Nick Redfern extends his writing presence

Mr. Redfern will be writing in TAPS Paramagazine (a news-stand publication) under a new column "Realm of Monsters."

The first effort deals with mermaids -- yes, mermaids.

Click here to let Mr. Redfern tell it.

Nick Redfern -- Strange-Game Hunter

Nick Redfern has been on a Chupacabra hunt.

Click here to read his account

Soul-Harvesting by UFO aliens?

Nick Redfern gets futher immersed in the "demonic" aspect of UFOs (which we are a bit loath to accept at the moment).

But visitors here can decide for themselves.

Click here for Mr. Redfern's take

Nick Redfern on a religious charade?

Nick Redfern addresses an issue related to the topic(s) in his recent book, Final Events.

Click here for the commentary

Nick Redfern reviews Real Monsters, Gruesome Critters, and Beasts from the Darkside.

Nick Redfern provides a review of Brad Steiger's latest book.

Click here for Nick's review

Great Web-Site: UFO Comet

A new, for us, paranormal site -- UFO Comet -- has much about UFOs and some fine forums.

Check it out and sign up:

http://www.ufocomet.com

Nick Redfern and the Flatwoods Monster

Nick Redfern confronts the Flatwoods Monster.

Click here for more

Bigfoot, Sex, and Nick Redfern

Nick Redfern gets in bed with Bigfoot.

Read about it by clicking here

ALIENS AND CONSERVATIVES: THE RIGHT WING VERSUS ET by Anthony Bragalia

The recent and frightening re-emergence of the hard religious right as a political faction will have an impact on all of us. Whether or not such "Jesus-driven" candidates as Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Christine O'Donnell and Jan Brewer actually win elections to "govern by God," their fanatically held political and social beliefs will have repercussions for all of us who promote the study of things ET.

The words and actions of this frightening faction show that they oppose the Alien. They would never want extraterrestrial contact as they reject so many things that are "different" from them. They have repeatedly demonstrated their difficulty with inclusion of those who are not the same. And nothing could be more "different" that ET. Their near-racist opposition to Muslims and immigrants demonstrates their likely fear and loathing of extraterrestrial Visitors. As both history and current events reveal, extreme evangelical Christians even believe that ET are "demons."

GOING BACK TO PAT: "STONE THE ET BELIEVERS WITH ROCKS"



In July of 1997 religious right extremist Pat Robertson (of the "700 Club") issued a public statement on aliens and UFOs. He planned his proclamation to coincide with the news of the July 4th Mars Pathfinder landing that year. In a rambling diatribe, Robertson said that aliens and ET are in reality "demons" that are attempting to steer people away from Christ. So grave is the offense to study ET, Robertson maintains, that it is "God's word" that such people should be put to death!

Robertson says, "The Bible says the Earth belongs to man, but the heavens belong to the Lord. He has given us the Earth." Robertson warned of ET, "these things are at best lifeless nothings, intelligent and demonic. They are not a host of heaven, they are fallen angels."

Robertson, who still retains millions of followers to this day, continues, "Can a demon appear as a slanted-eyed, funny-looking creature? Of course he can, or it can. Of course they can deceive people. They can lead people away from the true God." Quoting Deuteronomy, Robertson instructs us what to do with those who study saucers: "stone to death that man or woman with stones." Note Robertson's racist and ignorant words to describe others not like us: "Slanted-eyed and funny-looking creature."

Deceased ultra-right wing conservative Christian (and founder of the "Moral Majority") Reverend Jerry Falwell echoed Robertson's sentiments that when "playing with ET, you are playing with the devil." Both Robertson and Falwell had a major impact on the political thinking and positioning of rightist Republicans and extreme conservative politics that continues to reverberate to this day.

CHRISTIAN SYMPOSIUM 2009: "ALIENS ARE DEVILS!"



