Haunted - Stalking Dillon

Before you watch this clip of Holly Stevens and me using a ghost box last week in Seminary House at our alma mater Acadia University (in Holly's old room from her college days, no less, which also turns out to be haunted), it's important to remember one key thing: that despite both of us at different times directing demons, poltergeists, and other things to visit and / or interact with our director of photography (and my young protege) Dillon Garland, to the point where they may now be following him (as seen in this clip)... we're not actually bad people. 

Honest.

Our laughter notwithstanding...

More information about Haunted

Paul Kimball

Haunted

It's been a while (making award-winning feature films, getting married, taking an active role in politics, living life to the fullest - all have taken precedence to my paranormal hobby for a while now), but I'm back on the paranormal beat, so to speak, re-uniting with my old ghost investigating partner Holly Stevens for Haunted, a new series that we just finished filming, and which premieres in October up here in Canada. You can find out more at Winter Light Productions. 

We've already been renewed for a second season (which we start filming in September), so it seems that ghosts are as popular as ever!

Paul Kimball

I Went to a Hockey Game and Some Synchronicity Broke Out!

The Halifax Forum on Saturday evening, 16 January 2016.

Given my interest in, and experiences with, synchronicity, last night's hockey game was... well, interesting. 

At the last minute this evening I decided to walk to the Halifax Forum, despite a snow storm, to catch a university hockey game between one of my alma maters, the Dalhousie Tigers, and the UPEI Panthers, whom I had never seen play before and knew nothing about this year's team. 

Just before leaving the house I stopped to chat briefly with my room-mate Linda, who had been flipping through channels and come upon Sense and Sensibility with the late Alan Rickman, which she decided to watch (both Linda and I were huge Rickman fans). Indeed, Rickman was on screen for the entire short period of time we were talking. 

I got to the game just in time to watch the warm-ups, and then I grabbed a seat right behind the UPEI bench, which was a great vantage point for picture taking. UPEI filed out onto the ice, skated around, and then after the national anthem the players not starting sat down on the bench. 

Who should sit down on the bench right in front of me when the UPEI Panthers took the ice? Derek Ryckman, a defenceman for the Panthers. As you can see, his uniform number is 2. 

Ryckman on the bench in front of me just before the game started.

Making it even weirder? When I got home, I looked Ryckman up to see where he's from. lt turns out that he hails from Alberta. 

If you put Ryckman's uniform number 2 into play here and take the first two letters from Alberta you get... Al Ryckman. 

Cue the Twilight Zone music. 

Paul Kimball

A New Era for Physics?

"We may be entering a new era in physics. An era where there are weird features in the universe that we cannot explain. An era where we have hints that we live in a multiverse that lies frustratingly beyond our reach. An era where we will never be able to answer the question why is there something rather than nothing." 

- Harry Cliff,  Ph.D.

High Energy Physics group, Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge

Oh, Canada!

Flying saucers? 

Pfftt! In Canada, it's flying pucks we have to be on the look out for... as this photo I took earlier this evening at a local hockey game demonstrates!

Paul Kimball

Posthuman Blues, Vol. III

It's taken me longer than I had planned to finish editing the final volume of Mac Tonnies' Posthuman Blues book series, but I'm in the home stretch. We have slated March 1st as the publication date. Meanwhile, here is the front cover.

Mac is gone, but never forgotten.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Paul Kimball

Victimizing the Victims

It should probably come as no surprise that "researchers" like Budd Hopkins and David Jacobs attract unsavory supporters / defenders, but Sean Meers takes the proverbial cake. Here he is threatening Emma Woods earlier this evening on the Paracast forums, where he goes by the handle "kruggutter":

A thug like Meers continues to have free rein at the Paracast forums (and elsewhere), where he threatens Emma Woods with further victimization, long after she was banned. 

Ufology in a nutshell.

