Grass Roots Welcome Committee

The latest scandal in UFO Land -- Phil Imbrogno's lies about his academic and service background -- is still being discussed. I'm not supporting Imbrogno's lies, nor defending him for doing so. His ideas about things UFO -ish are still interesting, and, while not new, still worth exploring. I had respect for Imbrogno and am sorry this happened. But, it does seem clear it did happen. Which made me wonder: why would someone feel the need to lie about his or her background, when it comes to UFOlogy? Phil Imbrogno isn't the first person to have been exposed for lying about his credentials, and realistically speaking, he probably won't be the last. Yet, why do some people feel they need to lie, in the context of UFOs?

UFO culture is a grass roots culture. Anyone --- despite the UFO Police and snarky researchers who dismiss whatever, or whoever, they don't agree with -- can live in UFO Land. (Well, except scofftics.) Anyone. It doesnt' matter if you have degrees or not, or what those degrees are in. Degrees do not denote intelligence; oh, they point to a specific type and tell us the degreed person has focus and perseverance in order to receive that degree. Don't misunderstand me, I am not "anti degree" and I have one myself. [Sidebar: full disclosure in case anyone tries to out little ol' me: I have an Associate Degree in Early Childhood Ed, a Bachelor's in English lit with an emphasis on Folklore, a Certificate in Ethnic Studies and Folklore, and two years of grad school. ] Does this make any more or less qualified than anyone else? Nope. Not a damn bit. I'm intelligent if discussing Beat poetry or folkloric applications but a goddamn dummy when it comes to math, business or 12th century military history.

So why do some feel the need to lie or exaggerate in context of UFO research? I have a theory. Ahem.

It's the damn debunker skeptoids. As well as those within UFOlogy, many of whom are in the UFO Police camp, who drone on about being "scientific" and academic and all kinds of -ics. No, I'm not implying science is useless, of course it isn't. We need it all in UFOlogy. But because someone holds a degree in the sciences, or at the least, in academia, does not make them any more qualified in any way to research UFOs. Not one damn bit.

In this culture we place a lot of esteem onto those who have college degrees. We automatically think they're smarter and better than the rest of us. Studying UFOs is a fringe thing to do, a kooky, silly thing to do. You're not serious or smart if you consider UFOs to be anything more than a curiosity. (I know, some co-workers and acquaintances think I'm not as smart as they thought I was, once they find I'm "into" UFOs. Surely someone intelligent wouldn't waste their time...) Some think that having a degree gives a little bit of legitimacy to an illegitimate field.

But there's no need. No need to lie about your background, whatever it is. As long as you're using your head, are truthful and honest and following your own voice, you can't go wrong. Despite what some others might say to you about that, the research and the work will stand on its own. And that's all you need.

Shermer's Gorilla Suit Man

Michael Shermer, uber-skeptoid and professional debunker, did an experiment at the recent 2009 Science, Technology and Research Symposium in Charleston to show that Mothman (which he admits to knowing nothing about), Bigfoot (to which he says he does) and other paranormal/Fortean/esoteric/anomalous phenomena are figments of over-active imaginations, but more than that,illustrations of why we lie:

We already know that people lie; that happens all the time. ... The more interesting question is why do people fall for it," he said.

In other words, people who speak of witnessing UFOs or other strange events, are lying.

Sure, people lie about their experiences. They elaborate, embroider, exaggerate and outright lie. They hoax and they pull pranks. They're delusional and mentally ill, they're alcoholics and drug abusers. Some people. And for some people in that category, they present to the world tales of UFOs, strange creatures, aliens and visits to Venus.

Those aside, thousands upon thousands more people without that baggage -- and even with some of that baggage, does not automatically exclude the experience of such phenomena or cause it -- have encounters with the weird that cannot be explained by tired exercises into so-called rationality. Such as Shermer's. (Warning: ad hom ahead. "Smirking Shermer" as I like to call him. Come on, the man smirks for crying out loud. He's so taken with himself.)

Shermer instructs an audience to watch a video of basket ball players, watching for:

the number of times six young people passing basketballs, three of them in white shirts and three in black shirts. He asked the crowd to count how many times the three in white shirts passed the basketball to each other.

Afterward, Shermer had the crowd call out answers. Then he played the video again, telling everyone just to relax and not worry about counting passes this time. And to the amazement of many, about halfway through a person in a monkey suit walked from out-of-frame into the middle of the scene, paused, gave a friendly wave and then promptly walked off screen.

This proves, says Shermer, that people see what they want to see. Er, that means we don't want to see a man in a gorilla suit at the Lakers game?