A Christian outreach ministry led by Roswell resident Guy Malone preaches a strange mix of counter-cult evangelism, Biblical perspective on UFOs and what Malone describes as "Alien Resistance." During the annual Roswell UFO Festival last year, Malone organized an "all Christian speaker symposium" which included pastors, ordained ministers and pastoral counselors who came from around the nation to deliver papers. From the Best Western Ballroom, these men of the cloth lit the torch of ignorance. They explained to the exceptionally gullible that we are in "spiritual warfare" with these unwanted Visitors. Some they say, are demon abductors. The ET utter false New Age gospel and the messages to contactees are from Satan.

Presentations from the conference included such topics as: "Communication with Non-Terrestrial Beings: Biblical Warnings" and "Why an ET God Appeals to Today's Culture." as well as "ET's Message to Humanity: A False Gospel." Speakers included those from such places as Creation Ministries International and Evangelical Ministries. Such topics would be humorous if they were not so dangerous.

Such thinking of course is exclusionary in the extreme. Not only do these extreme rightists believe that they have the gift to "discern demons" - they believe that those who believe that ET is another species from another planet are anathema, and that to think that is dangerous and immoral.

A REPUBLICAN GOVERNOR AND ET



Former Governor, Minister and Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee apparently has also weighed in on the ET issue. When the late TV journalist Tim Russert asked Huckabee about UFOs while moderating a 2008 presidential debate, Huckabee spelled out his reply. He said that he preferred "G-O-D" over "U-F-O" to audience applause. A volunteer for the Huckabee campaign, John Jones Nichols, was quoted at the time that "UFOs are really demons disguised as spaceships." Nichols added that he was "sure that the Governor agreed with the bibical experts" on this.

DEMONS AS ALIENS IN 2010



Over the centuries, many things have been ignorantly viewed as demonic. Things that change the way we live -and that give us a wider expanse of knowledge and viewpoint- are always first feared. People believed for centuries that physical disease could be caused by demon possession. They did not know of the world of microbial life. It was at one time considered sacrilegious to consider that the Earth is not the center of the Universe.

But what is so profoundly disturbing is that these notions of demonic ETs is so prevalent today in 2010, well into the new millennium. A Google search using key words "Alien" + "Demons" yields over 1,500,000 matches. Countless websites warn of the connection between UFOs and Satan. Aliens, they proclaim that ETs are "Fallen Angels."

Right-wing Christian blogger Jefferson Scott said recently on his website: "I believe UFOs, aliens, abductions and animal mutilations are all real and that the American Government maintains relations with these beings." But then Scott alarmingly adds: "But I believe that the whole thing is demonic."

Scott is recycling a decades-old meme. It is a theme of extreme conservative Christians that maintains that Earth is "number one," that the Earth was gifted to humans by God- and that ET that come here are not of God. They are not welcomed. They are undesired intruders who are of the devil himself. The demons are disguised as aliens. But Scott also reflects a paranoia and distrust of "Government" that has reached irrational proportions in the recent political climate.

These "fundamentalists against flying saucers" extend this extreme mistrust of anything in government to the point of believing that some of those in Military and Intel really cavort with ET devils!

FINAL EVENTS



Author Nick Redfern's new book "Final Events" discusses this potential infiltration of elements of US military and intelligence by extreme Christian fundamentalists. This fundamentalist faction believes that extraterrestrials are demonic in nature. Redfern describes a specific group within US military and Intel that has even named itself: The Collins Elite.

Some of these demon-fearing government groups have apparently been operating since the late 1940s. Some have even dreamt up scenarios where even the Roswell "memory metal" is seen as a "plant" by demonic forces. The material was created through "demonic alchemy" and placed in the desert by these evil entities as a devil's Trojan horse" for man to open doors best remained closed. That such religious fantasies may be held by those entrusted to protect our country is a frightening thought.

Though I have yet to delve into "Final Events" I do know that "evangelical infiltration" of our US Military and Intel has occurred. One only has to visit the Christian Embassy website to see how the corridors of power are infested by religious rightists who believe their mission is divinely inspired. The organization gives new meaning to the admonition: "Onward, Christian Soldiers!"

