Live with Jason Hawes: Your Paranormal Questions Answered

There's nothing I enjoy more than sitting down directly with the people who've supported TAPS and Ghost Hunters over the years — no cameras, no haunted locations, just honest conversation. JV Johnson and I went live to do exactly that: answer your questions, swap some stories, and spend some time with the community that makes all of this worthwhile. If you missed it, here's what we covered.

I've said it a thousand times — this community is the reason I've kept doing this work for as long as I have. When JV and I jumped on live, I wasn't sure exactly where the conversation would go, and honestly, that's the best kind. No script, no agenda. Just two guys who've spent a lot of years chasing things that go bump in the night, sitting down and talking about it like normal human beings.

We fielded a wide range of questions, and I want to be straight with you the way I always try to be: I'm a skeptic first. I've always believed that the best thing I can do for anyone reporting a haunting is to walk in trying to disprove it. That's not cynicism — that's respect. If I can rule out every rational explanation and something still can't be explained, then we're having a different conversation. But more often than not, there's a pipe rattling behind a wall or an EMF field from old wiring that's been making a family miserable for years. Finding that answer is just as meaningful as finding a ghost, maybe more so, because it actually helps people.

JV and I talked about methodology, about the evolution of paranormal investigation, and about what it really looks like behind the scenes of a long-running investigation career. People always want to know what the scariest moment was, or what piece of evidence keeps me up at night. Those are fair questions, and I don't dodge them. But I also push back when I need to, because I think the field does itself a disservice when investigators overstate what they've found. An unexplained sound on a recorder is interesting. It is not proof of life after death. There's a big difference, and I think the people watching us appreciate that we make that distinction.

We also just had fun with it. That matters. JV has been a great collaborator for a long time, and there's a shorthand between us that makes these conversations feel easy. Whether we were talking about favorite investigations, the gear we've come to trust over the years, or the letters and messages we get from people who've had experiences they can't explain, it was the kind of live session that reminds me why I still show up. The paranormal community is passionate, it's curious, and at its best, it asks hard questions. That's exactly what I want from it.

If you caught the live session, thank you for being there and for bringing your questions — the good ones push me to think harder, and that's never a bad thing. Keep watching, keep questioning, and never stop demanding real answers instead of easy ones.