What it says to me is this: when something weird and unexpected happens, especially in the midst of a mundane event, like a basketball game, we don't notice it. Which then means , that the weird, the unexpected, like say, a Mothman or a Bigfoot, even a UFO, goes right by us. It literally can be in front of our noses and we won't deal with the strangeness. In fact, when something highly unusual is going on, and the one or two people who do happen to be aware of it point it out to others, most people refuse to even look to see for themselves.

Shermer had his own out of body experience. Under laboratory conditions, don't you know. Which proves that no such thing as astral projection and OOBEs occur, since it can be recreated in the laboratory:

Shermer said he once had an out-of-body experience successfully recreated under laboratory conditions. It had nothing to do with his consciousness actually leaving his body.

This is another standard, and very tired meme of the uber-skeptic: that because something paranormal/anomalous can be recreated in the lab, it doesn't exist. Rather, it doesn't exist paranormally; of course it exists, they just recreated it! (The same is said of hoaxes, as the recent hoaxed UFO lights showed: to the skeptoid, UFO hoaxes "proves" that UFOs don't exist.)

Why do we insist upon "believing weird things" as Shermer so often phrases this conundrum of human existence? It has to do with evolution:

As for the reason people believe strange things, Shermer said it is rooted in humanity's evolutionary history and its psychological drive to connect invisible causes to the events around them. That movement in the grass may be the wind or it could be a predator.

Or fairies! It's fairies!

If we think of the movement in the grass as a predator, we're good ... Shermer concludes that if we think the worst: "better safe than sorry" then we believe that forces control the things we can't explain. Like a lion in the grass? Huh?

Shermer's presentation didn't prove a thing, but of course, the choir he preaches to think otherwise.

Soure: Science vs. ESP: Skeptic Ponders UFOs, Mothman

Synchronistic Linguistics and Twilight Language

I'm not sure what either one of them means; like other terms, such as exo-politics, disclosure, and post modernism, the definitions seem murky and ever shifting. But I like what I think I think those terms mean. Anyone out there who wants to educate me on these terms -- synchrnonistic linguistics, twilight language -- feel free. I know Loren Coleman refers to twilight language a lot, but haven't figured out exactly what it is.

In the meantime, I found the following article on the Paranoia Magazine site: Synchronistic Linguistics in The Matrix; Or How Bob Dobbs Became the Tetrad Manager, by Robert Guffey.

I do know I've been fascinated by juxtapositions and images as language for many years. Patterns, comparisons, startlingly little items that seemingly have nothing to do with each other and yet, for whatever reason, I see a connection. Or a . . . something. Maybe it's just the Fortean inclined mind.

Things

Snarly Skepticism
Lots going on at Snarly Skepticism. I had to change the comment settings after getting a few nasty comments (ah yes, the ad homs and the skeptic!) so sorry about that, but there's three, four at least new items up there.

Vintage U.F.O.
I have something about creepy clowns on Vintage U.F.O., which fits in a bit with my Trickster's Realm column on Binnall, which will be up sometime on Monday. That column is about "MIBs, Clowns and Helicopters," inspired mostly by Tim Beckley's The UFO Silencers, but also Chris O'Brien's Mysterious Valley books.

James Rich, Artist
I've been shamelessly promoting my husband's work everywhere. He's finally finished taking images of his paintings and finding a good art hosting site at Yessy.com. He has literally hundreds of paintings, so be sure to check it out regularly; he's putting up images daily.

Lulu.com: E-Books
So are, I only have one little thing up there; a collection of articles on the Trent UFO case and the McMinnville, UFO Festival. I'll more things up there in the weeks to come. You can see what's available on my Lulu Storefront.

The Sigh Files

If ever a UFO Guild We're The Only Ones You Should Be Listening To organization gets itself going --which of course, I hope never does, the very idea is an abomination - one of the first things they need to do is pass a law that condemns the use of the following phrases: "anal probe" and "tin foil hat wearing."

Gleaning From “Numb3rs”

Is it ironic that a “scientific” TV show, appreciated by skeptics, is also one of my favorite shows -- and that I’ve gotten so much esoteric-Fortean use out of the show?

Numb3rs is a favorite show of mine. I like the combination of mystery, crime solving, science and mysticism. It’s also set in L.A., where I was born and raised, and I like the three lead mensch-like characters.

