“UFOs are a modern manifestation of an age-old category of mysterious aerial phenomena that are akin to accounts in folklore, mythology, and religion.”
-Thomas E. Bullard, Mysteries in the Eyes of the Beholder
“[T]he modern, global belief in flying saucers and their occupants is identical to an earlier belief in the fairy faith.”
– Jacques Vallée, Passport to Magonia, From Folklore to Flying Saucers
“The fairy-faith is not dead but different.”
– Peter M. Rojcewicz, Between One Eye Blink and the Next: Fairies, UFOs, and Problems of Knowledge
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The last two years have been quite an amazing time for UFO speculation. The intriguing interview of Bob Lazar on the Joe Rogan Show was watched by a wide audience. I, for one, am convinced from it that the American powers that be have been tinkering with “captured UFO technology” for decades. Lazar’s testimony is genuine, and his retelling of reverse engineering work at Area 51 leaves the mind spinning. Added to this was the coverage this July of the “Tic Tac” UFO footage captured by our own Navy pilots. Combined, the two news stories can lead one down some amazing rabbit holes. But then, you learn that UFOs have literally interfered with our nuclear weapons programs, and you pay even more attention.
It is an interesting thing to bear witness to the speculations of the people of our day. Entirely new mythological creations are concocted all the time. In recent years, one can watch as UFO hobbyists constantly continue to pair up the various preternatural occurrences that span North America with what they consider alien technology. To these people, the lights in the sky are alien spacecraft fuelled by an unknown power source. The mutilation of our cattle is an ongoing biological experiment, as is the abduction of our citizenry, who are cleanly processed in a decades-long clinical genetic monitoring program. Surely, they say to themselves, these are a wise and highly evolved super species from another biosphere. In fact, UFO enthusiasts will even go so far as to state that the human race itself is the fruits of extra-terrestrial experimentation.
UFO enthusiasts like Joe Rogan, the late Art Bell, or perhaps even Giorgio Tsoukalos will state that it is statistically impossible for there to not be other intelligent civilizations in the universe. But this statement is predicated on the idea that life and civilization just suddenly erupt into existence through chance. Theirs is the speculation of an evolutionist. For them, the cosmos has no purpose, everything is a random coincidence, and the Earth is an insignificant ball of dirt. And so, when they look at a strange thing flying in the sky, they think it is an object with, perhaps, a carburettor, a fuel source, or a propulsion system of some kind. As Jacques Vallée puts it in his famous work, Passport to Magonia:
And indeed, if flying saucers are devices used by a super-scientific civilization from space, we would expect them to be packed inside with electronic gadgetry, super-radars and a big computerized spying apparatus.
Jacques Vallée, Passport to Magonia: From Folklore to Flying Saucers, page 30
Such people fail to make important connections. Such moderns will employ all of the scientific and military power they can to examine the anomalies that visit our skies, but they fail to recognize that this has been happening throughout recorded history, and they cannot grasp that there is a connection between this obscure phenomenon and our own myths—between our modern-day observations and the tradition of our folklore.
The Fey Folk
In a recent pre-show of Off The Menu, (view it by becoming a patron to Tumblarhouse) Charles Coulombe answers the question of a man named Raphael, who speculates that the idea of space aliens and “UFO mania” grew in popularity with the science fiction genre that cropped up in the 19th and 20th centuries.
…The fact is that with the growth in technology – starting in the last portion of the 19th century, which expanded wildly the science fiction genre – grew up apace alongside it. And the idea of people on other worlds, although people had thought of it before, really went into the mental bloodstream of the West in a big way. And I suspect, just as when we told stories, the earlier stories of elves and fairies and all that, you had fairy abductions instead of UFO abductions. But it’s interesting to me that the effects undergone supposedly by the victims in both cases were very similar, which tells you one of two things (or possibly both): #1 That there may be something real behind it, or #2 That there is a certain commonality in human psychology that these stories, if they’re not based in reality, nevertheless for whatever reason are deeply a part of the human psyche. And, of course, there’s a possibility that both are true. I can’t see both being false though, simply because these are universal motifs.
Charles Coulombe, Off The Menu Pre-Show, September 6th
So, what if the “space man craze” of the past handful of generations is a strange blip in how cultures normally process this? Perhaps Americans don’t have it in themselves to give a thought to “The Fey Folk”. Fairies, goblins, leprechauns, daoine maithe – call them what you will – their characteristics are similar to modern UFO encounters. While Americans have been noticing lights in the sky for years, so have the Europeans borne witness to fairy lanterns, will o’ the wisps, fairy boats, and spectre ships.
