May 10, 2015 — Red Pill Junkie with Richard Dolan

[red_pill_junkie]

Well, one event that is certainly NOT entirely comprised of 'true believers' is the Paradigm symposium. Dolan is still scheduled to be one of the speakers, and last year we had an interesting roundtable with him, Micah Hanks, Nick Redfern, Chase Kloetzke --and yours truly.

I think setting something like a "UFOlogy's Do's and Dont's" discussion is perfectly achievable in that venue

 

[Batmmannn]

...and them being paid by the public to attend and explain this is also very acceptable to you I take it? I don't agree. They can have a roundtable in prison as far as I am concerned and explain their actions to a jury. That would be acceptable to me. Fraud for financial gain is an imprisonable offense. In Fact it's a Felony.

 

[red_pill_junkie]

Yeah well, that's another important discussion that needs to be had: The power of the community members as consumers of information.

Ideally UFO buffs would act as responsible consumers, and be more selective about what kind of events they attend, which books they buy and which speakers they pay to listen to. Problem is, we've already established those 2 venues Schmitt and Carey are engaged to speak in are mainly attended by 'true believers', and herein lies the paradox: Any Paracast member would be equipped to ask hard questions to these guys, but at the same time most of us would not be too inclined to spend hard-earned money to listen to them; hence they will probably still have a good run preaching to the choir, even if they experience a lot of backlash from the beWITNESS quagmire.

Have any other alternatives been explored? You, Batmann, have you started perhaps some CHANGE.org campaign to demand the organizers of these events to exclude these individuals from their speaker line-up?

The thing is, these guys are still going to the conferences regardless of how much we bitch and moan in online forums. Which is why I thought Gorightly's suggestion was interesting to consider.

 

[Batmmannn]

So by your assessment, if Toyota advertises a Lexus takes full payment and then delivers a Lexus with no engine wheels or tires then it was the consumer that was at fault for not being more selective? They committed fraud took a tremendous amount of money from the public and should be in prison. They advertised Proof and delivered nothing of the sort, kept the money and did not give any refunds. As far as my opinion they are Con Men and Criminals.

 

[DaveM]

The problem is there is no controlling body for Ufology (and probably never will be.) Anyone can set up a website, call themselves an expert, or conduct an alien slide seminar and people will flock to them. What if you do set up a discussion of do's and don'ts and the parties you want to participate won't attend? You are back to square one. Are people like Schmitt and Carey going to show up at a seminar to rehash something they wish to forget? Not likely. They aren't going to allow the cash spigot to be turned off.

 

[red_pill_junkie]

So by your assessment, if Toyota advertises a Lexus takes full payment and then delivers a Lexus with no engine wheels or tires then it was the consumer that was at fault for not being more selective? They committed fraud took a tremendous amount of money from the public and should be in prison. They advertised Proof and delivered nothing of the sort, kept the money and did not give any refunds. As far as my opinion they are Con Men and Criminals.

You did not answer my question. Have you tried to ACTIVELY seek ways in which these individuals get to be ousted from their speaking engagements, and the UFO community at large? Or, since you're so certain they actually perpetrated a felony --and even hardcore skeptics would get to disagree with that-- proceeded to start legal action against them?

 

[red_pill_junkie]

The problem is there is no controlling body for Ufology (and probably never will be.) Anyone can set up a website, call themselves an expert, or conduct an alien slide seminar and people will flock to them. What if you do set up a discussion of do's and don'ts and the parties you want to participate won't attend? You are back to square one. Are people like Schmitt and Carey going to show up at a seminar to rehash something they wish to forget? Not likely. They aren't going to allow the cash spigot to be turned off.

Right now the only 'controlling bodies' we have are things like the UFO Watchdog website, which we know was temporarily run by The Paracast.

But I think we can safely agree such strategies have a very limited rate of success. People like Maussan have remained in UFO's 'Wall of Shame' for many, many years, and yet he was still able to pull the beWITNESS show off.

You know, this whole thing reminded me of that WIRED article which appeared last month, about several dissident groups who are trying to undermine the North Korean regime by way of smuggling USB thumb drives full of foreign films and TV shows. Turns out these dissidents discovered that if you bombard the people who are still under the influence of Kim Jong Un's political apparatus with direct attacks against him and his regime, many of those people will REJECT the attacks and instinctively perceive them as Capitalist propaganda --after all, that's what they've been conditioned to think over several generations.

