Ufological Seriousness and the Media
Nick Redfern
11 Comments
Someone recently asked me how Ufology, and those of us that dare to step into this surreal realm, can improve our relationship with the media.
It's a bloody good question.
The fact is, as much as the self-important and ego-driven characters within Ufology hate to admit it, as far as the mainstream media is concerned, we are nothing more than (A) a source of light entertainment for the last couple of minutes of the nightly news; and (B) occasional fodder for an hour-long show on one of the documentary-driven TV channels.
I have said it time and again (but that won't stop me from saying it again here, now), it matters not a bit how many letters after their name this or that ufologist has; it matters not a bit whether a certain ufologist wears a suit and tie for an on-screen interview, or I wear combat-boots and a t-shirt adorned with a big old skull; and it matters not a bit if we try and give the subject some credibility by talking about "radar-visual" reports, FOIA documents, or whatever.
Ufologists have been doing that for fucking years - and we're no further ahead!
Keyhoe (in jacket, shirt and tie, of course) went on TV decades ago talking about "the cover-up." Hynek was a highly credible character. But still we face "Take me to Your Leader," and "Beam me up, Scotty," type jokes on morning talk-shows and the like.
Why?
Because we lack hard, definitive evidence of UFO reality; that's why.
In short, we need an alien body, we need some ET-DNA, a bit of wreckage, or an honest-to-goodness crashed UFO that can be presented to the world - by us. The UFO community has been relaying data to the masses via the media for decades. FOR FUCKING DECADES. And what advances have we made with the media? None.
Yep: we're still the jokey "And finally..." faces that you see at the end of the news.
And for those who love to hog the camera: let me telll you that appearing on more and more TV shows does not mean you're making advances with the media. Numbers are not important: physical evidence is.
We are still entertainment fodder, staring at the skies in search of aliens we can't prove exist.
Take Roswell (I wish some fucker would, please): regardless of what did or did not happen on that fateful day back in 1947, there's a hell of a lot of testimony strongly suggesting that something seriously fucked-up occurred; and on top of that the official world has changed its story more often than I care to remember. But what happens whenever Roswell is discussed on most TV documentaries?
I'll tell you what: the show's writer, director and producer bring on the token skeptic to talk about Mogul balloons and crash-test dummies, and to shoot down the ufologists in the process - and more often than not it's the skeptic that gets the last word, too. Have you noticed that?
And why?
Again: because we have no proof to back up our position from a stance of overwhelming, pulverizing strength. We have the only things we have ever had since the days of Kenneth Arnold: testimony, trace evidence (and documentation, in later years) that is always controversial, never definitive, and always firmly lacking in the "smoking-gun" stakes.
And so, our position in the "serious" stakes never increases.
Now don't get me wrong: as someone who has done a lot of TV shows, I understand that entertainment is an utterly vital part of the mix if viewers are expected to stay the course and watch the show. No-one wants to watch a deathly boring program with some ufologist droning on for half an hour about bloody radar or temperature inversions. But Ufology never gets beyond the entertainment barrier. That's where we were 50 years ago; it's where we are today.
If you wanna go on this TV show and that TV show, and talk about this case, or that incident, or this particular FOIA document, then that's completely fine. But don't imagine that you're changing the world, or that you or me or any of us are anything more than that aforementioned bit of entertainment for the TV companies and the masses. And if you're happy being filmed pointing at the stars with your mouth wide open and looking like a complete fucking moron, then that's your choice, too.
At the end of the day, however, only hard evidence - presented to the world by the UFO community - will elevate us from entertainment to something more significant. That's partly why I don't wear shirts, ties and suits. Okay, I don't like them first and foremost. But second, and most importantly, dressing like a bank-manager achieves nothing - because it never has achieved anything and it can't achieve anything.
Show the media physical evidence and you'll transform the way in which that same media (and as a result, the public too) view this subject and the UFO community. I utterly guarantee it.
So, focus less on how many letters you have after your name, or if your shirt and tie are nicely ironed, and instead dig, dig, dig for that aforementioned physical evidence. That really is all that matters if we are to prove our case.
Reader Comments (11)
This sums up the ufological situation exactly.
A great rant, and right on the mark!