OBAMA AS ALIEN: FEAR AND PREJUDICE AGAINST CHANGE



Such reactionary, divisive and rightist thinking is troublesome, even creepy. I cannot help but make this analogy:

Many of these misguided are the very same types that believe that President Obama is not really who he says that he is. They believe that he is not an American. They scream that he is not a U.S. citizen. In veiled terms they hint that he is "not like us." They lie about his religion. One yelled out during a McCain speech that Obama was "an Arab." Others rant that he is in fact the Anti-Christ.

Obama is "Alien" to these groups.

And the "fear of change" would be profound if such reactionary religious conservatives had to accept the visiting extraterrestrial. The perceived threat to their "order of things" would be too great for the bigoted and narrow-minded. Such people wish to restrict the immigration of Muslims and the construction of mosques in this country. The Christian Conservatives would rally strenuously against the construction of an alien's place of worship. They would no doubt take up the Palin call to violence: "Don't Retreat, Reload."

Rather than recognize that extra-solar planets likely teem with sentient life, they say that such things are Demons from Hell. They do not see that ET represents the splendor of God's diverse creation made evident throughout the universe. Like the delusional Florida pastor who called out to burn the Koran, they would no doubt burn ET's bibles. And just as they treated the "witches" of yore, such fanatics would falsely accuse ET and seek to destroy them.

Nick Redfern on Paranormal Warfare

Nick Redfern addresses, in his weekly column at Mania.com, how the military uses creature legends in warfare…..yep.

Click here for Mr. Redfern’s take…..

Nick Redfern reviews Christopher Dell's MONSTERS

Click here for Mr. Redfern's review

Nick Redfern interviewed about Final Events

Mike Clelland (whose excellent artwork can be seen in Mac Tonnies' book "The Cryptoterrestrials") interviewed Nick Redfern 9/15 about my new "Final Events" book.

The interview lasted about an hour and a half, and Mike has now posted the interview to his blog.

Click here to access the interview

Early Crop Circles and Official Interest by Nick Redfern

Precisely who, or what, is responsible for peppering the British landscape with the now-familiar Crop Circles, as well as the fantastically elaborate Pictograms – as they have come to be known – is a matter of deep conjecture, and one that has been hotly debated for several decades. Numerous theories have been advanced to try and explain the phenomenon; but opinions remain sharply divided. For some, Crop Circles are the work of benign extraterrestrials.

Others see the spirit of the Earth itself – calling out to the people of the planet to change their destructive ways – as being wholly responsible. Then there is the notion that all of the Crop Circles have man-made origins. Whatever the ultimate truth of the matter, the phenomenon is one that shows no signs of disappearing anytime soon.

But one of the most genuinely intriguing aspects of the affair is the extent to which British authorities have taken an interest in such formations.

Can the tales about official, government interest in Crop Circles be validated? Do governmental, military and intelligence files exist on this particularly emotive topic? The answer is most certainly: yes, to a degree, at least.

Under the terms of the British Government’s Freedom of Information legislation, a number of files concerning the wartime activities of MI5 – an arm of British Intelligence - have been declassified and made available for inspection at the National Archive, London, and which tell a notable story.

According to one MI5 document:

“The early days of 1940 and 1941 produced an avalanche of reports about the spies and fifth columnists who many people thought were roaming the land unhindered. Each village boasted of enemy agents in their midst, and it is only by recapturing the atmosphere of those days that one can see the matter in its proper perspective.

Everyone had heard of the activities of fifth columnists on the continent and of the alarmingly successful part they had played in the overthrow of France and Belgium. It was therefore natural with everyone tense for the threatened invasion that so many reports came in. Each had to be investigated, even if only to put the minds of the public and the services at rest.”

The report continues, and outlines the nature of its content: “This account is not concerned with the activities of fifth columnists such as sabotage, capturing airfields and key points, and harassing he defending army, but in the methods used in communicating to each other and to the enemy. Reports from Poland, Holland, France and Belgium showed that they used ground markings for the guidance of bombers and paratroops (and of lights by night).

Such ground markings might be the cutting of cornfields into guiding marks for aircraft.”