BUT, if instead of a direct political message, you show them an episode of Friends or the movie Titanic, that actually makes them open their eyes about the lies they've been given by their government!

Maybe UFOlogy could learn a thing or two about the North Korean dissidents

 

[DaveM]

It's much like the rhetoric when the US criticizes a country like Iran. It plays right into the Iranian governments hands. Most citizens will back their country's government over the decadent Americans. Unfortunately the UFO Watchdog group came about for just this special slide spectacle. I wouldn't count on them anytime soon again. It was just because of the outlandish nature of the slides that some group stepped forward and proved it wrong. Even so, Maussan, Moulton-Howe and Strieber won't let it go. Perhaps a financial reason to keep it alive??

 

[Wade]

Maybe UFOlogy could learn a thing or two about the North Korean dissidents

That's an interesting comparison but how do you propose to carry that over to UFOlogy?

If you don't "attack" his methodology those on the outside will assume the people inside the field are protecting their own.

I have always had a passion for parody and satire and maybe it doesn't hurt to be self-effacing...something I notice you do a lot...if you can laugh at yourself that will win people to your side and as far as Jaime and Greer and others like them there is probably a way to subvert their message or impact without giving them a reason to foster a seige mentality?

How is Jaime at facing criticism, does he take it in stride and laugh at himself with his tomfoolery? If so then he may be a force to be reckoned with if he n ' take himself too seriously.

 

[red_pill_junkie]

That's an interesting comparison but how do you propose to carry that over to UFOlogy?

If you don't "attack" his methodology those on the outside will assume the people inside the field are protecting their own.

I have always had a passion for parody and satire and maybe it doesn't hurt to be self-effacing...something I notice you do a lot...if you can laugh at yourself that will win people to your side and as far as Jaime and Greer and others like them there is probably a way to subvert their message or impact without giving them a reason to foster a seige mentality?

Oh I do that out of masochism

Srsly though, I guess that instead of a full-frontal exposé, to show something that would undermine their credibility in an indirect way could prove to be more successful in the long run.

I guess that for me, reading something like Greg Bishop's Project Beta forced me to question a lot of my long-held assumptions about the UFO world, especially concerning the mythology of underground bases, shady deals with the aliens, etc.

Since Greg approached the subject from an 'excluded middle' POV, it allowed me to be more open to it, had he chosen instead a fully-negative, 'debunking' tone.

It's something I've always criticized about the skeptic community: How even if their message is correct, it's the TONE they employ full of ad-hominem attacks and vitriol which actually produces the exact opposite result of what they're allegedly seeking.

 

[Psychedelic_Alchemist]

Adam Gorightly had an interesting suggestion on his blog Untamed Dimensions:

Of course it’s easy in retrospect to take pot shots at the Dream Team after it all went down in flames, but granted they made themselves easy targets by claiming that they’d done their “due diligence” in determining that—at the very least—there was something truly significant about these slides which, in the final analysis, proved to be a whole lot of nothing.

Apologies are all well and good, but in this instance they seem a rather hollow attempt to say: “Hey, we admit our mistake, but it’s now over and done and time to move on.” Apologies—in the minds of some—help bring closure and resolution and that “Yeah, well, we sorta screwed up, although we don’t really want to talk about that too much, except to say that we’re sorry and we’ll make sure it never happens again.”

Such apologies don’t cut it with some of the more vociferous members in the UFO research scene who—if they had their druthers—would prefer to see the Dream Teamers cut off at the legs and never allowed to attend any future UFO conferences or profit from anything related to UFOs and be forever blackballed from the hallowed halls of Ufology.

However, I have an alternative that would put a positive spin on this whole debacle and at the same time move Ufology a few steps forward—after the backward missteps it took that led to the beWITNESS train wreck.

As Don Schmitt is slated to speak at Contact in the Desert on the weekend of May 29-31—and both Carey and Schmitt at the Roswell Festival in July—these events would provide the perfect forum to discuss the “Lessons Learned” from the beWITNESS and Roswell Slides affair and allow the principals involved to explain how they arrived at the erroneous conclusion (or at least the working theory) that they actually had photographic evidence of a dead alien so that future UFO researchers can avoid the same pitfalls to which the Dream Team fell victim.