Paul Kimball

Ufology and Misogyny

Male-dominated ufology's general view of women

Every now and then someone writes a well-meaning blog post or article about the problems with ufology, and how to fix them. Virtually none of those articles mention the misogyny that permeates ufology, and which represents one of the biggest and most pernicious problems with the ufological subculture. Nowhere has that been on display more fully than in the coverage of the Emma Woods story over the past several years. If you want to see it in full force, check out some of the comments at the Paracast forum thread discussing the latest appearance by David Jacobs on that program. It should act as an eye-opener for anyone who hasn't been paying attention.

Paul Kimball

Obi-Wan and Luke

That's yours truly speaking at the 2015 East Coast Paranormal Conference this past weekend in Liverpool, Nova Scotia. The man working the slide projector for my presentation, whom I fondly dubbed my "slide monkey"? None other than Stan Friedman. He volunteered for the gig, which was a nice switch from the time years ago when I worked his slide projector for him at a conference. We joked that it was time for the master to give way to the pupil. He even gave me his green laser pointer, which I dubbed my "Luke Skywalker lightsaber."

Great fun was had by all!

Paul Kimball

Meeting Loren Coleman

Yours truly with Loren Coleman this past weekend at the 2015 East Coast Paranormal Conference in Liverpool, NS, where we were both speaking. Loren and I have been on-line chums for years, but we had never actually met in "meatspace" until a couple of days ago. The event itself was great fun - I'll write up a little review and some thoughts when time allows this week, particularly about my own paranormal adventure on a ghost investigation of the historic Astor Theatre - but meeting Loren after all these years was definitely a highlight!

Paul Kimball

RIP to Bruce Duensing

RIP to Bruce Duensing, a friend and fellow blogger, who has sadly passed away at the age of 64. He will be greatly missed, as will his thought-provoking contributions to the discourse about the paranormal, and many other subjects. I heartily recommend his appearance on Radio Misterioso with Greg Bishop a few months ago, which you can listen to here.

Here are his final written words, posted at his blog A Transit of Contingencies on May 22nd, in a piece titled The Voyages of the Dead:

In every fiction there is an element of truth and the same could be said by reading that statement in reverse order, and so this writer thinks on poetics as a series of observations that indirectly point to a reality not directly manifested in their sentences. 

The same may apply to us.

May he journey well to whatever lies beyond.

Paul Kimball

UFO$, Inc. - Volume 3

Whitley Strieber. So much could be said about his role as a leading figure in UFO$, Inc. given that he's been at it for so long, creating and selling memes that have taken firm root in the broader popular culture, always without a shred of evidence to back it up, in increasingly outlandish scenarios. I think his work can best be summed up with his latest escapade, which is helping to keep the Roswell Slides Scam alive in conjunction with fellow UFO$, Inc. board members, including Linda Moulton Howe.

If you want something that will make your stomach turn and your head spin at the same time then have a listen to Strieber, Howe, and slides promoter Jaime Maussan on Strieber's program recently, as they try to resurrect the slides story. It's appalling and fascinating in equal measure. You can tune in for what Strieber calls "the most astonishing Dreamland I have ever done" here.

But like a very small-scale Bilderbergers-like group, UFO$, Inc members are always willing to work with their colleagues in order to allow everyone to profit.

Paul Kimball

UFO$, Inc. - Volume 2

Richard Dolan is the king of ufological sleight-of-hand. One of thousands of people possessing a Masters Degree in History from some small liberal arts college, Dolan managed to turn himself into "Ufology's historian" in just over a decade, all while building a nice little multi-media congolmerate with him as the centerpiece. 

How has he done it? Well, he wrote a book about the history of UFOs that was a combination of fact recitation, just enough wild-eyed speculation to bring in the true believers, and copious footnotes - the apotheosis of quantity over quality. But in the land of the blind, the one eyed historian proved to be king. He followed that up by doing anything and everything that would get allow him to build his brand, which was that of the reasonably articulate, well-educated (by ufology's standards), young-ish, and good looking researcher. What followed? More books, of course, usually just repeating the same themes that he has written about before, mixed in with some television gigs and now his own radio show (the flagship of the KGRA internet network), and a publishing company (that he called Richard Dolan Press, which is quintessential personal branding).

