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BLAARGing

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Northern Lights said:
And I understand the entire BLAARGing premise, but it is flawed. The premise starts with sasquatch is not real, so therefore, anyone taking the "knower" position must, by definition be lying, thus playing the game. I will be happy to interject myself into this equation as a test subject.

I know they exist, I am not pretending nor am I misrepresenting anything with regard to the subject. In my mind, I know that I am not lying, so I am not playing a game, even if you don't believe me. Your desire to pigeon hole the sasquatch phenomena into a single one size fits all isn't correct, from my point of view.

I don't expect you or anyone else in this forum to stray to far from the BLAARG theory because everyone is in agreement with the initial premise, which again, is flawed.
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You realize, I hope, that you are reprising the errors of the arguments made against athesits, right?

My own, personal, "initial premise" is that there has never been a single bit of congruent, fruitful, luminous, empirical, objective, non-anecdotal evidence even suggesting the possibility of the existence of a population of giant, previously uncatalogued, North American primates. Unless and until that first hurdle is overcome, I have no more reason to believe in the existence of 'Squatch that I have to believe in the existence of 'god'.

Overcoming that hurdle is the onus that must be borne by the claimants.
 
Another indication of widespread pretending to believe is that Bigfooters submit their "evidence" to Internet forums and websites instead of universities and other official organizations.
 
William Parcher said:
Another indication of widespread pretending to believe is that Bigfooters submit their "evidence" to Internet forums and websites instead of universities and other official organizations.
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Yep. I've been at this for quite some time. People don't call us to report their bigfoots. It must be because we're denialists or something.
 
Look how much more productive these discussions are. We continue to accumulate evidence instead of spinning our wheels with "prove the negative" and dealing over and over again with the same canards.

Look at these pretenders in Area X. They claim for tax purposes to be a habitat preservation group. Not one square inch of territory has ever been nominated by them in any of the pertinent places nor any territory purchases made as with the Nature Conservancy or Isaac Walton League, etc.

They have also not nominated their pretend animal as endangered with the US Fish and Wildlife Agency. They do not work with the agencies managing the land around their rental cabin to foster preservation.

There is no example, not in the entire world, of an organization dedicated to habitat preservation or protection of a species that refuses to reveal where that animal is. It is the very first order of business for such groups. None of them ever say that the way to protect something is by concealing where it is.

All we get is special pleading that is the opposite of such groups. Are the bona-fide groups afraid of being ridiculed? On the contrary - they are quite proud. Are they afraid people will stampede to the site they are placing preservation restrictions upon? No, how stupid can you get? The point of preserving land is that you acting to restrict its use.

This goes strongly against the claims of substantial numbers of "true believers". Unless you argue they are truly morons. All you need is one true believer to have one genuine effort at preservation like lobbying your representatives, the US Fish and Wildlife, the state agencies, etc. Yet there is no example of anyone actually doing same. The one thing we have not seen out of people asserting a population of true believers is evidence supporting their belief, and by that we mean evidence that parallels behavior for cases of real animals or real habitats.
 
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AlaskaBushPilot said:
This is a misrepresentation of Patterson's career, as if there were one lone hoax he did amongst all his serious efforts instead of the truth: a long career of nothing but hoaxing.

Patterson faked a lot of tracks, especially before his presentations to sell his book. He made all manner of idiotic contraptions like the bigfoot capture van, the speakers blasting off, the giant dangerous tree-fort, etc. that were all clearly attention-getting instead of serious efforts at finding the fictional animal.

His brother-in-law who did the famous film road show told us in Greg Long's book that his "bigfoot hunting" was drinking in bars and chasing tail. I support that fully, but I don't call it bigfoot hunting.

There isn't one example I know of where it can be demonstrated he was actually seriously hunting what he claimed to believe in.
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No, Roger had been hoaxing for many years prior to the PGF with his first attempted in the early 60's as well as tracks. I think it's a fairly safe bet that Roger was also responsible for Bigfoot showing up at Jerry Merritt's house three times five miles down the road from Patterson.