RRR
Another frustrating irony is that the popularity of the paranormal has risen in direct proportion to the shriveling of serious theoretical explorations of it's origins as well as the same internal debates re framed ad nauseum,by either conspiratorial or imaginary concoctions which in turn, drive a external view of the subject as a social-hobbyist niche that could well be akin to eccentrics debating how many angels fit on the top of a pin.Another irony is the proliferation of false alarms, ambivalent conclusions and the counterintuitive shoot first ask questions later which makes the whole thing a chicken little story...the skies falling here...its falling there..which makes the whole phenomenon appear to be the result of cranks with chronic paranoiac anxiety. The fact that this phenomenon straddles the intermediary boundary between materiality and the intangible, this resists empirical
approaches while demonstrating a capability to mark this territory as if it were a dog at a fire hydrant which is a wonderful arrangement to create a situation that frustrates and deconstructs reality while showing high indifference.This high indifference is then seen as a marker that is nonsensical and so if this whole dynamic is nonsensical, it probably is an illusion. So, in the end, in an era that looks like the beginning of an epoch of social upheaval, the whole field is now mined for it's escapism factor, like a Busby Berkeley musical in the Great Depression...a cartoon shown on a prison wall.... .
Well at least you can still be Catholic Nick.
...Ok, but how about a pipe?
I'm sure showing up with a pipe in the mouth might just do the work! ;-)
Bang on the nail again, Nick. My educational background is in law, so I know only too well that hard evidence is what makes a case compelling. No posh suit or long string of academic credentials can make up for hard evidence. But where do we find it? I guess we just have to keep digging...
Hey Siani
Yes, that's the biggest question: where do we find the evidence? I think one of the biggest problems is that those who might hold the evidence (the official world) also have the biggest ability to hide it unfortunately.
Absolutely, Nick. And the powers-that-be have played silly buggers with us for so long, many are disinclined to believe what they say, even if there's a remote chance it may be true. For those of us trying to make some sense of it all, it's a lose-lose situation. And of course, when we make it clear we don't necessarily accept the official stance, the mainstream media brands us as crazed conspiracy theorists and UFO nuts. Cue the little green men jokes!
BTW Nick, what's your take on the MoD releasing its UFO files? I've written a post over at the UFO Magazine guest blog, expressing my misgivings about that situation (http://ufomagazine.squarespace.com/guest-blog/2008/5/21/those-mod-ufo-reports.html) and just wondered what you thought of the whole thing. I've not read all the files yet, but if anyone's looking for hard evidence of anything in them - they can forget it!
Siani:
My personal view is that these files offer no smoking-guns. They demonstrate (as, actually, most credible UK researchers believe) that the Ministry of Defense had a relatively minor role to play in the subject, with no big secrets being held by them.
Of course, the bigger question is whether there were other agencies and departments knew more,
It's possible, but nothing substantial has surfaced to confirm that yet.
We do know that the British Police's "Special Branch" secretly watched certain UFO researchers for years - and this was completely separate to the MoD's UFO investigations.
So, I suppose it really depends on how we personally view the idea that (a) this is really all the MoD has; or (b) someone else, very well hidden, knows more...
Personally, I'm just not sure how much they know or don't know. But I'd be surprised if there was *nothing" else on UFOs held by other agencies.
One thing that a lot of people don't realize is that the release of these files is nothing new.
Yes, it's quite true that we need to offer big thanks to researchers Dave Clarke, Joe McMonagle and Gary Anthony for pushing the MoD, via FOIA, to release this material in bulk form.
But as back as the early 90s, the MoD released every January (under the terms of the Government's old "Thirty Year Ruling") 100s of pages every year from the old 1960s files.
As an example, back in January 94, 95, and 96 I went down to the archives and sat and read the 1964, 65, and 66 equivalents of what is surfacing now.
It's just that much of the media has incorrectly thought that there was something new about the release of the files.
In the sense that these are much bigger releases and much newer files, and that the MoD have released these records thanks to Dave etc, that IS significant.
But in light of the fact that for 15 years they have been releasing files between 300 and 400 pages per year - well, it's business (kind of) as usual!
"It's just that much of the media has incorrectly thought that there was something new about the release of the files."
Is that because it was advertised this way to them by the MOD? How did it become a big story in the first place?
No, the story was basically told accurately: that the MoD had decided (over a period of time) to make all this material available. I suspect that most newspapers simply didn't bother to check and find out that 1,000s of pages had *already* been released each January under the provisions of the old Thirty Year Rule.
Had they known that, I suspect their coverage of the story would have been slightly different.
In reality, all that is really happening now is that we're getting bigger releases of files via the UK FOIA than via the old 30 Year Ruling.
The media's biggest error is to make it look like (albeit not deliberately I actually think) this release of MoD files is a first.
Thanks for that, Nick. I appreciate it. As a relative newcomer to this whole field, it's nice to get input from an experienced professional. I guess it's no real surprise that the recent files are just a case of 'same old, same old'. Great for people with a passing interest, probably, but nothing of substance to anyone looking to dig deeper. Once again - many thanks for the response :).