An Anti-Cults follower (with the customary "green with envy" facepaint) for whom Cricket Voodoo is an important component of their Ju-Ju.

Originally a juvenile game, Cricket Voodoo, due to its exponents belief of success, has today achieved the status of a pseudo science and has often been employed as a ritualistic element within a cultist religion known as The Anti-Cults.

Practitioners visit the Aberdeenshire Cricket Associations website and go to the photo gallery. By clicking on a picture, they increase that particular photograph's viewing ratings and the team, or individual featured (it is claimed), will experience a surge in form and success generally. A more malicious variant of the "game" involves negatively clicking, i.e. selecting photos that relate to anything other than your opponent of that week, thereby forcing their images down in the ratings.

Like most pseudo sciences, there is very little empiric data to support the claims of Voodoo believers. Coincidence and perception may account for known "successes" but there is some support from the Psychology field who contend that the activity can be construed as a form of negative reinforcement. Sceptics point to the many instances of "affected" individuals having no access to the website and therefore no comprehension of their apparent unpopularity. Those who use Cricket Voodoo, some psychologists argue, come to depend, increasingly, on it's (alleged) powers.

This page was last updated Tuesday, 13 March 2007