When we look at the field of research and the amount of information presented on UFO history, there are several surprises and questions when regarding the media’s portrayal of extraterrestrials. For the most part, despite the fact that the public was wildly interested in the subject of UFOs, any real research into the subject was often ignored except in the case of a few independent publishers at the beginning. And there were even cases where major companies would turn away from the UFO narrative as the public perceived it – much to the chagrin of researchers and extraterrestrial “experiencers.”
The subject leads all the way back to the first media portrayal of the flying saucer phenomenon. After the Roswell Incident, newspapers simply ignored the possibility of an alien saucer recovery after the military declared it a mistake. It’s strange to think the newspapers didn’t question such a monumental story, but in fact that’s precisely what happened. And when we look at the reason why, we may run across a program known as “Operation Mockingbird” starting a mere three years after the Roswell Incident. But while the timing may be enough to make some raise an eyebrow, it’s still three years after the event. By the time Mockingbird went into effect, the media should have already made the alien spaceship story old news. So what could have influenced their lack of interest in the previous biggest story of the day?
Oddly enough, newspapers started reporting stories indicating the whole UFO controversy was “gibberish” immediately following the Roswell incident. Once again this is a coincidence that would have been strange on its own, but with the others it paints a more disturbing picture. Was there a predecessor to Operation Mockingbird already in the works just as World War II was ending? Indeed it seems government control of newspapers would have been at an all time high during one of the greatest conflicts in human history – and the recovery from it when world governments were beginning to understand that technology had not weeded out the most dangerous elements of the human psyche.
And then came several decades of staunch support for the official story until an author by the name of Erich Von Daniken began the long process of once again popularizing the idea of alien visitors. Though several books on aliens had been written in the preceding decades, none had been quite so popular as Daniken’s. And so the subject once again became too big to be controlled. And a new face had to be put on UFOlogy. The idea of the “conspiracy theorist” supplanted that of the “UFO folklorist” while the more conservative term “skeptic” was transplanted over to those who did not believe in UFOs and demanded an overwhelming burden of proof to entertain the idea further. And so the trap was set, though by hands not entirely unseen. And as other conspiracies did indeed come out (including the CIA’s “Family Jewels” which were released in 2007) proving conspiracies did exist, it was too late. The idea of any individual who questioned the official story of the weather balloon was labeled a conspiracy theorist.