This would include an explanation of the Dream Team’s investigatory process—or lack thereof—and exactly what materials they provided to the experts who conducted the photo analysis and, in turn, what documentation these experts returned to the Dream Team that apparently confirmed, in their minds at least, that the little guy in the photo was an alien.
This type of transparency would instruct the UFO community on how these mistakes were made and greatly assist future Ufologists in adopting a more sound methodology to avoid future fiascos of this nature.​

Everybody keeps mentioning these so-called "experts", but how is it possible that they could mistake an obvious mummy for an alien being? What exactly are they experts in? Who decided upon which "experts" would be consulted? And how much were these "experts" paid, if at all, for their "expert" opinions?

 

[Burnt State]

Everybody keeps mentioning these so-called "experts", but how is it possible that they could mistake an obvious mummy for an alien being? What exactly are they experts in? Who decided upon which "experts" would be consulted? And how much were these "experts" paid, if at all, for their "expert" opinions?

they're not experts - they're informants of a pseudo reality and now crutches to lean on when you want to try to convince people that there's actual science afoot concerning the anomaly. they get used as excuses for many in the aftermath who would like to rely on what the experts say, so who are they to question whether or not it's an alien, or a gecko or a salamander or whatever....they create an easy out bascially

 

[Batmmannn]

I would clarify that and state you need to see what they did and that their acts clarify them as Con Men not experts, not investigators, not researchers, but CON MEN out to take your money by fraudulent means!

 

[Han]

Here is an independent experts opinion (An Historian with 50+ years experience)


My message N.B. I did my best not to lead the witness:

"Dear *****, I was sent these two slides in the hope that I could identify what is shown, but I would like an historians opinion.
I have very little information regarding the slides except that they were taken in the late 1940s.
Please have a look and tell me what you think."


The response:

Dear Harry

I have been in ****** for some days, so sorry that I have not replied before.

The slides remind me of those that used to be available on the Internet, purporting to be pictures of preserved Aliens, held in some secret American Government facility - I forget the story - rescued from a flying saucer?

The images are poor quality so it is impossible to say much about them. They remind me of the faked monsters stitched together as freak shows in the nineteenth century. They look fairly human, and could be based on human embryos, almost at full term. The time spent in preserving fluid would distort them to some extent. Who knows?

At the time of sending I did not have access to the high res versions, and since I have now discussed the matter with him, he is no longer unaware of the other evidence, so a second opinion from him would be biased.

In truth I was expecting him to say: that is a Mummy. but the most important thing to me is: he said:

"The images are poor quality so it is impossible to say much about them."

I knew that much before I sent the message, so confirmation was no suprise.

My understanding is the Bewitness "experts" (specifically the anthropologists) spoke about what the slides "appeared" to show, and even went as far to say that without the body, only "opinion" could be offered, as opposed to real physical evidence.

I want to see the professionally translated reports, and it is increasingly suspicious that they have not got around to it yet, but we are dealing with the most slippery subject and characters (the paranormal) and its hard to prove that anyone was anything other than misguided.
I wish that it would go to court because then some real questions would be asked, but I am coming to the conclusion that this whole affair is toxic, as demonstrated by my outburst in another thread.

I am still just as angry, but I am going to focus my energy elsewhere, because people will be people. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink, especially if it has been guzzling gallons of Koolaid on the journey to the watering hole.

 

[red_pill_junkie]

Looky here: By trying to access the webpage bewitness.mx you're immediately linked instead to a different URL:

thefaceofroswell.com

A bit sleeker, in English, showing right on top the 'scientific reports' of Doble, Zalce, and De Alba. Though the last two still remain untranslated. I mean, does it really take THAT LONG to find someone who could translate the damn thing?

There is however, a 'ratification' from the Forensic Medicine Institute:

Lic. Jaime Maussan Fleet President. Insider television. A. de C. V S PRESENT.


