by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
One of the reasons why conspiracy theorists suggest that the government may be hiding the existence of alien life from us all is the prospect that we would all freak the fuck out.
And, yet, I would suggest that under almost all reasonable methods of us discovering that We Are Not Alone, it would all be a lulz. Let me explain.
Right now, as you read this, we know for a fact that the US military has repeatedly over the years run into very strange drone-like things that seem to exhibit technological abilities that are far beyond what we assume humans can do.
And yet…it was barely a blip for one news cycle.
As such, we could discover absolute proof of alien life in the universe and outside of very online people and science nerds… the average person probably wouldn’t care that much. And if they did start to care, then the very dynamic we see with global climate change and vaccines would kick in. If people really started to have to confront the implications of humanity not being alone in the universe, they would think up ways to dismiss it for political reasons.
So, the case could be made that there is only one way First Contact would matter to the average person — “hard” First Contact. We’re talking huge alien spaceships over major cities like in Childhood’s End.
But if it’s a “soft” First Contact that’s not sexxy, then, lulz. It, too, would be important on Twitter for little more than a few hours. Given how clear that is, I think we may be surprised what we learn in the next few years. The Powers That Be probably have figured out how hard it would be to actually scare people about evidence of ETs, so they won’t care if some happens to appear. No reason to hide it if no one cares.
