THE PARACAST NEWSLETTER
May 14, 2011
The History of UFO Personalities Explored on The Paracast
Special Announcement: The Paracast is heard Sundays from 6:00 PM until 9:00 PM (Central Time) on the GCN radio network.
The Paracast Humbly Requests Your Donations: Although ads help cover a small part of our expenses, the income they produce is never enough. Also, we do not receive any revenue from the ads placed on the show by our network. So we hope you'll be willing to help fill the gap if you can to help us cover increasing server costs and other expenses -- or perhaps provide a little extra cash for lunch. No contribution is too small (or too large
. We have a Donate link on our home page, below the logo and audio player. There's also a Donate link on our forums, right below our logo. Or just send your PayPal donation direct to sales (at) theparacast (dot) com.
Attention U.S. Listeners: Help Us Bring The Paracast to Your City! Last summer, The Paracast joined the GCN radio network. This represented a huge step in bringing our show to a larger, mainstream audience. Now we want your help to add more affiliates to our growing network. Please ask one of your local talk stations if they are interested in carrying The Paracast. Feel free to contact us directly with the names of programming people we might be able to contact on your behalf. We can't do this alone, and if you succeed in convincing your local station to carry the show, we'll reward you with one of our special T-shirts, and other goodies. With your help, The Paracast can grow into one of the most popular paranormal shows on the planet!
You Can Now Order The Official Paracast T-Shirt: You asked, and we answered. We are now taking orders for The Official Paracast T-Shirt and a collection of other specially customized merchandise. To get your T-Shirt, just pay a visit to our new online store at Welcome to The Official Paracast Store to select your size and place your order. We now also offer a lineup of other premium merchandise featuring The Paracast logo.
Sunday, May 15, 2011: The Paracast covers a world beyond science, where UFOs, poltergeists and strange phenomena of all kinds have been reported by millions across the planet.
Set Up: The Paracast hosts interview long-time researchers in the field, to shed light on the mysteries and complexities of our Universe and the secrets that surround us in our everyday lives.
Join us as we explore the realms of the known and unknown, and hear great stories of the history of the paranormal field in the 20th and 21st centuries.
This Week's Episode: Gene and Chris take a fascinating journey through the history of UFO research with Tim “Mr. UFO" Beckley, who has been active since his teenaged years in the 1960s, and prolific paranormal author Tim Swartz.
Christopher O'Brien's Site: Home - Our Strange Planet
Tim Beckley's Site: Conspiracy Journal - Unfair and Unbalanced!
Reminder: Don't forget to visit our always-active Discussion Forums for the latest news/views/debates on all things paranormal (and note our new Internet address): The Paracast Community Forums.
Sometimes We Just Don’t Buy It!
By Gene Steinberg
There’s an unfortunate belief that Chris O’Brien and I must believe every single guest we have on the show, that we won’t bring on people who hold contrary views. That follows someone’s crazy review of The Paracast on iTunes, where it was claimed that only my friends are willing to came on the show.
Well, if that’s the case, I must have hundreds and hundreds of friends, because we’ve had very, very few refusals. Just about everyone we’ve invited has agreed to appear, including such notables as Dr. Jacques Vallee, Jerome Clark, and none other than former Governor Jesse Ventura. The only notable exception is author and abductee Whitley Strieber, who evidently resents the fact that some of the people who post in The Paracast Community Forums have said unkind things about him.
But you have to wonder about people who, despite being in the limelight for years, and making claims with which many people disagree, somehow cannot handle difficult questions and skepticism. That’s unfortunate, and we hope that Whitley will come to realize that our forums contain many viewpoints, and we don’t pretend to agree with all of them. It’s an open forum where listeners to The Paracast can have their say, so long as they follow a few common sense rules that govern acceptable online behavior. What that means is that you shouldn’t defame people, and engage in virulent personal attacks. We do give people a fair amount of latitude, though, and we only remove messages and restrict posting for people whose transgressions become too extreme.
As you might know, some of the people who have had their posting privileges revoked, and it’s a very small number overall, have decided to take their complaints elsewhere. The extreme behavior that caught our attention is manifested in anger because they couldn’t get their way.
