Theme park scraps Halloween attraction after criticism from Kay Warren, megachurch pastor’s wife

Fear VR, a temporary Halloween attraction at a popular southern California theme park, has been terminated after an email campaign that was joined by megachurch pastor Rick Warren and his wife Kay, the Orange County Register  reported Wednesday.

Knott’s Berry Farm of Buena Park announced Tuesday it would shut down the attraction after mental health advocates raised concerns. the Register reported. The park had previously agreed to a name change as a concession to critics.

The Warrens, who lost a son to suicide in April 2013, were among the objectors to the original name for the attraction, “FearVR:5150,” a reference to a section of the state’s Welfare and Institutions Code, which authorizes the involuntarily confinement of a person suspected of having a mental disorder who is endangering themselves or others, the Register reported.

Mrs. Warren particularly took offense to the name as her late son had been held for treatment under section 5150 “several times” prior to his suicide, according to the Register. 

The company insists that the attraction was never meant to make light of the challenges of the mentally ill, but rather scare the wits out of paying customers with the tale of Katie, a demon-possessed girl.

“We’re going to take guests on an immersive experience … in a real-life horror movie,” Christian Dieckmann, an executive with Knott’s parent company Cedar Fair, told the Register in a Sept. 6 story about the virtual-reality attraction.

“We don’t really know much about her, but we quickly start to realize there’s something a little supernatural to her,” teased Jon Cooke, entertainment design specialist at Knott’s.

“Over the past week, we have heard from a number of people expressing concern that one of our temporary, Halloween attractions — Fear VR — is hurtful to those who suffer from mental illnesses,” the company said in Tuesday statement, the Register reported. “Contrary to some traditional and social media accounts, the attraction’s story and presentation were never intended to portray mental illness.”

All the same, the theme park and its parent company dropped the ax on the Halloween attraction, citing the difficulties of reworking the attraction to assauge the concerns of critics, the Register explained.

A similar social media firestorm caused a supermarket chain in Fresno, California, to pull a locally-manufactured energy drink, 51FIFTY, from its shelves, the Fresno Bee reported in March.

“[O]ur sale of the product was never intended to diminish the seriousness of mental illness. We have made the decision to discontinue this product in our stores,” said Save Mart spokeswoman Nannette Miranda, the Bee reported.