On this intriguing matter, MI5 elaborated that from interviews conducted with personnel who had taken part in the hostilities in Poland, it had been determined that one of the ways that Nazi spies were communicating with German Luftwaffe pilots was by “beating out signs, twenty meters in diameter, on harrowed fields or mowing such signs on meadows or cornfields.”

Crop Circles, in other words.

Notably, however, despite the widespread discovery of such formations, no definitive evidence ever surfaced to suggest that the strange creations found all across Europe were indeed the work of the Nazis. In other words, this was merely a theory to try and explain a tangible mystery and nothing more. The files also reveal that MI5 agents were dispatched throughout the UK to examine similar crop formations found in British fields in the early 1940s, in an attempt to determine if they, too, were linked with the activities of the Nazis.

And while the investigations did not confirm this hypothesis, the files are a perfect example (and, more importantly, an officially- documented example) of the fact that Crop Circles are not just a phenomenon of the modern era; but were reported to - and investigated by - high-level government departments seventy years ago.

The extent to which similar investigations may have been undertaken by British authorities in the modern era of the mystery, however, is an issue that still has many researchers of the puzzle going, quite literally, around in circles.

Nick Redfern on Chupacabras (in Texas?)

Nick Redfern's latest weekly "Lair of the Beast" at Mania.com deals with a "Texas Chupacabra."

Click here to read Nick's take

Nick Redfern interviewed about Final Events

Nick Redfern is interviewed about his latest book, Final Events.

Click here for the interview

UFOs, Zamora, Zamorro, Big Foot, and ?

The tale in a clipping we found in our batch or UFO stuff intrigues in several ways.

Click here to see clipping

Lonnie Zamora saw a UFO with two beings near by. Zamorro saw a “saucer” with a Big Foot creature near by.

What’s our point?

That observations of UFOs and other paranormal artifacts (ghosts, sea monsters, fairies, et al.) are connected by synchronous delusions, variegated by the mind-sets of the observers, posing a psychological or neurological link amongst witnesses to UFO events, as we and Paratopia’s Jeff Ritzmann would have it.

UFOs, while having, sometimes, a tangible effect on materiality, the residue or remnants of that original tangible effect are lost or muddled in the observational aftermath.

UFOs have remained elusive for millennia. Collected data has provided no distinct clue as to what they are.

Ritzmann, among others, think that UFOs alter their presence or appearances to correspond to the cultural/societal conditions at the time they are observed.

That is, UFOs adopt the technological attributes of the period in which they are seen or witnessed.

No, it’s not a matter of interpretation by witnesses – such as chariots of fire in the early historical records of humankind or the 1890 airships. What is seen or reported is exactly what is seen; the UFO (or flying saucer) manifests itself precisely as witnesses have reported them.



The “saucers” of the 1950s, the occupant-sightings too, were geared to the mind-set of the observers.



The zeitgeist determines how UFOs will look -- their apparent construct.

But as the old philosophical saw goes – if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound? – applies: if a UFO is in the vicinity of humans, but no one is around to see it, does it produce a tangible presence (for cameras, radar, et cetera)?

It seems that real UFO incidents need humans to perceive them, directly or indirectly.

And when humans perceive the UFO(s), they do so with all the aggregate mental detritus that suffuses their mind or memory.

Is there a UFO reality that is concrete or uniform? Apparently not.

UFOs alter themselves – we’re suggesting a living attribute obviously -- or are altered by the mental configurations of those perceiving them.

There is no one UFO presence, no one UFO reality. UFOs are all things to all people, manifesting their reality dependent upon the mental make-up of the person or persons taking in their presence, in the air, on the ground (as in previous years, more so than today), or via technology (radar, for instance).

And those who refuse the reality are also determinant mentally. They refuse the “reality” or “delusional reality” of others because they are saddled with mind-sets of a restrictive kind.

Until neurology, psychology, sociology, and other disciplines tackle the UFO phenomenon within the parameters of human mental vagaries, the mystery will remain elusive.

Hypothesizing about UFOs with an extraterrestrial orientation seems a futile enterprise. The folkloric aspect, propounded by Jacques Vallee or Dr. David Clarke, is a sensible approach.