He's kept this all going by getting more and more outlandish with his claims over the years as he has refined his branding to the only place he could really take it and be successful - over-the-top conspiracy theorizing about anything, usually by quoting anonymous "witnesses" and "sources." Most recently he wound up on the stage at Mexico City with the Roswell slides promoters, a decision which blew up in his face within just a couple of days. Whereas some of the others involved apologized, however, Dolan did what all good corporations do - he issued some bland statements about how none of it was really his fault (conveniently forgetting any and all statements he made in support of the event and the slides before May 5th), and urged everyone to move on as quickly as possible... even as he steadfastly refused to offer anything even remotely resembling an apology for agreeing to be part of an event that was a money-milking sham.

But that's how UFO$, Inc. rolls. 

Paul Kimball

UFO$, Inc. - Volume I

For many people interested in the subject of UFOs, it is just a hobby. There are also the true believers, of course.

But for a small group, it's a corporation - UFO$, Inc. For them, it's all about the money. Like the entertainment industry, they constantly have to generate new content to stay profitable, almost always riffing on the same basic stories and themes that they have been pushing for decades. They are a transnational conglomerate, no different in principle from Exxon or Lockheed - Martin (even as they are clearly penny ante in terms of practical impact)... or, in a less formalized sense, the Bilderberg Group.

So I've decided, in the wake of the "Roswell Slides" fiasco, to list the people who clearly comprise the Board of Directors of UFO$, Inc.

Some of them are con men / women and frauds, a few are true believers in the flying saucer gospel who are also very adept at turning that belief into buckets of bucks, and some of them are a bit of both. I'll let you, the readers, decide into which category each Board member fits.

First up - Linda Moulton Howe, the grand dame of UFO$, Inc.

More to come.

Paul Kimball

The "Roswell Slides" Movie

The poster basically says all that there needs to be said. Courtesy of the talented Jeff Ritzmann.

Paul Kimball

Guest Column - James Mitchell on "Ufology as Pro Wrestling"

James Mitchell, aka James Vandenberg, The Sinister Minister, and Father James Mitchell

Anyone who knows me is aware that I am a big fan of professional wrestling, and have been since I was a kid watching Leo Burke, The Cuban Assassin, Killer Karl Krupp, and the other legends of Atlantic Grand Prix Wrestling on television here in Atlantic Canada. I even made a short documentary called "A Nite at the Opera" for the CBC years ago about a local indie promotion called Mainstream Wrestling based in riral Nova Scotia.

One of my favourite characters throughout the years was James Mitchell, a pro wrestling manager known by a number of aliases over his career, including James Vandenberg, The Sinister Minister, and Father James Mitchell. In real life, he James Mitchell, a cool guy who, as it turns out, is as much a fan of the paranormal subculture (from a skeptical point of view) as I am of pro wrestling. We became friends a few years ago via Facebook.

In the wake of the Roswell slides fiasco / con / hoax / brouhaha (take your pick), Mitchell sent me a note wherein he compared pro wrestling to ufology... which is something I once did on Radio Misterioso with Greg Bishop when we put on an ad hoc, off-the-top-of-our-heads ufological wrestling death match tournament that might be the funniest thing I will ever do.

Anyway, I asked James if I could post his observations, which I thought were spot on, and he kindly said yes. So without any further ado, let's get ready to rumble with James Mitchell on why ufology is a lot like pro wrestling!

Ufology as Pro Westling by James Mitchell

I sat back as an observer and was thoroughly entertained by the two year long Be Witness / Roswell Slides debacle. The other day my wife asked, "being that you have always said flying saucers, Bigfoot, ghosts, psychics etc., are all bullshit, why do I hear those subjects via podcasts every time I'm within ten feet of you and your computer? And what's the deal with those goddamned Roswell slides?"

Upon reflection, I had a "eureka" moment and explained to her that Ufology / paranormal drama has replaced professional wrestling as entertainment for me. The dynamics are very similar. 

