Monday, June 18, 2007

The Hunt for the Skinwalker

I picked up this book because I have some sick and twisted interest in Skinwalker, and when I saw that Joe recommended it, I jumped on it. Once I had the courage too anyway. First of all I have to admit I lost a lot of sleep while reading this book, even now when I hear a noise or I see a light I kinda freak out. I was a little disappointed in the lack of creepy skinwalker stories, but this book did not lack weird tales that a did a number on my tough guy image.

I am a little skeptical though about the ranch, I mean the stories seem a little ridiculous at times, but what interested me most in the book was the theories at the end of the book.

In my opinion all facts aside, just my own thoughts and theories I think the whole ranch is a combination of the conclusions. I do give credit to "Tom Gormom" and his perseverance to win back his ranch, but I also think that had something to do with the continuing appearance and disturbances he wanted them to show themselves and attack the cattle in order for the scientist to conduct their research, I think that most paranormal instances are based on the person willing or wanting something to appear. With that in mind I have also heard that the only way you can see a skinwalker is that you believe in them and have a deep seeded want somewhere in your mind to see one. I think that by giving them that, you in sense feed the flames. I think that idea also translates to the other types of paranormal discussed on the farm.

Contrary to that though are the people who like the Gormans, who move into a place with no intentions of paranormal activity, but I have also think that a presence can stay in the place it was called for so to speak, the discovery channel talks about this a lot in their show "A Haunting" about people moving into places that previous owners had in a sense condemned with their "Black arts" and actions, and the "curses" are just at the location, the beings harass the tenants even if they had no intention or knowledge of the previous tenants. I think that is a part of the problem with the Gormon's ranch, the local Ute tribe wouldn't set foot on the land, and spoke of the land having a lot of activity for many generations, even the previous owners were a little shady with their no digging policy.

I do think of myself as one of those X-files nerds, that think the government usually has it hands in many sinister stews (thanks monarch!) I would assume the government would have an interest the farm with all of activity, and the reasons as to why the government wouldn't be part of the problem are a little weak in this book, they say the government could have taken this land at anytime they wanted, which I say yes too of course they could, but in doing so they have just given validity to the stories, the government would have been bombarded with conspiracy theories that would have lead to FOX reports, which in itself it worth not taking the land. The other reason is that the U.S Government is not one to terrorize its own citizens or harass them, this is kind of funny in its own sense, this government is very self-serving at the moment, so I find it hard to believe it would not harass some local country bumpkins in Utah to get some information.

I did enjoy the talk about inner and outer dimensions, a nice coincidence I had while I was reading this was that I was also reading Slaughterhouse five, and its talks about their being more dimensions that humans just cannot reach without help, I was interested in the effects of the drug DMT on the patients, the idea that you are able to unlock different dimensions inside your head or through meditation is very interesting to me, but I am a nerd so you need to take that into account.

All in all I am no where near finished with my ideas about this book I will need to read it again in order to come to some more solid conclusions, but I would like to hear your thoughts on it Joe, and maybe we can bounce some Duchovny style ideas and theories around, maybe even convince some more people to read it and participate.


P.S I am not some big shot English language guy (as you can tell from that sentence) so bear with me in reading that give me a little slack, unless you are Mr. Strickland (aww yeah reference there)

12 comments:

Grifter said...

Well my man, it has been a solid year since I read the book, but some impressions remain. And I might add that my initial interest in the phenomenon began because of a family member's familiarity with the general area and some bizarre and inexplicable occurences, such as witnessing the spontaneous combustion of a cow (that is what I was told with utmost seriousness--although I know a second hand story means nothing).

I think that the occurences are too widely known to be entirely false. Something was happening there, most likely, but I tend to apply Occam's Razor in a matter such as this and seek the simplest solution. I really think that the happenings were a result of a natural phenomenon of both weather (inordinate ball lightning activity), geology (the abundance of Gilsonite...perhaps), and sensationalism. You are correct in your idea that the desire will fuel a result: it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. I also wonder how objective this NADS, I mean NIDS team was.

I think I am just interested in the stories for their outlandish and unpredictable essence. I mean, Predator-like creatures lurking in the trees and then tromping off through portals and such. Do you remember the story about the guy talking to the 2 Spacecraft pilots lounging against the tree, and randomly BIGFOOT shows up and the alien beings are bossing him around and such? I was intrigued by the surrealism of the whole thing. Giant wolves and flocks of tiney birds, floating refrigerator-like boxes in the middle of open fields. Mind boggling.

I would likely agree that if I were to conceed that all these things were truly occuring, then perhaps a government agency was performing some advanced weaponry testing. I mean, that is at least a semi-plausible explanation, although it isn't without its latitude.

