To combine the subjects of the recent posts, the reason that the “Ground Zero mosque” issue is so troubling  is that it’s trumping up the fear of the other.  If this is the reaction to the basically-inconsequential building of a cultural center in downtown New York, how in the hell will people react to something like UFO disclosure?  What would Fox News do with President Obama revealing that UFOs have been sighted by the military for years.  If he’s considered a Muslim Marxist now, what would he be considered then – an alien?  Don’t underestimate people’s desire for paranoia.  If he can be called the new Hitler, people will believe anything.

If a Republican president revealed the same thing, you’d get a similar reaction from the left-wing base, with people wondering what sort of nefarious plan might be on the horizon – like a false flag alien attack.  This is already talked about in conspiracy circles, and for such an insane idea as earth being visited by extraterrestrials, every lunatic idea would be given a voice in the mainstream, much as the media is legitimizing the voices of people who say things like Muslims are evil.  If we’re being tested for tolerance and how we might react to a radical idea like UFOs, we’re failing.

Nevermind first contact and an alien landing on the White House lawn.  Like every debate it would become a mess – some would say it’s CGI, psy-ops, survivalists would stockpile more guns and possibly turn to violence, the intensely religious would go more batshit – including Middle-Eastern terrorists who would find a new reason to hate us.  It would be an invitation to devolve into every paranoid fantasy. Every conspiracy theory would then be legitimized.  Even if the alien race appeared benevolent, you would have countless news reports beginning with, “Some say the aliens are here to eat us.  Experts weigh in.”

I’ve thought before – hey, people can handle this idea, they can adapt, but now I’m not so sure.  People’s reaction to the “War of the Worlds” broadcast wasn’t entirely absurd – after all, the radio show was purporting to be a report of an actual invasion.  But the media turns fiction into non-fiction by treating all points-of-view as carrying equal weight.  Witnessing the debate about the “mosque” in New York, I’m beginning to wonder if humans are a long way from being able to absorb this type of information.  The media turns normal things into hysteria – because it gives a louder bullhorn to the hysterical than the nuanced.  It would turn something abnormal like UFOs into something potentially apocalyptic.  Even if the media were smart and careful, large groups of people would do this all on their own.  Until we have a better media, and less reactionary people, I wonder if this issue can truly be made public.

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Update: I cross-posted this at the Daily Grail to see what kind of response it would get – hoping it would be mainly about the UFO issue – and the response has been pretty depressing.  I’ve been surprised by the number of people who say “They should have known this would happen” about the Cordoba mosque.  Perhaps nine years later with a Democratic president they didn’t anticipate the shitstorm and thought this could happen peacefully.  They were wrong.

Change is going to make people unhappy, it’s going to make people resistant.  The resistance isn’t the pure feeling we should run with, it’s the change that’s more important.  And welcoming in moderate Islam and understanding the difference between Islam and jihad is necessary change.  In a country where 1 in 5 believe Obama is a Muslim that’s evidently not possible.

You could make the same argument about any sort of change – “They should have known this would happen” when people are resistant.  It’s blaming the messengers for the misinterpretation.

But this has also been instructive, given the premise of the original post.  People are heated and headstrong about this topic.  And if people are resistant to the idea of an Islamic cultural center, they’d be 1000 times (or more) resistant to UFO disclosure, which would rip apart our current ideas of religion, faith and science.

Update 2: A commenter there adds -

Many business people would see this as a business opportunity. Many Chinese leaders would see this as a threat to the unity of China, others would see it as a new opportunity to acquire new technology. The Afghani Taliban would see the aliens as foreign invaders of Afghanistan and fight them. The Pakistani Taliban would see them as infidels and execute them.

Saudis would ask if they need oil, Greenpeace would protest the inconsiderate crossing of empty space without due respect for empty space. Nike would get them to sell shoes.

The world would change, people would be the same.

This is what I’m getting at.

Posted on August 18, 2010 at 12:29 pm
http://www.theamericanbookofthedead.com/2010/08/18/muslims-and-ufos/
Categorized under: Blog
Tags: UFOs