Aliens and children

[Mighty_Emperor]

This site:

http://www.aliensandchildren.org/

makes some grand claims:

This website features a series of drawings made by children who were abducted by aliens for the alien purpose of creating a new race of alien/human hybrids. The drawings show different aspects of the alien abduction phenomenon and include cruel medical procedures performed on children, children boarding alien spacecraft with other aliens, children playing with alien/hybrid children so the alien/hybrids can learn how to be human, and children being taken by aliens against their will, and the types of aliens encountered by the abducted children.

The pictures were drawn by children who successfully resisted the aliens by using a "thought screen helmet" which blocks the telepathic control aliens have over humans. The helmet is a leather hat lined with eight sheets of Velostat, an electrically conductive plastic used to prevent static electricity damage to electronic components. The girl in this photo has two other cloth hats lined with Velostat which she wears to school.

but that last paragraph sets off my BS Detector.

There is another site dedicated to the helmets:

http://www.stopabductions.com

But I haven't found any obvious signs that it is some kind of spoof.

I did a quick search for Michael Menkin (the man behind the site) and found one passing reference:

http://www.forteantimes.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=258199#post258199

and he does appear to be for real.

Emps

 

[Jerry_B]

Hmm....according to that site, aliens are abducting children and babies left, right, and centre in a variety of ways - but apparently there aren't enough of them to pilot their own craft...

 

[Timble2]

A bit off thread, but have you seen this chaps other website.

It explains how to make stylish and effective alternatives to that traditional tin-foil hat:

http://stopabductions.com/

 

[Anonymous]

Velostat is an electrically dissipative material, not conductive.
It is designed to 'bleed off' charge slowly, as such it requires Grounding. Ungrounded, static dissipative material merely slowly spreads electical charge evenly across itself.
In any case, the 'stat' in Velostat is refering to static electricity, which bares little relation to EM radiation.

I would have thought a metal hat would be more effective to preventing EM radiation from penetrating the cranium, providing the metal was matched to the expected frequencies (otherwise it may pass through). Tin foil may be more like it !

If these (strange-looking) people think these hats are working for them, I imagine its a placebo effect. The author makes no attempt to suggest how the Velostat does its job (that I can find).

Lastly, I do not really think that it is neccessary to discredit this sort of thing, as it is obviuosly pseudo science of the highest order. However this sort of thing really annoys me, I fail to find the lunatic fringe of UFOlogy remotely amusing, hence the polite debunking.
Cheers,
an electronics engineer.

 

[Mighty_Emperor]

Timble: Not off topic at all although I did mention it in my first post :

There is another site dedicated to the helmets:

http://www.stopabductions.com

But I haven't found any obvious signs that it is some kind of spoof.

joester:

If these (strange-looking) people think these hats are working for them, I imagine its a placebo effect.

Now there is an area for studiy: 'The Placebo Effect on Alien Abductions'. I'm not sure how this would be tested as a control group would need to be using a technique which did fend off alien abductions. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm I suspect I am struggling to get my head aorund the contradictions in such a study but........

Emps

 

[Anonymous]

I think in the large majority of cases, certainly in middle America,sanity would be the key factor in preventing future abductions.

 

[Anonymous]

http://aliensandchildren.org/

http://aliensandchildren.org/

Yes, it does include instructions on how to make your own 'tin foil helmet', but what do people make of the rest of the content? If alien abduction recollections is just masking some repressed kiddy-fiddling or something similar, then it's more than I'd expect, even in a world that does feel like it's going to hell in a handbasket.

Also, just how well would children tap into the media culture that feeds the unconscious? Just how au fait would children be with the X-files culture that could potentially expose them to grays? Why not aliens more along the lines of malevolent pokemons, or manga or whatever it is that kids are actually more accustomed to?

One thing certainly puzzles me is the site's suggested motivation and premise for the alien interference? If hybrids are to "replace" humans, why? What benefit would this have as opposed to just destroying or enslaving us? I can't imagine the actual planet offering them anything given the way we've been very happy to shit in our own food-dish as it were.

I like the idea of the grays coming unstuck with simple and very earthly obstacles like the Tripods, the original Daleks and water/soap dodgers in Signs; it seems that Duck tape is just too dastardly for these space bounders.

Some of those pictures would look great stuck to a fridge door and would certainly raise the eyebrows of your neighbours.

Apologies if this has been discussed elsewhere, but using the search function brought up too many erroneous results to risk checking them all.

 

[stu neville]

Re: http://aliensandchildren.org/

http://aliensandchildren.org/

Yes, it does include instructions on how to make your own 'tin foil helmet', but what do people make of the rest of the content? If alien abduction recollections is just masking some repressed kiddy-fiddling or something similar, then it's more than I'd expect, even in a world that does feel like it's going to hell in a handbasket.

It reminds me of Ceto's New Friends:

Ceto’s New Friends is a colorfully illustrated, fictional story for young children.

Ceto is a friendly extraterrestrial who comes to Earth and befriends a young girl named Annie and a young boy named Seth. Ceto takes the Earthlings for a ride aboard his spaceship and shows them some fascinating things about his species. The author’s aim in writing this book was to teach children to not fear or automatically reject others just because they look different.

All very noble in intent, I'm sure, but my reservations about it (abduction reality aside) are neatly summed up in this open message to the author from the Skeptic Files

Leah Haley is an alien abductee who has written a book about her
experiences, _Lost Was the Key_. In addition to this book, she has witten a
children's book called _Ceto's New Friends_. I'll summarize the story for
those not familiar with it:

The children's book describes the adventures of two (human) children, Annie and Seth. One day while playing outside, Annie and Seth encounter a classic Grey alien named Ceto. "Ceto cannot talk with his mouth. He talks with his eyes."

