Are We Truly Prepared for Contact: What District 9 Represents

This summer's alien offering, District 9, might have a little more gore and gristle than the typical Independence Day "time to meet the aliens" contact outing, but it also has a message that resonates on a deeper level: if contact is imminent and we are faced with the interstellar pot-luck that contact could imply, are we ready?

The film, which carries a very strong socio-political message about mankind's inability to tolerate and co-exist with the different factions and races within itself, raises a few strong questions that seem to go largely unasked in UFOlogical circles. One of these questions is very simple. Have we celebrated and glamorized the idea of contact to fantastic heights that will undermine the very event itself? What if we aren't looking at Adamski's and Meijer's visitor's. What if we aren't face with the Nordic visages of the Plaeidians? What if, in fact, OUR visitors appear grotesque and not humanoid at all? We as humans seem to have a hard enough time dealing with different colors, even deformities, but what about an extending pair of mandibles or a prehensile tail that can decapitate with the same lethal force as a grizzly bear? What if on top of their appearance they were more agile, stronger, faster, and prone to the same aggressive outbursts that we ourselves are privy too? Some race is bound to circumvent their own extinction sooner or later none the wiser?

Let's suppose that for one moment there is the possibility that they don't come bearing gifts. What if instead of handing out a Sear's Roebuck catalog of new technology and extending the olive branch, solving our problems, they need OUR help. Then we are faced with a slightly new Malthusian argument. What if they are seeking refuge or even sanctuary? What if we are looking at a planet-wide exodus where their surviving numbers increase our own by 20%? 40%? Our scientific pursuits aren't always altruistic. What if we had to divert our research to sustaining a population that explodes instantaneously?

I think a film like District 9 is meant to entertain the audience with sometimes a heavy handed undercurrent of introspection. It uses aliens, explosions and the fantastic, allowing us to look at our own prejudices through the shimmery veil of Hollywood. My final question, and one that might seem as heavy handed as the politic laden District 9, is this: Has the UFO community spun a veil of it's own, leaving us as unprepared and as prone to mistakes as the very real kind of antagonists that make District's conflict not only a plausible one, but perhaps a disappointingly prophetic one?

What Is Wrong With The Mainstream Media?

I just finished watching ABC's Primetime Outsiders special and I am livid. They are not the only ones guilty of this, but that is where I am focusing my anger right now.

First, a major network decides to do a special on abductees and experiencers. Good idea, right? Not if you are the mainstream media. It seems that the entire pupose of the show was to debunk the people that were kind enough to be on and make them look like they are crazy, liars, or as they put it, "charlitans". The only person they interviewed on the show outside of the people that have had the experiences are either very stout non-believers, and one clinical hypnotist that they made look like he was crazy for believing in extraterrestrial life.

Why don't they have proper UFOlogists on? Because that might make these people look legitimate. If these people look legit, then they won't be able to try to turn their special into an episode of the muary povich show. Would it have been that difficult to get people like Timothy Good, Stanton Friedman, or Bill Birnes? Of course not, I have been able to reach out to each of those people at one point or another to get them on our show and we're just an internet radio show, I'm sure they would jump at the chance to be able to express their views on national television, but it will never happen. It won't happen because each of these people are too intelligent for these programs to have on, there is no way that they would be able to make them look silly in front of their viewing audience.

Don't even get me started on that terrible host Juju Chang. You could tell her questions were so passive agressive to make these people look bad it wasn't even funny. She went into it without even trying to believe or even be slightly open-minded about it. I've never seen anyone be so outright condescending in an interview in my life. She should be ashamed at her piss-poor excuse for journalism and throw herself off of a tall building. If I were any of those people and she asked me some of those questions I would have tried to turn it around on her and slam her lack of journalism skills. Of course, that part would have wound up on the cutting room floor, but I would have my own hidden camera going and put it up on youtube. The show should not have been about her or her worthless views. It's about the guests, that is why we have guests that return to our show regularly. We aren't here to debate them, make them look bad, or confront them. We are here to let them talk about their experiences, talk about their subject matter, and tell us their feelings on these extraordanry situations that live has given them, and I promise all guests that we ever have on this show, we will NEVER treat you like that.

Mark