It Was Never About Extraterrestrials

I can handle being told the truth. I can handle being told something I don’t want to hear. What I have trouble tolerating is being treated like I’m too stupid to recognize what’s happening.

A few months back I wrote the article The Government Registered Alien.gov. That’s Not Disclosure. I don’t have a crystal ball, well actually I do, but that’s beside the point. At the time, I suspected the domains had nothing to do with UFOs, UAPs, or extraterrestrials.

As it turns out, they didn’t.

We now know what the website was created for, and whether someone agrees with that purpose or not is beside the point. What interests me is how we got there. Because the more I looked at the domains, the site itself, and the reaction it generated, the less this felt like communication and the more it felt like marketing.

What interests me is everything surrounding it.

When the domains first appeared, people immediately began connecting them to UFO hearings, disclosure efforts, whistleblower testimony, and decades of speculation surrounding extraterrestrial life. That reaction wasn’t surprising. In fact, it was probably one of the most predictable reactions imaginable.

Then there is the site itself. The domain names are one thing. The presentation is another. Looking at it, I find it difficult to believe nobody involved understood the associations people would make. Maybe they did. Maybe they didn’t. I know which explanation I find more convincing.

Which is why I have a hard time believing that nobody saw it coming.

The more I thought about it, the less this felt like a story about UFOs and the more it felt like a story about how institutions manipulate the public.

Government communication increasingly feels less like information and more like engagement marketing.

Somewhere along the way, press conferences became posts, explanations became slogans, and informing the public became managing the audience.

That may be what bothers me most about the entire episode.

Not because I think people are stupid. Quite the opposite.

What concerns me is the growing sense that governments, corporations, media organizations, and just about everyone else with a message to sell have become convinced that people are predictable. Give them the right words, the right image, the right emotional trigger, and they will react exactly as expected.

Social media operates that way.

Marketing operates that way.

Our government shouldn’t.

Maybe I’m getting old. That’s entirely possible. But I miss a time when major announcements came with explanations instead of teasers, when information was presented directly instead of wrapped in a campaign designed to generate attention.

I can handle being told something I don’t want to hear.

What I have trouble handling is the feeling that more and more institutions no longer speak to people as adults. They speak to them as audiences.

And audiences are managed, nudged, marketed to, manipulated, and steered.

We as citizens deserve better than that.