However, that does not mean that Roger did not actually believe in Bigfoot. The people closest to him knew his belief was genuine and many of the things he did are not consistent with someone who did not actually believe and hoaxed only for monetary gain. The quote you mention by Al DeAtley is as follows...

"If the truth be known," he said sardonically,"knowing Gimlin and Patterson they probably took their horses, stopped in a tavern and got drunk and chased women for a while and found some strange thing to ****, and then maybe they got into the woods sometime."

"Both of them were believers," he said. "Roger believed there was a Bigfoot. No doubt about." - Al DeAtley, The Making of Bigfoot, p. 251

Now that can be taken with a grain of salt since DeAtley was as much a hoaxer as Roger, however, Roger's actions such as his trip to Thailand chasing after a body, or doing the same in competition with Rene Dahinden in the Joe Metlow escapade I think demonstrate someone who really did think Bigfoot was out there to be found.
 
kitakaze said:
However, that does not mean that Roger did not actually believe in Bigfoot. The people closest to him knew his belief was genuine and many of the things he did are not consistent with someone who did not actually believe and hoaxed only for monetary gain.
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The fact is it is totally possible for a person to slip into believing their own B.S. For instance you can learn to cold read accidentally and easily convince yourself you have psychic powers.

For me to what degree the BLAARGers and many other Woo Slingers believe their own story is largely irrelevant. There comes a point where continuing to be wrong in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary becomes a choice. You are choosing to be wrong because wherever emotional or social upside you are getting out of it outweighs your intellectual honesty and standards. You're still lying, you're just lying to yourself instead of to others. It's exactly why I've always argued that at a certain point and in certain contexts being wrong becomes rude in and off itself, regardless of how you state your wrongness.
 
AlaskaBushPilot said:
There is no example, not in the entire world, of an organization dedicated to habitat preservation or protection of a species that refuses to reveal where that animal is.
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I'd say there are quite a few examples of that information being masked to keep the great unwashed out of a sensitive area to reduce poaching pressure (especially for plants), but yes your point stands: The official folks who need to know to get the protection enacted are certainly brought on board.
 
Is there a clear consensus on what BLAARGing actually is yet? Here is what we have so far:

BLAARG - Bigfoot Live Action Alternative Reality Gaming

Definitions:
Pretending Bigfoot is real (or probably real), pretending to believe in Bigfoot.
Roleplaying akin to hoaxing and Civil War re-enactors yet also distinctly different to Civil War re-enactors and LARPing; whose actions do not match their words (eg. Lack of 911 calls).
Equated with liars, con jobs, manipulators, misinformationists. Equated with those who question BLAARG as a hypothesis or the hardcore skeptical approach.
Euphemism for projectile-vomiting made-up stories.

True Belief vs Make-Believe?
BLAARGers intentionally misrepresent their own beliefs.
Some may really believe but may not – online communities = majority true belief, active searchers = BLAARG.
There is no true belief in Bigfoot. True belief = BLAARG.
Ridiculous claims = BLAARG.

Reasons for BLAARGing:
Money.
Social – identifying with the sub-culture, acceptance, status, fun, enacting a fabricated persona. May be due to loneliness and attention-seeking.
Duper’s delight, irrationality, delusional, mental illness, brain damage.
To identify themselves as a paranormal subculture or to distinguish themselves from other paranormal subcultures.
Trolling – inflammatory statements deliberately intended to cause an emotional response.

Edited by Agatha: 
Edited breach of rules 0, 4 and 12
 
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Night Walker said:
Is there a clear consensus on what BLAARGing actually is yet?
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No. If you think this is some sort of gotcha, have a look at some of the Atheism v Agnosticism threads. Or the What does it mean to be a skeptic threads. Consensus around here is about as common as bigfoot evidence.
 
There is a sub-set of Blaarging-Footers that I would call Blaarging-Dupes.

These are the sub-set of Footers who really think there is something out there, and attach themselves to Blaarger-Footers, for the sole purpose of trying to solve whatever they think they saw, or think they heard out in the woods. They are unable to cope with the idea that their minds tricked them, so they sincerely attach the Bigfoot label to their experience, with the hope of one day proving to themselves and others, that they were right, and that their mind wasn't tricking them.

