• This week in hysteria: UFOs over LA and the KKK’s non-filtration

    UFO spotted over Los Angeles, captured on HD video

    The footage is compelling to behold, as the video makers freak out a little. The link got almost 4800 upvotes on Reddit. But it’s actually just routine missile testing done by the Navy, as reported by a San Diego NBC affiliate.

    In this age of ubiquitous HD video we can easily unravel what used to be “bright lights in the sky” type sightings. The onlookers have no idea about the size/distance of the object and reported that it seemed “very close”. In fact, it had to be many miles away after a launch from sea. It’s obvious how unusual light sources like meteors and military launches lead to many “UFO” sightings over the years.

    Hacker group known as Anonymous promised to release list of KKK members, “leaks” already-public members

    https://twitter.com/AnonyOpNews/status/661857917486784512

    On November 5th, a list (of some 350 names) was indeed released. This was reported by many news outlets, including The Guardian, The Huffington Post, BBC, among others. However, the information did not “out” anyone. It is more a list of publicly-known KKK members, as reported by The Washington Post and on Vice News. Vice reported,

    Mark Pitcavage, director of the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism, said that the list at first glance was “not exactly exciting.”

    “This is low-hanging fruit, basically public source information,” Pitcavage said of the list, which included Louisiana House of Representatives Member David Duke, who is notorious for his former participation in the KKK. “For most of these people it’s not a secret that they’ve been in the Klan.”

    To make matters worse, an anonymous twitter user released a fake list days earlier. Many mistook that release for an official Anonymous posting, which has created doubt and confusion. Combined with the errors and missing bite in the actual Anonymous release, this might be a fifth of November Anonymous would not like to remember.

    Category: Critical ThinkingfeaturedFeatured Incskepticism

  • Article by: Edward Clint

    Ed Clint is an evolutionary psychologist, co-founder of Skeptic Ink, and USAF veteran.