But one shouldn’t eschew the ET interpretation out-of-hand. It remains a possibility, in the great scheme of things, but it shouldn’t becloud other interpretations, as it has for the past 60 years or so….

Nick Redfern's new book: Final Events

Nick Redfern presents material outlining a government study group's “obsession” with a demonic aspect of UFOs and the Afterlife too.

Click here for Mr. Redfern’s site about his new publication

GhostsStory.com

Sure, this isn't about UFOs, per se but it is a site we recommend highly.

And there is a tangential connection to UFOs, as you know.

Click here to go to GhostsStory.com

Ufology and The Perversity or Criminality of Beards

Copyright 2010, InterAmerica, Inc.

If you wish to avoid lies, subterfuge, and intellectual deviance in life and the UFO community, make it a point to avoid or eschew persons with beards and writings by persons with beards.

The current thinking in psychology is that persons with beards are using facial hair to cover or disguise mouths that spew lies (or have engaged in perverse activities of an oral nature).

We have always been wary, instinctively, of those ufologists who are heavily bearded, and find that those instincts compare favorably with the prevailing thinking of psychiatry nowadays.

Here’s what Wikipedia has to say, in part, about beards and those who sport them:

In the course of history, men with facial hair have been ascribed various attributes such as … filthiness, crudeness, or an eccentric disposition.

In a general way, in Rome at this time, a long beard was considered a mark of slovenliness and squalor. The censors L. Veturius and P. Licinius compelled M. Livius, who had been banished, on his restoration to the city, to be shaved, and to lay aside his dirty appearance, and then, but not until then, to come into the Senate.

From the 1920s to the early 1960s, beards were virtually nonexistent in mainstream America. The few men who wore the beard or portions of the beard during this period were frequently either old, Central Europeans; members of a religious sect that required it; in academia; or part of the counterculture, such as the "beatniks".

Many Hindu priests are unshaven as a sign of purity.

Vaishnava men, typically of the ISKCON sect, are encouraged to be clean-shaven as a sign of cleanliness.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Modern Mormon men are strongly encouraged to be clean shaven. Formal prohibitions against facial hair are given to young men entering their two-year mission service. Those entering the church-sponsored universities are asked to adhere to the Church Educational System Honor Code, which states in part: "Men are expected to be clean-shaven; beards are not acceptable."

The U.S. Army, U.S. Air Force, and U.S. Marine Corps justify banning beards on the basis of both hygiene and of the necessity for a good seal with gas masks. The U.S. Navy did allow beards for a time in the 1970s and 1980s, following a directive from Chief of Naval Operations Elmo Russell Zumwalt, Jr., but subsequently banned them again. The U.S. Coast Guard allowed beards until 1986, when they were banned by the Commandant, Admiral Paul Yost. The vast majority of police forces across the United States still ban beards.
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Our experience has been that those in the UFO camp who sport beards are crude, as indicated above, or sexually perverse.

Moreover, what they have to say about UFOs is tempered by us as we have found that such hirsuted persons will lie, through their teeth (as the old caution puts it), to achieve any nefarious end that benefits their personal psychopathology.

If you come across anything written or said by a person with a beard – the bigger the beard the worse will be the affect – either eschew the material or receive it with a large dose of skepticism.
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N.B. Reginald Reynolds: Beards: Their Social Standing, Religious Involvements, Decorative Possibilities, and Value in Offence and Defence Through the Ages (Doubleday, 1949) (ISBN 0-15-610845-3)

James A. Brussel, M.D.: Casebook of A Crime Psychiatrist (Bernard Geis Associates, [Grove Press], 1968)

Charles G. Costello (Editor): Symptoms of Psychopathology: A Handbook (John Wiley and sons, Inc. NY, 1970)

Leland E. Hinsie, M.D. and Robert J. Campbell, M.D., Psychiatric Dictionary [Fourth Edition], (Oxford University Press, London, 1970)

Nick Redfern reviews Hilary Evans' new book "Sliders"

Click here for Mr. Redfern's review