My subsequent searches after reading this book became even more bizarre: reportedly unclassified documents brought about after the Freedom of Information Act that detailed underground passageways connecting New Mexico and Utah, the deepest levels of which we populated with Lizard people and Octopus-like men (who evidently trusted Mormons). Yeah. That was all in a document somewhere out in the backwaters of the internet. So odd. Such crap, yes. But how do people even arrive at these places? That is where my main interest is.

And I hasten to add that the stories, the raw stories, really can be a little...spooky. All in all, it is an inconclusive book, as I expected before reading. But it was entertaining. Look at it this way: you could read Cujo (or some other Stevie King fodder) or you could read this, and there isn't a scientific investigative team saying that most of Cujo very well may be true.

Grifter said...

sorry about my spelling on that post. it was typed quickly on a Mac keyboard, which is like tying your 30 -eyelet goth boots with broken chopsticks.

Grifter said...

A quick Google search brings up insanity

Allen TenBusschen said...

That was a most excellent read, I really enjoyed the LDS stuff in it. Amazing, just amazing. I really did enjoy the stories the most in the book, the bigfoot being controlled by Aryan race aliens is priceless, I see what you mean though I would rather read the semi scientific and hear peoples personal accounts rather than a complete fiction, but sometimes it felt like this book was heading a little too far into the fantasy of it all. I do also think that if everything they said happened, there would probably be a big to do about that place in Utah, another thing about NIDS they were really full of themselves, I am sorry but I can almost promise you no government or alien civilization was afraid of these guys, I will give them credit for attempting it, but come on

Allen TenBusschen said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Allen TenBusschen said...

Another thing too, have you ever come across any stories about Skinwalkers actually doing physical harm to anyone? I have never heard one, and this book describes them as pure evil, willing to kill whatever, even the stories James and Valerie and I heard from some friends were spooky and chilling about skinwalkers but they never injured anyone, only frightened them or dented up their car.

Mike Laughead said...

This discussion makes me think of my reading of the book "Communion" which is supposedly about alien abduction. The book was cool and creepy and had the regular little aliens, it also had supposedly half-alien Men In Black trying to investigate and everything, but when the alligator aliens started showing up and all that stuff, I just got sick of it. Why do they have to push things like that?

Grifter said...

"Communion" had me pissing my pants at age 10. The cover alone terrified me. But Mike is right, it just got campy.

I think my fascination with such literature is on the highly offensive level of going to the State Fair just to gawk at all the oddballs. As wrong as it may be, there is a distinct pleasure in observing the oddities. I think it is also the contemplation of the idea of reality for other people: what constitutes their realities and how did they arrive there. For my philosophy these days, I read alien abduction books. Pathetic.

Dylan Todd said...

Okay, so this conspiracy stuff gives me the heebie-jeebies. The scariest thing (besides that people really, truly believe this incredibly delusional fiction) is that, if you immerse yourself in enough of this (as I have, I will admit, at times), it becomes hypnotically real. It's like dream logic: upon waking, you realize how ludicrous the whole thing was, but while you slept, man that junk was real. I clicked the link and found myself sucked into its insanity, if only for a moment. This is what scares me - the viral transmission of insane ideas. It's freaking creepy. At least with a Stephen King book, you know it's a complete fantasy. He's not passing it off as reality.

There's a cynical part of me that thinks that these people don't even believe this stuff, that they're just preying on the weak-minded in the name of self-aggrandizement and personal gain. That would be a little more comforting, but ultimately more obscene.

I think it's also funny how much these things, eventually, link together. It's not uncommon to start reading about crop circles and find that they're related to the JFK assassination, the Unabomber, G. Gordon Liddy, the Masons, Bigfoot and pink lasers that control minds. It's like Forrest Gump... only, you know, not lame.

That said, there are some of these things that I just can't dismiss: Operation Paperclip, the JFK assassination, even UFOs - they're too plausible.

Or maybe I'm just another internet crazy one bad day away from posting the USA's most secret documents on the interwebs with actual! scientific! facts! (sort of!) to back them up! I was a Mormon missionary after all, which means I was working in collusion with the CIA, right?

Allen TenBusschen said...

Pretty sure Dylan works for the Gordon Gestapo

Dylan Todd said...

If by "Gordon" you mean "Bigfoot's" and by "Gestapo," you mean "Taco Bell," then yes; yes I do. And dang it! I keep typing in hopes of getting rid of widows in my comment space but it's just not happening! Curse you design education! Curse you!

Mike Laughead said...

Why is the cover to "Communion" so creepy? How did that artist manage that? Or is it just in my head?