Moving into the topic of close encounters of the 3rd kind (when a person encounters “the alien” themselves), Americans will report figures that are often short, slender, pale, and sporting big black eyes. This, also, is how elves and fairy folk have often been described. Disney’s “Tinker Bell” abomination is a fairy image that’s plagued modern conceptions of traditional lore. But no, the fey folk are frightening and only human-like; they are not completely shaped like a normal human being. The fey, to us, shouldn’t be there. They are an unnatural anomaly that gives us pause when we see them, and the very sight of them disturbs us. It is as though something in the cosmos tried to cheat the universe’s program code, and it attempted to make something that looked human, but it clearly is not. Only a distorted facsimile.
But what of Bob Lazar’s account of captured alien craft and artefacts? Was this not a tangible, physical proof of “alien” existence? How can old timey fairy stories stack up to such a proof? Well, the fact is that we also have artefacts taken from Fairies. Take, for example, this account from an area called Willy Howe, a tumulus mound located in the Yorkshire Wolds:
In the province of the Deiri, also, not far from the place of my nativity, an extraordinary event occurred, which I have known from my childhood. There is a village, some miles distant from the Eastern Ocean, near which those famous waters, commonly called Gipse, spring from the ground at various sources (not constantly, indeed, but every alternate year), and, forming a considerable current, glide over the low lands into the sea: it is a good sign when these streams are dried up, for their flowing is said unquestionably to portend the disaster of a future scarcity. A certain rustic belonging to the village, going to see his friend, who resided in the neighboring hamlet, was returning, a little intoxicated, late at night; when, behold, he heard, as it were, the voice of singing and revelling on an adjacent hillock, which I have often seen, and which is distant from the village only a few furlongs. Wondering who could be thus disturbing the silence of midnight with noisy mirth, he was anxious to investigate the matter more closely; and perceiving in the side of the hill an open door, he approached, and, looking in, he beheld a house, spacious and lighted up, filled with men and women, who were seated, as it were, at a solemn banquet. One of the attendants, perceiving him standing at the door, offered him a cup: accepting it, he wisely forbore to drink; but, pouring out the contents, and retaining the vessel, he quickly departed. A tumult arose among the company, on account of the stolen cup, and the guests pursued him; but he escaped by the fleetness of his steed, and reached the village with his extraordinary prize. It was a vessel of an unknown material, unusual color, and strange form: it was offered as a great present to Henry the elder, king of England and then handed over to the queen’s brother, David, king of Scotland, and deposited for many years among the treasures of his kingdom; and, a few years since, as we have learnt from authentic relation, it was given up by William, king of the Scots, to Henry II, on his desiring to see it.
William of Newburgh’s “History”, book 1, chapter 28, ‘of certain prodigies’
Other artefacts resulting from Fey encounters are still held in our possession, such as the Fairy Flag of Dunvegen Castle, which was gifted to the Scottish MacLeod family long ago. Another drinking vessel stolen from the fairies, The Oldenburg Horn, found its way to the Hannover Art Treasury. We also have snippets of their music, from occasions when someone chanced upon one of their celebrations. There is even a fairy census, in which researchers attempt to track and monitor their activity.
Yet, more than artefacts and the like, we also have the idea that there are mixed race bloodlines. That is to say, there are fairy-human hybrids in existence as a result of sexual commerce between the two species. There is, of course, the account of how Morgan Le Fey of King Arthur fame was purported to be half fairy. Lesser known are the Tuatha Dé Danann High Kings of Ireland, whom it is said descended from a Scythian fairy race. There is the account of the Pellings, from the Celtic tradition. Also, there are the locals of Pennant Valley in North Wales, some of whom are said to have lineage from a fairy ancestor. The faery girl of Llyn y Fan Fach begat three sons with a human, and her three sons later earned renown as the famous Physicians of Myddfai, whose medical formulae still can be found in Welsh manuscripts to this day.
Compare this to the idea of how so many “alien abductees” find themselves becoming impregnated or having their seed extracted for the purposes of conceiving an “alien hybrid”. For those unfamiliar with this aspect of the UFO abduction phenomenon, it has been often reported that aliens will abduct someone first as a child, and then a series of abductions occurs throughout their lives, often through puberty. Women will sometimes at first have positive urinalysis and blood tests that confirm their pregnancies, only to find suddenly that they are no longer pregnant, there was no miscarriage, and there is not even any kind of a trace of any fetal tissue whatsoever.
