The Yowie: Australian for 'unlikely'
By: Aaron Sakulich
Issue date: 3/2/07 Section: Ed-Op
Originally published: 3/2/07 at 10:23 AM EST
Last update: 3/2/07 at 10:23 AM EST
Originally published: 3/2/07 at 10:23 AM EST
Last update: 3/2/07 at 10:23 AM EST
This tale is utter madness. Yowies that attack him in the middle of the night? Perpetual motion machines? Invisible footprint-making monsters chasing him off a cliff? UFO-controlled auto accidents? To those who are attempting to find the Yowie, working on the theory that it is just a big, ugly animal we've not seen before, I feel only pure, undiluted sympathy. This story is, at best, the ravings of a lunatic.
On the other hand, perhaps not all of the researchers deserve sympathy. The same site has an article written by a journalist who went out for a night with an experienced Yowie hunter. They crept through the brush, hearing the sounds of Yowies yelling back and forth to each other, before they decided to change positions. Going down a different backwoods path, they were startled to see a Yowie with glowing red eyes step onto the path in front of them. The journalist writes that the creature was amazing, and we'll have to take his word for it, because the pair had for some reason left their camera in the car.
Seems a bit on the convenient side, doesn't it?
I mean, a man knows so much about Yowie activity that he can just pick an area, show up one evening, and not just hear a handful of them communicating, but actually see one at close range. As easy as spotting a guy in an Eagles jersey in Philadelphia. And yet, not a single photograph or sound recording has ever been made. At least there's the occasional blurry shot of Bigfoot going through someone's trash; the only thing that the Yowie has going for it is a handful of plaster casts of supposed footprints. (Footprints, for the record, are easier to forge than photographs.)
The Yowie researchers also have a bit of the anti-government paranoia that has infected the UFO community ever since the Air Force made it clear that they didn't want the Soviets to have any advantage over them. Unproven, unprovable claims, such as that young police officers do not report Yowie cases due to fear of ridicule, or that there is an active government cover-up of the phenomenon, spatter otherwise sane-sounding monster hunting.
That's the short version of the Yowie story. I'm not an expert on them. I can't even find Australia on a map. But I hope that the Yowie enthusiast community won't hold it against me to say that, although the existence of such a creature is theoretically possible, I don't believe in it. The total lack of evidence, the lunacy of the UFO ghost psychic phantom gibberish with which your research is associated, and the questionably convenient reports of some of your colleagues are giant, bold, red strikes against you.
Be seeing you.
On the other hand, perhaps not all of the researchers deserve sympathy. The same site has an article written by a journalist who went out for a night with an experienced Yowie hunter. They crept through the brush, hearing the sounds of Yowies yelling back and forth to each other, before they decided to change positions. Going down a different backwoods path, they were startled to see a Yowie with glowing red eyes step onto the path in front of them. The journalist writes that the creature was amazing, and we'll have to take his word for it, because the pair had for some reason left their camera in the car.
Seems a bit on the convenient side, doesn't it?
I mean, a man knows so much about Yowie activity that he can just pick an area, show up one evening, and not just hear a handful of them communicating, but actually see one at close range. As easy as spotting a guy in an Eagles jersey in Philadelphia. And yet, not a single photograph or sound recording has ever been made. At least there's the occasional blurry shot of Bigfoot going through someone's trash; the only thing that the Yowie has going for it is a handful of plaster casts of supposed footprints. (Footprints, for the record, are easier to forge than photographs.)
The Yowie researchers also have a bit of the anti-government paranoia that has infected the UFO community ever since the Air Force made it clear that they didn't want the Soviets to have any advantage over them. Unproven, unprovable claims, such as that young police officers do not report Yowie cases due to fear of ridicule, or that there is an active government cover-up of the phenomenon, spatter otherwise sane-sounding monster hunting.
That's the short version of the Yowie story. I'm not an expert on them. I can't even find Australia on a map. But I hope that the Yowie enthusiast community won't hold it against me to say that, although the existence of such a creature is theoretically possible, I don't believe in it. The total lack of evidence, the lunacy of the UFO ghost psychic phantom gibberish with which your research is associated, and the questionably convenient reports of some of your colleagues are giant, bold, red strikes against you.
Be seeing you.
Ian Westray
posted 3/03/07 @ 7:29 AM EST
"Stultify": cause to lose enthusiasm and initiative, esp. as a result of a tedious or restritive routine.
"Stupefy": astonish and shock.