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As I was reading Javier’s articleon the questionable actions of Kevin Horkin, he raised the notion of the paranormal  putting those that are interested, into laughable positions, publicly. I couldn’t agree more with that position. We are covering more and more questionable paranormal/crypto/ufo stories every week it appears, with no end in site. It raises questions for the future of all facets of the paranormal. As I talk about the paranormal in this article, keep in mind that I am talking about paranormal, cryptozoology and UFO’s…and I’m just gonna rant…

Before we look into the bad, let’s point out the good. Loren Coleman’s International Cryptozoology Museumin Portland, Maine is the highpoint of recent paranormal news. The importance may seem low, but for cryptozoology this is huge! Loren Coleman has been on of the foremost leading cryptozoologists, and this museum, I am sure, is his baby. For cryptozoology lovers everywhere, this will be a museum to visit, and I hope to see it someday myself. If anyone ever goes to this museum, be sure to let us know what you thought of it!

Now the breakdown of the bad…everything. Well maybe not everything, but it sure as hell seems to be everything, because every facet of the paranormal has it’s questionable events.

I know that there are just about every type of charlatan out there, and now more than ever, that appears true. It’s growth can be traced to our personal tool of choice: World Wide Web. At first I am sure, the Internet was a boon for everything paranormal because everyone could tell their own stories, present their own evidence, cooperate with different people from different parts of the world and organize into groups.  Then photoshop came out and we have been doomed since. Ok, maybe that’s unfair, but there has been no shortage of questionable photo’s over the years, and unfortunately that will continue to be the case in years to come. Personally, I can’t understand why people take pictures of ghosts and UFO’s anymore. It’s almost a defacto cause for dismissal by anyone out there. “Nice photo!” while the viewer is thinking ‘probably fake’.  Same goes for digital content, because it can be edited and/or manipulated much more easily than a photograph.

YouTube brought a different style of video to the internet. Personal videos. You can post just about everything on YouTube just about anthing you want, within reason. The problem with this is the amount of people out there who either want to be famous (YouTube stars), or posting parody related material. Some posters have good intentions with horrible execution as they justify orbs, airplanes, mysterious sounds and other types of questionable occurances and cram them into the paranormal world. Of course this medium is wrought with it’s own type of questionable deeds as posters attempt to pull ‘slight of hand’ styled tricks from the camera’s viewpoint to entice believability by the viewer of the video, or attempt to produce their own ghostly effects/ufo’s. These video’s are the skeptical believers worst nightmare as they undermine the field of study and harden the resolve of psuedo-skeptics and dogmatic scientists everywhere.

Another annoying fact in today’s world is the horrendous amount of low quality journalism out there. There are so many media outlets vying for market share, they will take and sensationalize, just about any piece of paranormal information that can be made into a story, with horrible (and predicatable results). Sites such as The Examiner or UK’s The Sun should be viewed with liberal amounts of salt, as they tend to sensationalize or forward questionable stories. Horrible TV programming further undermines many of these fields of interest with laughable shows produced to ‘entertain’ the masses, yet provide no real relevant evidence for investigators or the general public. TV producers still do not get it as they continue to produce facsimile shows, one after another, further reducing interest into the paranormal.

Remember Bigfoot in the fridge? People will go to great lengths just to fake something, if only for their moment of notoriety. I remember some people in Cincinnati if I do recall who rigged their kitchen so that it appeared to show poltergeist activity. Everyone wants to be famous, and I still wonder, why?

It seems there is no end to it. Even travel companies, businesses, sightseeing venues, hotels, motels, libraries and theatres (to name a few) are getting in on the act. Everyone claims to have something paranormal occuring, just for publicity purposes. And they call the believers crazy! This is insanity at it’s finest…

 In the end, I really think that even though interest will be raised into all things paranormal/crypto/UFO, the exploitation of these fields will leave our dignity laying by the roadside and wanting of real evidence.