They join groups, which typically contain Blaarger-Footers, and become the willing dupes of the Blaarger-Footers. NAWAC may have several Blaarger-Dupes in their group, or they may have none. The Blaarger-Dupe will go along with Blaarger-Footer scheme, even supporting it, thinking that the Blaarger-Footer is being honest with them. If a Blaarger-Footer says that a Bigfoot must have thrown that rock, then the Blaarger-Dupe will accept that explanation, simply because the Blaarger-Footer would not be lying to them. The Blaarger-Dupe will echo the findings of the Blaarger-Footer, with no intention of being dishonest, which distinguishes the Dupe from the Blaarger-Footer. The Blaarger-dupe sincerely thinks he is working toward the resolution of something that haunts him in some way.

Hash this out and see if I'm on to something.
 
But... but the skeptics are just BLAARGing about BLAARGing! They're just as bad!

Yeah I saw that coming.
 
Drewbot said:
There is a sub-set of Blaarging-Footers that I would call Blaarging-Dupes.

These are the sub-set of Footers who really think there is something out there, and attach themselves to Blaarger-Footers, for the sole purpose of trying to solve whatever they think they saw, or think they heard out in the woods. They are unable to cope with the idea that their minds tricked them, so they sincerely attach the Bigfoot label to their experience, with the hope of one day proving to themselves and others, that they were right, and that their mind wasn't tricking them.

They join groups, which typically contain Blaarger-Footers, and become the willing dupes of the Blaarger-Footers. NAWAC may have several Blaarger-Dupes in their group, or they may have none. The Blaarger-Dupe will go along with Blaarger-Footer scheme, even supporting it, thinking that the Blaarger-Footer is being honest with them. If a Blaarger-Footer says that a Bigfoot must have thrown that rock, then the Blaarger-Dupe will accept that explanation, simply because the Blaarger-Footer would not be lying to them. The Blaarger-Dupe will echo the findings of the Blaarger-Footer, with no intention of being dishonest, which distinguishes the Dupe from the Blaarger-Footer. The Blaarger-dupe sincerely thinks he is working toward the resolution of something that haunts him in some way.

Hash this out and see if I'm on to something.
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Well, BLAARGer-dupe is certainly a kinder term than useful idiot.
 
kitakaze said:
No, Roger had been hoaxing for many years prior to the PGF with his first attempted in the early 60's as well as tracks. I think it's a fairly safe bet that Roger was also responsible for Bigfoot showing up at Jerry Merritt's house three times five miles down the road from Patterson.

However, that does not mean that Roger did not actually believe in Bigfoot. The people closest to him knew his belief was genuine and many of the things he did are not consistent with someone who did not actually believe and hoaxed only for monetary gain. The quote you mention by Al DeAtley is as follows...

"If the truth be known," he said sardonically,"knowing Gimlin and Patterson they probably took their horses, stopped in a tavern and got drunk and chased women for a while and found some strange thing to ****, and then maybe they got into the woods sometime."

"Both of them were believers," he said. "Roger believed there was a Bigfoot. No doubt about." - Al DeAtley, The Making of Bigfoot, p. 251

Now that can be taken with a grain of salt since DeAtley was as much a hoaxer as Roger, however, Roger's actions such as his trip to Thailand chasing after a body, or doing the same in competition with Rene Dahinden in the Joe Metlow escapade I think demonstrate someone who really did think Bigfoot was out there to be found.
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We work on the basis of actions. We know them by their actions, not their words. Let's do this one first:

It is hard to believe you pose Roger leaving a "known" bigfoot hotbed in order to go where there is no history of bigfoot whatsoever as proof he believed. There is however, a history of beautiful girls working the bars, known to Vietnam era soldiers.

How can that possibly show Roger believed? Show us the logic there, please.
 
My son doesn't mispronounce words. He just passed his sixth grade reading test and is not eligible for kindergarten until next fall, nightwalker.

In that photo he is learning about ants and the kind of damage they do to trees. He's never heard of BLAARGing. Talk about a straw man.
 
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