As for Strieber, as I said, he’s welcome to come on our show, but he has to be willing to accept difficult questions. Certainly, if his experiences are genuine, he should welcome the chance to appear before a somewhat more skeptical audience and make his case.
Now I bring up the question of what we believe because of this week’s guest, Tim Beckley, who is sometimes known as “Mr. UFO.” Now Beckley is often thought of as a carnival barker, who hawks merchandise with a paranormal flavor regardless of its authenticity simply to make a boatload of money.
This image has been perpetuated over the years by the wide range of topics covered in the books and magazines he publishes. The man behind that image, however, is extremely serious about what he does. If he really wanted to clean up in terms of income, he would not have chosen what many regard as fringe subjects with limited audiences. His interest is genuine, and he’s had a few personal experiences over the years that cry out for answers.
But as with any publisher, the material in his large catalog represents a wide range of viewpoints and claims. As with most publishers, he will pick works that appear to have some level of sales potential, regardless of his personal viewpoints, while at the same time he isn’t going to sell material that is clearly fraudulent. Tim’s entitled to make a living.
As you probably realize, Tim is on friendly terms with many serious long-time paranormal researchers. He doesn’t just hang out with characters that some of you may regard as kooks. At the same time, some of these people are endlessly entertaining, and there’s nothing wrong with sitting back and listening to or reading about a good yarn. You’re not forced to take all of it seriously
By the same token, we’ve featured guests on The Paracast whose viewpoints might be questionable to some of you – and to us for that matter. Again, there’s nothing wrong with sitting back and suspending your disbelief for a few hours. Even if a particular viewpoint, or case history, appears on the surface to veer into the land of the absurd, it may be worth a listen anyway. The best way to seek the truth behind all these strange events is to examine a wide range of views and evidence before coming to a final conclusion.
Indeed, you listeners might believe in material that I just don’t buy. But that’s all right too, so long as you understand that we also take these subjects very seriously. Even if some claims don’t past the “smell” test, there many mysteries to be explored in our paranormal universe, and they demand satisfactory explanations.
The Paracast Copyright 1999-2011 Making The Impossible, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Privacy Policy: Your personal information is safe with us. We will positively never give out your name and/or e-mail address to anybody else, and that's a promise!
May 14, 2011
The History of UFO Personalities Explored on The Paracast
Special Announcement: The Paracast is heard Sundays from 6:00 PM until 9:00 PM (Central Time) on the GCN radio network.
The Paracast Humbly Requests Your Donations: Although ads help cover a small part of our expenses, the income they produce is never enough. Also, we do not receive any revenue from the ads placed on the show by our network. So we hope you'll be willing to help fill the gap if you can to help us cover increasing server costs and other expenses -- or perhaps provide a little extra cash for lunch. No contribution is too small (or too large
. We have a Donate link on our home page, below the logo and audio player. There's also a Donate link on our forums, right below our logo. Or just send your PayPal donation direct to sales (at) theparacast (dot) com.Attention U.S. Listeners: Help Us Bring The Paracast to Your City! Last summer, The Paracast joined the GCN radio network. This represented a huge step in bringing our show to a larger, mainstream audience. Now we want your help to add more affiliates to our growing network. Please ask one of your local talk stations if they are interested in carrying The Paracast. Feel free to contact us directly with the names of programming people we might be able to contact on your behalf. We can't do this alone, and if you succeed in convincing your local station to carry the show, we'll reward you with one of our special T-shirts, and other goodies. With your help, The Paracast can grow into one of the most popular paranormal shows on the planet!
You Can Now Order The Official Paracast T-Shirt: You asked, and we answered. We are now taking orders for The Official Paracast T-Shirt and a collection of other specially customized merchandise. To get your T-Shirt, just pay a visit to our new online store at Welcome to The Official Paracast Store to select your size and place your order. We now also offer a lineup of other premium merchandise featuring The Paracast logo.
Sunday, May 15, 2011: The Paracast covers a world beyond science, where UFOs, poltergeists and strange phenomena of all kinds have been reported by millions across the planet.
Set Up: The Paracast hosts interview long-time researchers in the field, to shed light on the mysteries and complexities of our Universe and the secrets that surround us in our everyday lives.
Join us as we explore the realms of the known and unknown, and hear great stories of the history of the paranormal field in the 20th and 21st centuries.
