fully awake she is no longer a witness.
Her boyfriend on the other hand is so asleep he is effectively dreaming.
He truly believes he is seeing this mystical woman, does as you describe, and runs back to bed.
Both man and woman are now in hiding, they see nothing and only hear the cubs cries for attention.
The cubs mammy comes back from the hunt at 4.10.
The screaming stops.
The couple feel safe again.

They get up the next morning and confirm each others story.
They ring your mother who further confirms their story.
They now fully believe they saw a banshee.

The fear of this "sighting" leaves them unable to sleep the following night.

Like i said just one possible explanation of what happened that night, minus the banshee!

Cunning Stunt

If they really saw a woman screaming outside their window and this went on for over an hour, why didn't they ring the guards?

kylith wrote: »

I do not believe that the banshee exists.

I don't know what your family members may have seen, but is there a fire escape outside their window? Do they have any friends who may have set this up as a hilarious 'joke'? Is it possible that they're making it up or mistaken (foxes screech like you wouldn't believe)? Barring this I would think that it's most likely a case of one of them having a nightmare and waking the other to describe it. The second person, being half asleep, then integrates this into their own dream and believes that they've seen it too, as is believed to have happened in the Barney and Betty Hill 'abductions' in the 60s.

Lets begin at the start; first of all the question was ,does anyone believe in the banshee?? i think this is the only post that answered that question.

second thing, is the betty and barney hill story which is totally out of context in this post to what actually happened in the report, maybe the skeptic who wrote it should explain the reason it appears in the subject of the banshee!??

maccored

not matter if the banshee exists or not, I'd say that if you traced this story back would you find the same story?

Im not trying to diss the OP in any way, but surely sometimes these kinds of stories grow in the telling (im assuming the post was copied from an email going by the formatting)?

jonbravo wrote: »

Lets begin at the start; first of all the question was ,does anyone believe in the banshee?? i think this is the only post that answered that question.

Actually I would deem any post offering an alternative explanation, on a skeptics forum, to be one written by someone who does not believe in banshees, just because its not explicitly stated doesn't mean it wasn't said.

amacachi

They've been watching too many horror films, not because of what they think they saw but because they stayed in the ****in house!

jonbravo wrote: »

second thing, is the betty and barney hill story which is totally out of context in this post to what actually happened in the report, maybe the skeptic who wrote it should explain the reason it appears in the subject of the banshee!??

I mentioned Barney and Betty Hill is that it is believed that their 'abduction' memories were caused by Betty having nightmares after which she would wake her husband and describe them to him in detail. He, having been woken from a deep sleep, was not fully awake while listening to his wife's descriptions and so his unconcious, suggestable mind led to him having similar dreams, and from there the couple's shared beliefs that they were victims of alien abduction.

I brought this up because I believe it is a possible explanation for this 'banshee sighting'; one of the couple had a nightmare (perhaps influenced by the yowling of foxes or cats, or even a car alarm) and woke the other to describe it. The second person, being barely awake, is thus influenced to think that they too had the 'banshee' experience and each believes that the other's memory gives credence to their own.

HTH

i understand the thinking behind whats being said however i disagree, maybe theirs another case study{other then betty and barney} which would make more sence to me!?
Im not sayin your wrong i just think its the wrong case study to highlight.
thats just my opinion....

It's the only one that I could bring to mind at the time. I'm sure there are more examples out there.

Are you having trouble understanding it because you don't think it's true or because their shared false memory was about aliens rather than banshees?

kylith wrote: »

It's the only one that I could bring to mind at the time. I'm sure there are more examples out there.

Are you having trouble understanding it because you don't think it's true or because their shared false memory was about aliens rather than banshees?

i dont believe in False shared memory but i do believe in shared memory, the banshee by myth Warns ,unlike ET in some case's. two different things in my opinion.

jonbravo wrote: »

i dont believe in False shared memory but i do believe in shared memory, the banshee by myth Warns ,unlike ET in some case's. two different things in my opinion.

Its not a shared memory, similar has happened to me before, your in REM, somebody attempts to wake you and tell you something, for example "wake up, its time to go to school" and then you start to dream about school.

In this case the man was told "wake up theres an old woman at the window" he did not wholly wake up, and he dreamed of a woman at the window.

And yes, in a sort of way, by myth the banshee warns, but not exactly in advance, or of something which can be prevented, so if it did happen who died that night?

wonderfulname wrote: »

Its not a shared memory, similar has happened to me before, your in REM, somebody attempts to wake you and tell you something, for example "wake up, its time to go to school" and then you start to dream about school.

In this case the man was told "wake up theres an old woman at the window" he did not wholly wake up, and he dreamed of a woman at the window.

And yes, in a sort of way, by myth the banshee warns, but not exactly in advance, or of something which can be prevented, so if it did happen who died that night?

something like that has never happened to me before im 100% sure on that, maybe their is something wrong with me..(no comit)
from the OP i dont know how someone would take from that, that the person was dreaming.... unless the dream had surround-sound or something, both persons heard something excluding the baby crying.
besides this person didnt see an old woman, He seen the banshee or someone smoking tryin to ring a taxi home!?

oceanman

judgeing from the content of post,i would say it most probably was the banshee.