There is a Yeti in the back of everyone’s mind; only the blessed are not haunted by it. ~ old sherpa saying
Showing posts with label sexism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sexism. Show all posts

Monday, December 24, 2012

Why is (almost) Everyone Giving Dr. Melba Ketchum a Hard Time?





Listened to some of last night's Coast to Coast with host George Knapp and guest Dr. Ketchum. And if what she says is true, as to her diligence with testing, then why is she getting so much flack from many in Bigfoot Land? Such flack from science, well, sadly that's no surprise. Sciences' blindness to the existence of Bigfoot and the data is horribly frustrating and a mystery but, to be expected.  Why, though, are some in the Bigfoot world attacking her? I think she's been coy in the past, a bit, but overall, look. She's trying to do something. She's sent samples out to several labs. She's looking at the DNA. She's used blind studies. She has a variety of samples, not just one strand of elk hair. All this costs money, a lot of money. Finding labs to do the work is a huge job. Scientists have turned her down once they get wind that her research is Bigfoot research. According to Ketchum, one scientist threatened to sue her and her team if they used his findings; that's how angry he was over the subject of her research -- and how afraid he remains of being associated in any way with Bigfoot research.


Knapp asked her about her insistence that those she's discussed her research with sign disclosure statements. (Knapp himself signed one.) Ketchum explained that it's important to keep the data as uncontaminated as possible.

Then there's the infamous "peer reviewed" journal citation that gives any researcher the cred they need to be accepted in mainstream science and academia. It's a crazy loop: you have to be accepted by the very types of individuals who think you're nuts to be doing this kind of research in the first place, so you're not going to be accepted. Not having been accepted, your research is nothing. If her research isn't accepted into an accepted scientific journal, she's out. So is the star of this thing: Bigfoot.

So, given all this, why is Dr. Melba Ketchum --despite her possible missteps involving communication or style -- being treated badly by some in cryptozoology?

One possible answer to that is the uneasiness among some researchers that Bigfoot might be human, or far more human like, than those researchers have presumed. Some Bigfoot researchers have no problem with promoting a kill -- "for science" they tell us -- or thinking of Bigfoot as a big ape. Or some kind of animal. (Forgetting that we, too are animals.) Bigfoot is intelligent, very cool, what a find! but in the end, "just" an animal.

Many witnesses who've encountered Bigfoot speak of the eerie human qualities of the "creature" and as we know, many have tales to tell of spiritual and paranormal events within those encounters. These aspects of Bigfoot encounters sometimes don't go over very well with the more pragmatic Bigfoot researcher. Are they afraid that somewhere along the line, Ketchum's research presents clues or evidence of "more" here?

Ketchum said in last night's interview that if she is rejected by peer reviewed journals she'll put it out to the public. That would be fantastic, but also a cruelly frustrating gift, since it will be ignored by science.






Saturday, November 3, 2012

Halloween Stupid Crap, Same Old, Same Old

I realize it was recently Halloween, but an unnamed blog that will also remain un-linked to, recently posted a "spooky" Halloween post about a female scientist being raped by Bigfoot. The obvious do-I-really-need-to-say-it response concerning misogyny, frat boy humor, etc. has been bewilderingly weak.  The one positive: I've deleted the blog from my reader which has cleaned things up a little.


Friday, April 8, 2011

Updated: Phantoms and Monsters: Paranormal, UFOs, Cryptids and Unexplained Phenomena


I've updated this: below is what I posted yesterday, just throwing up a link, and not commenting, mainly because I was tired and also, I am fed up with the anti-Autumn Williams cabal:

Updates on rants against Autumn William's book Enoch on the BFRO:

Phantoms and Monsters: Paranormal, UFOs, Cryptids and Unexplained Phenomena

Update:
Here's the link to what Autumn has to say, along with several comments left by others at her blog Oregon Bigfoot.com: Apology to all the Mikes.
 
Why is this pack at the BFRO going at it once more at this time, almost a year after Autumn's book Enoch was published? I wonder if some of this doesn't have to do with the 2nd OSS (Oregon Sasquatch Symposium) coming up in June -- are they fanning embers?

Autumn can take care of herself, and she does so in her post. Still, this latest round from those at the BFRO is another example of the ugly nonsense that goes on in Bigfoot research. (The parallels to UFO research and other esoteric and Fortean realms applies.)

Someone calling him/her self "navigator" -- and the fact this person uses a screen name and not their real name is noted --  posted on the BFRO:
The fellow who told Autumn Williams (by phone) the stories that she eventually published in a book titled “Enoch,” is actually a yarn-spinning homeless person in central Florida who our investigators had encountered in 2006 in Polk County, FL.
2006. Autumn's book came out in 2010. And, as Williams points out, it's probably a correct assumption to say there is more than one person named Mike in Florida. And where is "navigator's"  documentation on his allegations?

Another poster: "JRawk12" comments on both Autumn's book and her mother's -- Sali Sheppard Wolford -- book Valley of the Skookum, which came out in 2006:
Is this really a big surprise in the first place? Usually the math doesn't add up for a reason...Good story, but it was painfully obvious that it was a fictional story from jump street. Same thing with her moms book. They're both good storytellers though! (Weird how defensive everyone was when people called B.S on her story back when it came out)
Personal opinion is personal opinion; we're all entitled and you think what you think. It's opinion Valley of the Skookum is "fictional," not fact. (Yes, the same can be said of my opinion . . .)

What irks me however is that, instead of looking at Valley of the Skookum, as well as Autumn's book, from a Fortean, open minded perspective, there seems to be a deliberate campaign against Williams (and Woolford) as well as debunking a particular aspect of Bigfoot research. That is, anything that presents itself outside of the flesh and blood box is considered suspect.

The former is ugly pettiness, sad but typical in Bigfoot, UFO, etc. circles. The latter is harmful for what it says about Bigfoot research. As with UFO research, the number of narratives in Bigfoot encounters that include high strangeness elements is huge. Yet many researchers continue to ignore these events and dismiss them with a virulence that is pathological at times.

What is ignored are the common threads of experience in high strangeness Bigfoot encounters. Whatever the causes for the similarities, they are... what about them? How to explain them? A glib response that witnesses are "whacked," or "lairs" simply isn't honest research.

I'm not suggesting Enoch and Valley of the Skookum are along the same lines -- they're not. Enoch is not "high strangess," (although, not doubt there are some out there who might say the relationship Mike describes is just that) and Williams writes about the roles of witness and researcher; an extremely important point that is too often missed by some.

For more, see my post for Oregon L.O.W.F.I.: Thoughts on Autumn Williams' Enoch.


Saturday, March 1, 2008

"This is what happens. . ."

Oh for the love of the great flippin' goddess!!! When it comes to UFO and Bigfoot research, the biggest problem is not the (perceived) lack of science, or (perceived) lack of acceptability, etc. it's people. Big idiots acting like the idiots they are. Christ almighty, what a bunch of grudge holding, smug, self important, petty, and vindictive individuals that roam the UFO and Bigfoot landscape!


Bigfoot researcher Meliss Hovey writes
about the pinheaded reactions of some in the field who seem to care about "morals" and her personal life, including her personal sex life. It's a very nasty tangled web out there in the world of the weird, and it isn't because of aliens, UFOs, Bigfoot, or other unexplained things. The only thing unexplained is why some people are such huge flapping clown shoes.