The majority of the population doesn't give it the time of day and, for the most part, snickers and rolls their eyes about it. 

A small, yet vociferous minority ( the "marks") believe in it with religious fervor. They will even argue with an insider who tells them it's not real - They are the "tinfoil hat" crowd. 

There is also no shortage of what we carnies in the bump-and-groan-trade call "money marks". The money mark is someone with an open check book and zero understanding about the history and nature of the business or it's denizens. If they did, they would run for the hills rather than piss away their fortune. They become star struck because someone they have seen on TV is giving them the time of day and business advice. The dubious advice always includes the money mark featuring the grifter in a position of prominence and a fat payday.

The money mark is then put in the spotlight alongside their new "best friend" so he or she can distractedly gaze at their own reflection on TV or various social media platforms while they are being financially hornswaggled.

"This is new my friend Joe Blow who was abducted by aliens! Didn't you see him on Unsolved Mysteries? Or In Search Of back in 1978? He was on Ancient Aliens for fifteen seconds, too! He's FAMOUS! I'm going to finance the UFO Geek Symposium that he's planning! He says I'll quadruple my investment! I'll fly in and pay several of his colleagues who can't possibly be the filthy, lying, sociopaths everyone else says they are. After all, he vouches for them and he wouldn't lie to me, because I'm giving him top billing and top pay up front- in cash! That criminal record of his you saw online? He says it's DISINFORMATION!"

At the end of the day all money marks in wrestling or Ufology wind up learning the same lesson imparted upon the old lady who got talked into nursing an ailing viper that subsequently repaid her kindness with a fatal bite. "Lady," sneered the viper, "you knew I was a snake when you picked me up."

A slightly smaller crowd ("smart marks" or "smarks"), often much better educated and intelligent, is sort of fascinated by it from a sociological / psychological / watch the potential train wreck / entertainment point of view, and might spend spend a few bucks or even many hours of leisure time on it. They are not ashamed to say they follow it for various reasons. I suppose Jim Mosely and Greg Bishop would fit that characterization.

At the far end of the spectrum are those who are actively pissed off that folks would waste their time considering it for any reason, a la the James Randi crowd. It's all fake and not worthy of any serious thought. Therefore, anyone discussing it is beneath their contempt.

Then we have the cast of onscreen characters. The good guys, or "babyfaces" in pro wrestling parlance, that wave the flag of truth and righteousness within their fictional narrative. I put Kevin Randle, Nick Pope, and Richard Dolan in that pile.

"Heels" would be the usual suspects that are constantly peddling snake oil to the gullible and getting caught cheating by various means, yet somehow are able to repeat their nefarious deeds with no real sanctions of consequence. Massaun, Greer, Romanek, ad nauseam.

There is a subset of performers in Ufology that are analogous to what are referred to as "shooters" in pro wrestling. They have real world credentials. So long as they are in a position to get paid for furthering the fiction on their own terms without damaging their reputation beyond a wink and nudge from the knowing, they play into the story because their involvement lends an air of legitimacy. Some might even believe what they say. I would place Stan Friedman, J. Allen Hynek, and Edgar Mitchell in that category.

Finally, on the outer edges of the sub-culture we have the so called "dirt sheet" writers, ala Dave Meltzer of The Wrestling Observer. They are particularly reviled by wrestlers and promoters alike because they report the facts, air dirty laundry when needed, and are not afraid to call "bullshit". That would be guys like yourself and Lance Moody. They "break kayfabe", "smarten up the marks", and often spoil the story before it unfolds with sober analysis. No Virginia, there is no Santa Claus.

So from a wrestling booking standpoint, Roswell Slides fiasco was like a particularly bad WrestleMania PPV. Months of ballyhoo and build up about something that is not real to begin with and a big disappointment in it's ultimate presentation. There were highly charged, diametrically opposing promos from the white and black hats along with unflattering revelations of behind the scenes shenanigans, courtesy of truth seeking outside pundits.

