Anyone else watch Alien Abduction in Manhattan?

[Red]

It was pretty good with interviews of Napolitano and Rainey included, but man. Napolitano is still ticked with Rainey to this day.

 

[Burnt State]

The problem is that the story is entirely delusional and Rainey is one of the few with real insight into the reality of this tale.

 

[Richard Hawkins]

The problem is that the story is entirely delusional and Rainey is one of the few with real insight into the reality of this tale.

Yes 100% agree.

 

[Burnt State]

I think it was Chris O'Brien who said it, but while in discussion with Gene about certain UFO cases that keep coming back from the dead like Dracula. it doesn't matter how many times it's been proven false and you out a stake through its heart it still continues to circulate back, like Aztec, and Billy Meier etc. and now everyone has got a Netflix movie going on. Half of what ufology is about is mostly a circus which is why James Moseley as court jester was such an invaluable figure. There's no central mediator anymore and it's just a free for all. You can drag in the remains of some long dead people in front of national tribunal and call them dead aliens.

What the heck - might as well bring on the fake ancient American crystal skulls and say they've got a plan for world peace. No one else seems to have one of those either. And the central arbiter has lost heft now that the US has checked out and is radically altering its foreign policy in some areas. Strange days. Pretty Orwellian.

Can't wait to see those promised UFO files. That could possibly make people forget about reality for a while.

 

[Red]

The series was pretty bonkers, but it makes clear there was a lot at stake during the time Linda's story started to gain traction. The publisher was considering a re-release of one of Bud's books, and there were talks of a possible movie. Carol Rainey scuppered all of that when she wrote her article critical of Bud and Linda.
And although I think LN totally fabricated the story about her most famous abduction, I think perhaps she was an experiencer, and it's just that her prior encounters didn't fit the narrative that Bud was already wedded to. If he was dismissive of her previous experiences, well, the series made it very clear she could be vindictive, with even LN confirming that very fact. She was going to make Bud pay attention to her no matter what.

BurntState,
To your point, yeah, this field doesn't know a dead horse it doesn't like to beat (or in this case, mutilate, nyuck nyuck), and that will probably never change. I wasn't ready for the trickster-ish aspects of things 10 years ago, but now I think that most people will gravitate to the narratives that already conform to their worldviews.

Thankfully, I do think the attitudes regarding hypnosis have changed. While there are still true-believers out there, most people these days don't view it useful for recovering memories or useful in abduction research.

 

[Richard Hawkins]

The series was pretty bonkers, but it makes clear there was a lot at stake during the time Linda's story started to gain traction. The publisher was considering a re-release of one of Bud's books, and there were talks of a possible movie. Carol Rainey scuppered all of that when she wrote her article critical of Bud and Linda.
And although I think LN totally fabricated the story about her most famous abduction, I think perhaps she was an experiencer, and it's just that her prior encounters didn't fit the narrative that Bud was already wedded to. If he was dismissive of her previous experiences, well, the series made it very clear she could be vindictive, with even LN confirming that very fact. She was going to make Bud pay attention to her no matter what.

BurntState,
To your point, yeah, this field doesn't know a dead horse it doesn't like to beat (or in this case, mutilate, nyuck nyuck), and that will probably never change. I wasn't ready for the trickster-ish aspects of things 10 years ago, but now I think that most people will gravitate to the narratives that already conform to their worldviews.

Thankfully, I do think the attitudes regarding hypnosis have changed. While there are still true-believers out there, most people these days don't view it useful for recovering memories or useful in abduction research.

Yea I think false memory syndrome has been well and truly proven.

 

[George Wingfield]

The problem is that the story is entirely delusional and Rainey is one of the few with real insight into the reality of this tale.

Right on! The story of Linda Napolitano’s abduction by aliens from her apartment in Manhattan at 3 am on November 30, 1989 was a complete fantasy created by her and supplied directly and indirectly to “alien abduction expert” Budd Hopkins. It formed the basis for an on-going soap opera in which drama queen Linda was also kidnapped by Men-in-Black style government agents and supposedly held against her will. All of these adventures were told to Budd in installments and chronicled by him in his 1996 book Witnessed - The True Story of the Brooklyn Bridge UFO Abductions.

Her alien abduction soap opera didn’t stop there and Linda made numerous further claims of alien abduction, once saying she had seen a jailed mafioso crime boss among those who she met “aboard the ships”. She also claimed that on September 11, 2001 she had gone for a job interview at an office on a high floor of the WTC North Tower at just the time the building was hit by one of the airliners hijacked by terrorists. Amazingly, she said, she was practically the last to escape back down to the street following a harrowing ordeal which very few survived.

Today most people are astonished that anyone could have believed a word she said. Attached is a photo of her which I took when I met her in NYC in 1992. Back then most men who met her realized immediately that she was a strikingly attractive girl and, let’s face it, why would any of them want to cast doubt on her story! Budd, in particular, was well aware she was an utter fantasist but he went along with all she said knowing which side his bread was buttered on. It took Carol Rainey, who had earlier been Budd’s third wife and knew both him and Linda extremely well, to tell us exactly what the score was.

 

[Richard Hawkins]

Right on! The story of Linda Napolitano’s abduction by aliens from her apartment in Manhattan at 3 am on November 30, 1989 was a complete fantasy created by her and supplied directly and indirectly to “alien abduction expert” Budd Hopkins. It formed the basis for an on-going soap opera in which drama queen Linda was also kidnapped by Men-in-Black style government agents and supposedly held against her will. All of these adventures were told to Budd in installments and chronicled by him in his 1996 book Witnessed - The True Story of the Brooklyn Bridge UFO Abductions.

Her alien abduction soap opera didn’t stop there and Linda made numerous further claims of alien abduction, once saying she had seen a jailed mafioso crime boss among those who she met “aboard the ships”. She also claimed that on September 11, 2001 she had gone for a job interview at an office on a high floor of the WTC North Tower at just the time the building was hit by one of the airliners hijacked by terrorists. Amazingly, she said, she was practically the last to escape back down to the street following a harrowing ordeal which very few survived.

Today most people are astonished that anyone could have believed a word she said. Attached is a photo of her which I took when I met her in NYC in 1992. Back then most men who met her realized immediately that she was a strikingly attractive girl and, let’s face it, why would any of them want to cast doubt on her story! Budd, in particular, was well aware she was an utter fantasist but he went along with all she said knowing which side his bread was buttered on. It took Carol Rainey, who had earlier been Budd’s third wife and knew both him and Linda extremely well, to tell us exactly what the score was.

All very true George. Good to hear from you again it has been a while.