Ceto makes friends with the children and coaxes them into his spaceship.

Once on his spaceship, Ceto "taught them how to talk with their eyes" and
let them play with the spaceship controls.

When Annie and Seth started to get tired, Ceto took them back to Earth and gave them "a purple rock."

The story ends with the Ceto flying away, but with the promise that he "will come back soon to visit his new friends on Earth."

Now, what's wrong with this children's story?

We can ignore issues related to the reality (or lack thereof) of alien
abductions. Ceto's New Friends has greater problems than that.

The fundamental problem with this story is that it encourages children to go away with strangers. In an era where we are hyper-sensitive to children's encounters with strangers and to the hazards thereof, Ceto's New Friends sends a significant counter-message. Rather than be wary of strangers, Ceto's... sends the message that strangers will teach children all sorts of neat things (in addition to talking with their eyes, Ceto teaches Annie and Seth how to float and fly on their own) and will give them gifts.
According to the story, these are good things.

Who among us would willingly tell our children to go away with strangers,
that strangers met on the street will teach them great secrets and give them cool gifts, that cooperating with strangers is a Good Thing?

I don't know any parent who would willingly do such a thing, yet Leah
Haley's children's book sends exactly this message.

Regardless of the reality of alien abductions, this book is flawed and could
actually put children at risk. Children reading this book could get the
wrong message that strangers are OK to talk to and to accept gifts from.
This is hardly the message we want to send our children.

Also, just how well would children tap into the media culture that feeds the unconscious? Just how au fait would children be with the X-files culture that could potentially expose them to grays? Why not aliens more along the lines of malevolent pokemons, or manga or whatever it is that kids are actually more accustomed to?

Depends on the child IMHO - I know a lot of kids probably recognise the grey icon and associate it with aliens in popular culture (they do crop up in a number of Cartoon Network type programmes), but whether they question their objective reality or not is another matter. We tend (as adults) to think that kids are more open to fantastical notions, but IMHO they can be just as intransigent and fixed in their views as adults .

 

[Anonymous]

Re: http://aliensandchildren.org/

It reminds me of Ceto's New Friends

I've chanced upon this book before - because of the way the book came about the author's experiences - and as with you I thought the acceptance theme was commendable but I had my own reservations about the book. Perhaps it's me, but the cover looks vaguely sexual in a way I can't explain - possibly tying into the repressed kiddy fiddling memories that are said to behind a lot of this. Also, the children themselves look more like hybrids than normal children, with eyes as big as the Ceto himself - I wonder how much influence Haley had on Dusenberry's illustrations.

Depends on the child IMHO - I know a lot of kids probably recognise the grey icon and associate it with aliens in popular culture (they do crop up in a number of Cartoon Network type programmes), but whether they question their objective reality or not is another matter. We tend (as adults) to think that kids are more open to fantastical notions, but IMHO they can be just as intransigent and fixed in their views as adults .

My concern isn't whether they'd be aware of grays in popular culture generally, more why they'd chose thisparticular 'fantasy fodder' over something they are more familiar with, such as pokemon type characters etc., etc.. Also, children are known for having great imaginations and for flights of fantasy, so why restrict themselves to the imaginings of adults? I'm certain children could create something a little more exotic and fantastic than little grey men with overly large eyes.

 

[stu neville]

Yeah, I agree that "Ceto's..." has a rather sinister undertone to the illustrations, not just the cover.

And I see where you're coming from WRT greys taking "precendence" (for want of a better word) as children's fantasy figures. There are those who would say it's all part of the cultural "softening- up" to prepare us for the grey revelation, but perhaps it's just a lot of laziness and bandwagon-jumping by those that produce the stuff.

Certainly, Blue Peter ran a competition recently for kids to design a new monster for Doctor Who - a huge variety were submitted, and if there was a recurrent theme it was robots or... erm... lizards.

No doubt David Icke will have a book out citing that as proof of something before long .

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

The site and the book are both deeply disturbing. The updated tinfoil hat is also deeply disturbing.

As to the upsurge in robots, lizards and grays, in kids drawings and imaginations, crappy Japanese 'manga' TV series, like Pokemon, Dragonball Z and Gunky YoHo (or, whatever the cartoon series is called), have a lot to answer for.

Look not to the skys, to protect your children, but switch off Sky and particularily Fox Kids. 8)

 

[Graylien]

There's a notable lack of provenance for the drawings, apart from this statement;

The drawings of a brother and sister are featured on this website. Drawings of aliens by children all over the world are requested for display on this website

...which suggests that all the drawings were produced by this single pair of children. For all we know, they may even be related to Mr thought-screen-helmet himself. As we know nothing of their background, we can only speculate how much they may have been 'coached' by their parents into believing in aliens. Hopefully, they haven't been damaged for life by the paranoid fantasies of their elders.

 

[Anonymous]

There's a notable lack of provenance for the drawings, apart from this statement;

The drawings of a brother and sister are featured on this website. Drawings of aliens by children all over the world are requested for display on this website

...which suggests that all the drawings were produced by this single pair of children. For all we know, they may even be related to Mr thought-screen-helmet himself. As we know nothing of their background, we can only speculate how much they may have been 'coached' by their parents into believing in aliens. Hopefully, they haven't been damaged for life by the paranoid fantasies of their elders.

I wondered on this myself and am going to contact Menkin himself over the images. It would be both interesting and helpful to know how many illustrations were done by children other than the Strother siblings.

I've looked at the drawing over the last few weeks comparing the drawing styles as for clues, but young children's drawing styles can change dramatically as they develop different artistic abilities, motor and coordinations skills, self-awareness and awareness of others etc., etc..