The hybrid children resulting from such purported abductions, when witnessed by the mothers, are frail, small, and delicate looking – worthy of a long stay in a neonatal intensive care unit. Their bodies are disproportional from that of a human baby. They seem to have a pre-built wisdom already within them, but they are cold and malnourished when it comes to affection. And for this reason, the aliens will abduct the mothers once more, as they seem incapable of giving the necessary kindness and motherly contact necessary for raising a baby.
This whole topic of crossbreeding takes us back to fairy lore, in which tradition teaches us that the fey folk will often trick mortal women into going off to act as mothers and midwives at fairy births. The compassionate humanity of these women is a requirement for the fey, as they need the aid of one with a human touch to successfully nurture such a child. And, sometimes the fairies will undercut the entire ordeal, and they will simply abduct babies entirely, replacing them with changelings – which are actually demons seeking a mortal lifestyle. Such is the traditional folklore when it comes to Faerie.
Same Habits, Same People
Whether it is the paralysis of a “fairy-blast” or the famous Travis Walton getting caught in a stun beam from an alien craft, the two are quite similar. Just as fairy abductees suffer lifetime depression after their ordeals, so also are alien abductees never again the same person after their abduction ordeal. Both the fairies and the “aliens” we know today are happy to let us know they are there, but both desire we don’t inquire too deeply about them or pursue them – and they keep a distance from us. Fairies manipulate their forms quite easily, as though by magic; thus, we also see UFOs in the sky manipulate their forms, divide up, or combine into a whole as if they’re merely some kind of an immaterial light show. Alien abductees report losing large tracts of time, but so also can a man taking a nap in a fairy ring or witnessing a fairy procession return to civilization days, weeks, or months later, as though there is some kind of a time distortion taking place in the event.
The strange phenomena we see in the “extra-terrestrial craze” are cut from the same cloth as the fairy folklore of the old countries we left behind. We’ve entirely forgotten how to grasp what we are seeing, and now we view these incidents through a lens that was crafted by The National Enquirer. When we hear about the Mothman, the Levelland Incident, or the Flatwoods Monster, our American minds automatically switch on to the idea of mechanisms, technology, space aliens, and interstellar visitors. But perhaps this is not the best kind of speculative discourse.
What could be the purpose of such a worldwide elaborate hoax? Who can afford to contrive such a complex scheme, for so little apparent result? Is human imagination alone capable of playing such tricks on itself? Or should we hypothesize that an advanced race somewhere in the universe and sometime in the future has been showing us three-dimensional space operas for the last two thousand years, in an attempt to guide our civilization? If so, they certainly do not deserve our congratulations! Are we dealing instead with a parallel universe, where there are races living, and where we may go at our expense, never to return to the present? Are these races only semi-human, so that in order to maintain contact with us, they need crossbreeding with men and women of our planet? Is this the origin of the many tales and legends where genetics plays a great role: the symbolism of the Virgin in occultism and religion, the fairy tales involving human midwives and changelings, the sexual overtones of the flying saucer reports, the biblical stories of intermarriage between the Lord’s angels and terrestrial women, whose offspring were giants? From that mysterious universe, have objects that can materialize and “dematerialize” at will been projected? Are the UFOs “windows” rather than “objects”?
Jacques Vallée, Passport to Magonia: From Folklore to Flying Saucers, page 153
We have been reduced to a people who alienate ourselves from the very world we live in. We are saturated in history and wonder, yet we can only look at these phenomena in a detached, dispassionate, postmodern mode. We are immersed in this wide world of natural beauty and mystery, and yet we have to pretend we are neutral scientists observing a peculiar specimen in a petri dish. We are estranged from God, the Earth, and every charming thing about it – and this is why Americans in particular can’t even fathom the preternatural discourse taking place.
The picture of reality that has dominated in the West for the last three centuries is of a predictable, mechanistic, and purposeless world devoid of human or spiritual qualities. […] We represent the world to ourselves as impersonal, mechanistic, and purposeless, and we respond to this representation, as if it were a cosmic law. The truth of the matter, perhaps, is that the impersonal, mechanistic, and purposeless qualities are in ourselves.
– Peter M. Rojcewicz, Between One Eye Blink and the Next: Fairies, UFOs, and Problems of Knowledge
Perhaps someday, long in the future, our descendants will look back at that crazy 20th Century and shake their heads in disbelief at the notions we had about these kinds of things. Never before have a people concocted such a modern myth as wild as the “space alien” mythology. These creatures are not from Zeta Reticuli. They are right here, among us, darting in and out of our midst as they always have. Only a world that has healed itself and restored faith in God will be able to properly put this phenomenon in its right place. Until then, we are stuck listening to ancient aliens theories.