Ultimately, the heel protégés of the "evil manager" Jaime Maussan - Carey, Schmidt, Dew, and Bragalia - were defeated by the forces of righteousness. As is always the custom after a big blow-off PPV, a couple of the defeated heels attempted to turn babyface and ask for forgiveness from the true believers, much like Sgt. Slaughter did after spending a year in cahoots with The Iron Sheik during the Desert Storm conflict. The evil manager then calls his former confederates liars and insists that the footage of any cheating or loss on the part of his stable has been doctored. The referee was in the babyface's pocket. He would have "gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for you meddling kids".

Then the cycle of chicanery starts all over again for another year. Only the main events change with slightly different line ups. The marks in the crowd will always hold up signs that say "DISCLOSURE" and chant "ROSWELL! ROSWELL! ROSWELL!", right on cue.

It's a ritual as comforting and predictable as the Catholic Mass for those who choose to suspend their disbelief.

At least that's how I perceive it.

Don Schmitt Apologizes

Don Schmitt has apologized for the Roswell slides fiasco.

Is he sincere? Who knows? If he is then he will withdraw from the public part of ufology - no more books, no movies, no more lectures. Responsibility entails consequences.

Based on his past record, I doubt we'll see that from him. Britney probably sums up the whole lot of them. But maybe Schmitt will surprise me this time and do the honourable thing all the way through.

If so, good for him and happy trails on the rest of his journey. If not... well, that's why we all have blogs.

Paul Kimball

Talkin' Roswell Slides Blues, Part I

I was on The Gralien Report with Micah Hanks on Monday evening discussing the Roswell Slides fiasco. You can tune in here. 

Here is Micah's write-up about the episode:

This week on The Gralien Report, we’re all just about tired of hearing about the so-called “Roswell Slides”, and so as our final word on the matter, we feature a complete discussion of what happened, how it all fell apart, and what we can learn from it in the aftermath. A friend of the program, researcher and filmmaker Paul Kimball, was one of the operative members of the Roswell Slides Research Group, who helped determine the origins of the mummy depicted in the images. Paul joins us in hour two of the program to discuss the need for better judgement and discernment in the field of UFO studies.

My segment starts at 1:19:00, but I recommend listening to the whole show.

Paul Kimball

The "Roswell Slides" Scandal - Who is Adam Dew?

Anthony Bragalia is apparently very good at looking into peoples' background. Well, there's a project that he can sink his teeth into if he wants to earn some redemption for the role he played in the Roswell Slides fiasco. He should put all of his energy into answering one key question: Who is Adam Dew, the man behind all of this? 

If Mr. Bragalia really believes that he is the innocent victim in all of this, a naive but honest man who was led astray by someone who played fast and loose with the truth, then I would imagine he would want to look into the background of the man who started it all. I have no doubt that the ufological community would welcome the effort.

I know I would.

Paul Kimball

Bragalia - Famous at Last!!

The Mirror in the United Kingdom reported today on the Roswell slides fiasco, with the result that "slides" promoter Anthony Bragalia has now become the poster-boy for ufological incompetence in the mainstream media. An excerpt:

The UFO 'believer' community has been rocked by an admission that a photograph of an alien was actually the mummified remains of a dead child. An image taken from the so-called Roswell Slides was unveiled last week in front of a worldwide online audience at an event called Be Witness. Ahead of the big reveal, researchers said the picture was a "smoking gun" which proved aliens had crashlanded on Earth. But these claims are now in tatters after Tony Braglia, a "principal investigator" who analysed them, issued an astonishing public apology. He said the dead alien (pictured below) was actually a Native American child who lived in the abandoned ancient city of Mesa Verde.

For everyone he has threatened, insulted and harassed for the past three years (yours truly included), karmic Christmas has arrived!

Mr. Bragalia can always look at the bright side, I suppose - at least now he's referred to as a "world-famous researcher." Alas, it's fame for all the wrong reasons... and in a final well-deserved indignity, they didn't even spell his name right.

Paul Kimball