Besides entertaining me, Numb3rs has given me a bit of inspiration three times now for my esoteric writing. Awhile ago, I wrote an article about semantics and perceptions of UFOs, and used an example from a Numb3rs episode. In that example, the main character Don Epps, FBI agent, said, of UFOs: (paraphrasing)

“We don’t know what a UFO looks like, so how do we know one when we see one?”

That line inspired me to write several articles on the topics of UFO semantics and definitions, as well as denial and debunkery. (See my American Chronicle articles for more.)

In another episodes, the character Charlie Epps (Don’s younger, math genius brother) told his crime solving colleagues to “throw on more data.” The team was not making any progress in trying to solve a case; “throw in more data” was the solution. By including more data, the character explained, more patterns, more information, will be revealed, and the agents would get closer to solving the crime. That was the inspiration for a column I wrote recently for UFO Magazine: Throw On More Data:

What got me thinking about the UFO phenomena in light of Numb3rs was what the character Charlie (young math professor genius) said to an FBI agent when the agent asked for help in solving a mystery. No matter how many times the agent went over the data he had, he just couldn’t figure it out, yet he knew he could, knew there was an answer. If only he had the right formula, or was shown some way to get at it. The math genius told him to “throw in more data.”

Throw in more data. And by doing so, said the character, we can begin to see a “connectivity” between the clues that will lead the agent to his solution.

Throw in more data. And yet that what much of UFOlogy doesn’t do. We don’t see a “connectivity” because we’re divided, we argue, -- we downright fight and attack at times (forget the skeptoids,sometimes we’re our own worst enemies) -- we pick a theory or two and stick with it. More data, especially data that throws us off, is rejected. After all this time, we’re still arguing over nuts and bolts versus an ETH, or an ultra terrestrial theory. ~ (UFO Magazine, 2007)

This past Friday’s episode, about a serial rapist, served as another inspiration. It turned out the rapist had a MRSA (antibiotic resistant staph infection) STD. One of the agents, in explaining MRSA to her co-workers, said (again paraphrasing)

“There’s only one type of antibiotic that can kill it, but doctor’s don’t want to give it out.”

That line had me thinking about my own MRSA infection, the disconnects and jangled messages from various sources -- including doctors -- and so I wrote an article about MRSA and Morgellons and this oppositional juxtaposition in MRSA and Morgellons: Jangled Messages.(Hopefully it will be up at Book of Thoth in a day or two.)

So, thanks Numb3rs for your contributions to my continued inspiration!


Notes:
Image credits:
http://www.daemonstv.com/images/cbs/numb3rs1.jpg
amazing-tv-shows.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

American Chronicle

UFO Magazine
Book of Thoth

Sunday Orb

Chemtrails
Recently chemtrails have been the topic around here. While I may mention them now and again, they are on my mind a lot. It can’t be helped; the things are up there almost on a daily basis.

Like many people, a few years ago I didn’t think about chemtrails much. I’d heard of them, as any esoterica buff would, but didn’t see what the controversy was. It all seemed too scientific and clinical in a vague way. But as I began to look both up to the skies and into the subject, I realized there was something going on. And it wasn’t (isn’t) just contrails.

I have yet to come across explanations -- satisfying explanations that make sense -- for: black beams shot out from near the nose of the plane. I’ve seen this twice. Plane going along; abruptly a beam of cloud or some substance comes shooting out from what appears to be the nose of the plane, or somewhere near the front.

The “explanations” offered by denialists have included such semantical nonsense as “I couldn’t possibly have seen a black beam since black isn’t a color,” “It was a shadow,” and of course, the old standby; I’m a liar.

I’ve seen white sky spheres -- machines -- moving slowly back and forth, in connection with the trails.

I’ve seen white, unmarked planes at extremely high altitudes, and speeds, leaving all kinds of trails behind.

I’ve seen trails that were thick, drippy, twirly, circular, X’s, elbowed or angled. I’ve seen huge squarish or rectangular shaped patches that stayed stuck in the same place in the sky for hours that were oily looking, with rainbow type colors. (The local paper called one of these a “natural phenomena” due to ice crystals. This on a hot July day, with lots of helicopter activity in the area a few days before and during.)

I think what Fortean author Colin Bennett has to say about this is excellent, and anyone even milady interested needs to read his article Chemtrails:A Fortean View.

Thanks to Cindy PDX for sharing her experiences and videos, and to everyone else, like Lesley of Debris Field, who also comments on the chemtrails in her area. Lesley of the Debris Field blog has also taken photos and video of weird things related to this.

There’s also all kinds of chemtrail forums out there, including the West Coast Chemtrails on Yahoo. Look to the menu on your right for the purple Yahoo sign up box.