By this means, and to give answer to your friendly letter dated May 14 of this year, we commented that we have been attentive to the various manifestations of experts and non-experts on 1as slides presented and our work in the analysis what these images can be seen, so that our National Institute of Forensic Sciences we remain in position and conclusions issued by the medical expert, Jose de Jesus Benitez Zalce respect that:


"... This is a central image of anthropomorphic humanoid type feature in an artificial state of conservation cadaverous corresponding to formaldehyde and cooling and having features of evisceration by necropsy techniques"


"Which, by their morphology and anatomy observed and analyzed, together a series of anomalies in surnatoria NOT COMPATIBLE WITH LIFE. As the individual membership of each disease and each syndrome can be determined a percent reduced chance coexistence in the life of human type known .... "


Under the study by this expert it was under the supervision of the board of this Institute, which although has been made on a digital images we corroborated that these were originally taken from the source slides and were original, the forensic study It was developed with the estncto attachment to the canons dictated by the material in Forensic Medicine and Forensic Sciences in general, and that the opinion issued complies with the required scientific rigor to this case.


So that in order to change our perspective and position on the being shown in the pictures, we should have new solid, valid and scientifically sound evidence to allow our experts to expand the study and rectify if your position as in the field of forensic science the expert work should be based on tangible evidence and can be subject to study by the methods so that we can issue an opinion conviertaa the evidence irrefutably demonstrated.



Images studied, given the necessary evidence and appropriate for the Medical Examiner. so that minucios through detailed observation, based on their knowledge and experience. and with the assistance of other experts consulted anthropologists opinions geneticists, as well as formal documents, would endorse its conclusions here.


More photos in greater detail. a body physically presented, or any evidence related to the case, which is very objective and possible rule from any of forensic specialties, could be the means to expand or change our opinion


Forensic Sciences are precise and objective, not based on personal assessments and are free from all forms of prejudice, therefore, whoever discuss our work. You will have to be willing to support his statement with these same arguments.


Consequently, we will convene an academic to discuss regarding our position as opposed to those scientists who wish to present their points of view event.


The National Institute of Forensic Sciences, thank your newspaper company has had confidence in forensic scientists in Mexico to develop this research, and responsibly accept the commitment not only to our country but the whole world, it grants us to elucidate if before the images that have been exposed, we are facing a different way of life.


We reiterate the order, pending the demonstrations on this issue continue to emerge.
​

Allow me to be the first one to say it: Methinks they missed an 'r' in that title...

​

 

[Han]

I had a look on the website they are showing 2 versions of the slides, the one that bothers me is the one called "Imagen Mejorada" which I have translated as "enhanced image" but the placard is whited out! surely when enhanced it should be more clear??????

 

[red_pill_junkie]

I had a look on the website they are showing 2 versions of the slides, the one that bothers me is the one called "Imagen Mejorada" which I have translated as "enhanced image" but the placard is whited out! surely when enhanced it should be more clear??????

Not to mention they are still NOT high-resolution versions.

 

[Gene Steinberg]

Remember, too, that a Kodachrome slide is meant to be projected at a pretty large size. Depending on the exposure, sharpness and the capabilities of the camera, you can get a pretty clear picture that would be successfully captured in a proper slide scanner.

Just FYI, I saw a slide scanner on Amazon for $99.99 that advertised a resolution of up to 22 megapixels. That's surely enough to capture any key details in those original slides, although more expensive scanners will yield better quality color. In other words, scanning a slide with good quality is a pretty trivial and not costly process. It can be accomplished in seconds regardless of the hardware.

 

[red_pill_junkie]

Remember, too, that a Kodachrome slide is meant to be projected at a pretty large size. Depending on the exposure, sharpness and the capabilities of the camera, you can get a pretty clear picture that would be successfully captured in a proper slide scanner.

Just FYI, I saw a slide scanner on Amazon for $99.99 that advertised a resolution of up to 22 megapixels. That's surely enough to capture any key details in those original slides, although more expensive scanners will yield better quality color. In other words, scanning a slide with good quality is a pretty trivial and not costly process. It can be accomplished in seconds regardless of the hardware.

Indeed, I think we all agree their not sharing hi-rez versions of the slides has nothing to do with any potential technical problems they might face.

 

[Gene Steinberg]

Yes. But that should have been done on the very first day, particularly if any of the people involved has the slightest ability to run a scanner. It doesn't take much instruction.