The Allure of Scary Stories: Why We Need the Supernatural to Talk About Life and Death

The Unlikely Utility of a Good Scare

As the nights grow longer and the decorations of the season—witches, skeletons, and vampires—begin to populate neighborhood lawns across the United States, a familiar question resurfaces: why do we voluntarily subject ourselves to fear? In a recent episode of the podcast How to Be a Better Human, host Chris Duffy explores this impulse, noting that while he personally avoids horror films and the sensation of being scared, there is a deeper, perhaps necessary, purpose behind our fascination with the macabre.

Duffy invited Glynn Washington, the creator and host of the paranormal storytelling podcast Spooked and the long-running series Snap Judgment, to discuss why these tales maintain such a persistent hold on our collective attention. According to Duffy, as reported on TED Talks and Podcast Rex, the allure of the supernatural lies in its unique ability to provide a safe space to discuss subjects that are often relegated to the shadows of polite conversation: death, mortality, suffering, and the boundaries of morality.

A Forum for the Unspoken

Washington argues that in a modern society where traditional religious frameworks may be less central to daily life, individuals often lack a dedicated forum to confront the “big questions.” When people experience events that defy logical explanation—or what Washington describes as a “glitch in the matrix”—they frequently feel isolated, fearing that sharing such experiences might lead others to question their sanity.

“I think there’s a license. I’m almost gonna say this: we’re hiding behind the Spooked moniker in order to tell the truth. We’re telling ghost stories, and within that shield, we can talk about the stories that really matter to us.” — Glynn Washington

By framing these accounts as “spooky stories,” Washington suggests that listeners and storytellers alike are granted a temporary reprieve from judgment. This dynamic functions similarly to a campfire gathering; because participants are not forced to maintain direct eye contact while recounting their experiences, the pressure to conform to strict, skeptical narratives is diminished.

The Narrative Over the Report

The success of Spooked, which began as a seasonal Halloween experiment within Snap Judgment in 2017 before expanding into a standalone series, underscores a hunger for this type of vulnerability. Washington emphasizes that his interest lies not in forensic reportage or the verification of facts, but in the personal impact of the story. He posits that the way an individual processes their experience narratively—how it “twisted” or “shaped” them—is more profound than a cold recitation of events.

This perspective challenges conventional journalistic standards, which prioritize objective, verifiable facts. Washington acknowledges that even if a storyteller’s account contradicts physical evidence or camera footage, the narrative itself remains a vital human construct. For him, the value is in understanding how an experience moved the speaker, regardless of its factual precision.

Holding Contradictions

Duffy and Washington touch upon a psychological tension that many people navigate: the ability to hold two seemingly contradictory ideas simultaneously. One can be a firm, by-the-book skeptic and still listen to a story with the belief that the narrator is not intentionally lying. Washington observes that his guests—who often include people in high-credibility professions like law enforcement, medicine, or the military—have no clear incentive to fabricate their accounts.

For the listener, exercising this “muscle” of holding complexity and contradiction may be the ultimate benefit of the genre. Rather than merely a method to spike blood pressure, these stories provide a framework for individuals to process their own life experiences. As Washington notes, these narratives are often the very constructs upon which people base their most significant life decisions. While the horror genre remains a source of discomfort for many, the underlying desire to grapple with the unknown remains a distinctly human trait, providing a mirror for our own mortality and the parts of our lives that remain, by definition, inexplicable.