This Week's Episode: Gene and Chris take a fascinating journey through the history of UFO research with Tim “Mr. UFO" Beckley, who has been active since his teenaged years in the 1960s, and prolific paranormal author Tim Swartz.
Christopher O'Brien's Site: Home - Our Strange Planet
Tim Beckley's Site: Conspiracy Journal - Unfair and Unbalanced!
Reminder: Don't forget to visit our always-active Discussion Forums for the latest news/views/debates on all things paranormal (and note our new Internet address): The Paracast Community Forums.
Sometimes We Just Don’t Buy It!
By Gene Steinberg
There’s an unfortunate belief that Chris O’Brien and I must believe every single guest we have on the show, that we won’t bring on people who hold contrary views. That follows someone’s crazy review of The Paracast on iTunes, where it was claimed that only my friends are willing to came on the show.
Well, if that’s the case, I must have hundreds and hundreds of friends, because we’ve had very, very few refusals. Just about everyone we’ve invited has agreed to appear, including such notables as Dr. Jacques Vallee, Jerome Clark, and none other than former Governor Jesse Ventura. The only notable exception is author and abductee Whitley Strieber, who evidently resents the fact that some of the people who post in The Paracast Community Forums have said unkind things about him.
But you have to wonder about people who, despite being in the limelight for years, and making claims with which many people disagree, somehow cannot handle difficult questions and skepticism. That’s unfortunate, and we hope that Whitley will come to realize that our forums contain many viewpoints, and we don’t pretend to agree with all of them. It’s an open forum where listeners to The Paracast can have their say, so long as they follow a few common sense rules that govern acceptable online behavior. What that means is that you shouldn’t defame people, and engage in virulent personal attacks. We do give people a fair amount of latitude, though, and we only remove messages and restrict posting for people whose transgressions become too extreme.
As you might know, some of the people who have had their posting privileges revoked, and it’s a very small number overall, have decided to take their complaints elsewhere. The extreme behavior that caught our attention is manifested in anger because they couldn’t get their way.
As for Strieber, as I said, he’s welcome to come on our show, but he has to be willing to accept difficult questions. Certainly, if his experiences are genuine, he should welcome the chance to appear before a somewhat more skeptical audience and make his case.
Now I bring up the question of what we believe because of this week’s guest, Tim Beckley, who is sometimes known as “Mr. UFO.” Now Beckley is often thought of as a carnival barker, who hawks merchandise with a paranormal flavor regardless of its authenticity simply to make a boatload of money.
This image has been perpetuated over the years by the wide range of topics covered in the books and magazines he publishes. The man behind that image, however, is extremely serious about what he does. If he really wanted to clean up in terms of income, he would not have chosen what many regard as fringe subjects with limited audiences. His interest is genuine, and he’s had a few personal experiences over the years that cry out for answers.
But as with any publisher, the material in his large catalog represents a wide range of viewpoints and claims. As with most publishers, he will pick works that appear to have some level of sales potential, regardless of his personal viewpoints, while at the same time he isn’t going to sell material that is clearly fraudulent. Tim’s entitled to make a living.
As you probably realize, Tim is on friendly terms with many serious long-time paranormal researchers. He doesn’t just hang out with characters that some of you may regard as kooks. At the same time, some of these people are endlessly entertaining, and there’s nothing wrong with sitting back and listening to or reading about a good yarn. You’re not forced to take all of it seriously
By the same token, we’ve featured guests on The Paracast whose viewpoints might be questionable to some of you – and to us for that matter. Again, there’s nothing wrong with sitting back and suspending your disbelief for a few hours. Even if a particular viewpoint, or case history, appears on the surface to veer into the land of the absurd, it may be worth a listen anyway. The best way to seek the truth behind all these strange events is to examine a wide range of views and evidence before coming to a final conclusion.
Indeed, you listeners might believe in material that I just don’t buy. But that’s all right too, so long as you understand that we also take these subjects very seriously. Even if some claims don’t past the “smell” test, there many mysteries to be explored in our paranormal universe, and they demand satisfactory explanations.
The Paracast Copyright 1999-2011 Making The Impossible, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Privacy Policy: Your personal information is safe with us. We will positively never give out your name and/or e-mail address to anybody else, and that's a promise!
