HOW THE PRESS MYSTIFIES UFOS

The press often has ulterior motives to keep UFOs mysterious.

The press has the goal of making money.

UFOs sell papers:

• While a new UFO case is still a mystery, people go outside to see if they can see one. This increases the number of UFO sightings.
• While a new UFO case is still a mystery, sales of newspapers increase as people want to find out what is going on.
• As soon as the primary sighting is identified as something ordinary, the UFO sightings die off, because people quit looking for them.
• As soon as the UFO sightings die off, the sales of newspapers drop to where they were before the sightings occurred.
• Once sales drop, there is no reason for the press to pursue the subject of UFOs.

The press goal of making money affects what the press does.

Where they put the story:

• While a new UFO case is still a mystery, the stories are on the front page. Many people see the stories, and many who see the stories on the newsstands buy the papers.
• If a secondary sighting is also unidentified, it also appears on the front page.
• When the primary sighting is identified as something ordinary, the story about that is buried in the interior of the paper, sometimes in a section other than the front section.
• If a secondary sighting is identified, it also appears on an interior page.
• As soon as the UFO sightings die off and the sales of newspapers drop to where they were before the sightings started, any subsequent UFO stories appear on interior pages.

Radio and TV stations do similar things. A new case gets first air on the newscast. The solution to the UFO mystery gets one line in the human interest part.

They combine unrelated material into the UFO story.

Examples:

• After a UFO has been reported in the media, the press tends to combine into the UFO story any reports of unrelated events (e.g. power failures, radio or TV interference, cars not running, etc).
• After a power failure occurs, the press tends to combine into this story any UFO reports that come in to the newsroom.
• The press also tends to include anything any crackpot says about UFOs.

They don't know their science.

Examples:

• Many newsmen (other than weathermen) do not understand wind direction. They think the wind direction is the direction the air is moving. Misled by this, the press has concluded that UFOs could not be balloons because they would be headed into the wind.

  The correct definition of wind direction is the direction the wind is coming from. This is the direction that is important to sailors and farmers.

• Most newsmen do not know or understand astronomy. They do not understand the basic behaviors of the sun, the moon, stars, planets, comets, and meteors.
• Most newsmen do not know or understand atmospheric phenomena. They do not understand the basic behaviors of auroras, solar and lunar halo phenomena, mirages, lenticular clouds, and other things seen in the air.
• Most newsmen do not know about all of the different kinds of objects that can normally be found in the sky. This includes new technology, unusual aircraft, and toys. Some flying toys look like flying saucers.

They don't check all of the sources.

Examples:

• They call one airport and then report that the UFO could not have been a plane. But they fail to understand that:
  1. Military air bases don't have any information on commercial and private flights.
  2. Commercial airports don't have any information on military and private flights.
  3. Private airports know about only those flights that actually use that airport.
  4. Many private flights are not known to any airports in the area.
  5. Before 9/11/2001, many flights were known to only the pilots who were flying them.
• After a rash of UFO sightings in 1965, a reporter called one aerial advertising company. When they said their planes were not in the air at the time, the reporter concluded that aerial advertising did not cause the sightings. But he didn't check to see if other companies were also doing aerial advertising in the area. He didn't even check to see if any other such companies existed.
• They don't check the truth of each report. Some criminals used a UFO wave they created through false reports and fire balloons to get the police to chase UFOs while they committed burglaries

The press reports everything the witness reports as the absolute truth.

Examples of "facts" that the witness can't possibly know:

• The witness cannot know the true size, distance, speed, or altitude of an unknown object seen against the sky more than 30 feet away through visual observation alone. Without other clues to at least one of these values, the human visual system is unable to accurately provide these values. The values obtained are erroneous, distorted by guesses about the identity of the object.
• The witness offers effects he experienced that he attributes to the UFO. Such effects include effects commonly experienced whenever a human comes across anything strange: heightened awareness, slowing of time, tingling, enhanced hearing, and other effects on the body.
• Witnesses offer sounds and smells as though the object produced them. But strange sounds and smells could have many other sources.
• They report the reactions of animals to the presence of the UFO. But many witnesses report that animals reacted to the presence of a UFO, even when the UFO is later identified as Venus. If the UFO didn't cause the reaction of the animal, what did? Possibilities include the animal reacting to the agitation of the witness, or to unrelated scents or sounds.
• A UFO witness who had a Geiger counter reported that it showed a dangerous level of radiation when a UFO hovered half a mile away. But if the report was real, then people in the houses closer to the UFO should have had radiation sickness. Why were there no such cases of sickness?

The press thinks "UFO" whenever something unusual happens.

Whenever some unusual event happens, they think UFOs might be responsible:

• During the 1965 Northeast Blackout, some reporters and telecasters speculated that UFOs might have had something to do with it - even before any UFO reports were received. The same thing happened in the 1977 and 2003 northeast blackouts.
• UFOs and beings were mentioned in the news in connection with the 1967 fall of the Silver Bridge carrying US-35 across the Ohio River between Point Pleasant WV and Gallipolis OH.
• When Jimmy Hoffa could not be found in 1975, someone suggested he was abducted by a UFO. Two years later, the witness of alleged beings coming out of a UFO said he heard a voice come out of the UFO. It yelled, "I am Jimmy Hoffa!" three times.
• In the 1994 Winter Olympics, when Tonya Harding was late in appearing for her free skate because of a broken skate lace, the TV announcer said "She might have been abducted by aliens."
• The 6/1/2009 Air France Flight 447 disappearance was suggested to be UFO related before it was found in the ocean.
• In 2014, the press suggested that a UFO abducted the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which disappeared on 3/8/2014.

The press wants the UFO stories to continue so newspaper sales stay high.