Glowing Red Eyes
Kithra, who writes very well on weird things and folklore, wrote a piece on anomalous creatures with red glowing eyes. That inspired me to write about an experience I had with a being when I was a child. You can read about both on Women in Esoterica.


Native American Ancestry
There’s an idea that the majority of people with paranormal experiences and who study this field are Native American -- either enrolled in a tribe, or of that ancestry. (I’m Cherokee and Lenape.) I don’t know if this is true, and my little poll isn’t scientific in any way, but it’s interesting to see how it comes out. So far, those who’ve answered that they have Native ancestry are in the majority.


Bigfoot and Fairies
A relationship I’ve been interested in, and Lisa Shiel of Bigfoot Quest has an item on it. You can read more on my Bigfoot blog Frame 352.

The Great Gazoo Has Moved
I had a video clip stream going here of The Great Gazoo, the little green man from outer space from the Flintstones. I moved it over to Vintage UFO. Please take a look and leave comments. And if you have any unusual UFO related experiences you’d like to share that occurred before 1980, please E-Mail Me here.

Crazy Looking UFO People

Is This Even Necessary?

course not; just like all those grumpy bloggers who pontificate about how writing about UFOs is a waste of time, (unless, of course, you’re writing about how writing about them is a waste of time; then you’re not wasting time) are people like this person, who asks: Why are UFO people so crazy looking? And not only that, humph, he makes the mistake in thinking that one can make a choice of “believing that UFOs exist.” We all know UFOs exist. That is hardly the question. As usual, we have to figure out what one means these days when they say “UFO.” Once we get past that, now we also have to worry about why we’re all so “crazy looking.”

UFO Semantics, Part One

UFO Semantics, Part One

Either through outright, intentional obtuseness in the case of pathological skeptics, or lazy journalism habits of media people, the question “Do UFOs exist?” continues to be asked. (Variations include statements such as: "UFOs don't exist," etc.)

UFO means unidentified flying object. Unidentified.
We have proof of the existence of UFOs through photographs, video, film, and eye witness reports. A huge amount of data gathered from all over the world.

This data has consistently shown (proven) that unidentified flying objects are in our skies.

What is there to debate? Nothing. If UFO means “unidentified flying object,” and you have a photograph/video/film/report of an unidentified thing, how can anyone who is rational and sane, deny what is in front of them? And what’s in front of them is an unidentified something.

All the rest: assumptions about extraterrestrials, or psychological manifestations of unintegrated mystical experiences, or government mind control via staged UFO events, etc. are just that: assumptions.

Anyone who denies that “UFOs exist” isn’t paying attention, are guilty of making assumptions, play games with semantics and are often disingenuous in their insistence that “UFOs don’t exist.” (as with skeptwoos.)

I Know, It’s A Waste Of Time . . .

But I do wish the following would forever disappear from the culture:

“Do you believe in UFOs?”

"Are UFOs real?"

“Do you believe you’ve seen what you thought was a UFO?”

“Aunt Millie said she’s seen a UFO; do you believe her?”

“Do you believe UFOs exist?”

You get the picture.

I know, I know, it’s “only” semantics (a phrase that drives me wild) and it’s a ridiculous battle. No chance at all of ever winning, or even coming close.

Still, every now and then I just have to rant about the use of UFO as an: idol, an idea, a concept, a entity, an alien -- make that an outer space alien -- a mirage, a hallucination, a fantasy, a lie, a drug or alcohol induced event, a mental aberration, a religious figure, a God/

Instead of what it is: a weird object/craft/machine/light of unknown origin and purpose. Nothing to “believe” in at all. Do you “believe” in your microwave? The point some make that “we know what a microwave is; we don’t know what a UFO is” is a nonsensical response. Yes, yes, we know about microwaves, and we don’t know the whats, wheres, and whys of UFOs, but that’s what UFOs are. In that sense, we do know what UFOs are: we don’t know what they are. (heh.)

Putting all this other stuff onto an unexplainable light/thing/machine in the sky only reveals the issues of the individual doing the interpreting. Including the thuggish (or disingenuous, depending) response of the pathological skeptic who insists that “everyone knows when we say UFO we really mean aliens from space.” Speak for yourself there Mr. or Ms. Pelican Head.

I have ideas, theories even, as to what some UFOs are, but that doesn’t mean they are that.

I’ve seen several UFOs in my life. (Some with some high strangeness thrown in.) And while I won’t deny or try to explain away, nor rationalize in any way, that I’ve seen UFOs, -- because I have -- neither will I say I “believe” in them.