Now That’s Science!

For some unknown reason, Sunny and I found ourselves watching the Hisory channel today. Just like MTV no longer shows music videos, it appears that The History Channel no longer broadcasts shows about History.

Today's show was about cattle mutilation, and it was one of the most unintentionally funny things ever.

You see, there's a formula to shows like this. You have a voice over guy who announces everything like he's describing the end of the world, a batshit crazy 'scientist' who's qualifications tend to be that they bought a $50 USB microscope from eBay, a bunch of people making shit up so they can get paid a few hundred bucks for their story…and one token sane scientist who refutes everything everyone else says.

At one point in the show, a farmer dude claims that aliens/Satanists/communists killed his bull and that he now feels ill whenever he goes to where the bull was found or where he buried it. So they went to the spot and right on cue, the farmer starts saying that he's feeling ill…only he stands there for about fifteen seconds, pretending to have difficulty breathing…and then looks up, makes to walk out of shot, then realizes the camera is still on him and goes straight back to feeling ill again.

Weird, huh?

So they send a few soil samples to the 'scientist' (who talks about her total lack of qualifications like it's a good thing because she's not limited to 'stiff, orthodox approaches to science') who analyses the soil samples by looking at the soil hrough a cheap USB microscope that gives less magnification than a good magnifying glass.

Her scientific conclusion? "The soil from where the bull was found is 'good' because it has roots in…but the soil from where they buried the bull has no roots and is 'kinda bland'"

Oh really? That's your scientific analysis is it? I thought the way you analysed soil was running a whole battery of tests on it, not just looking at it under a 20x microscope and proclaiming it 'kinda bland'.

I got incredibly funny from then on because you'd see these lunatics backed up by this same batshit insane, self-proclaimed 'scientist' explain how the wound on a mutilated cow could not possibly have been caused by an animal and was most likely caused by a super-powerful laser burn…then the camera would cut to an actual professor who would blow their theories out of the water over and over. They'd come out with all kinda of outlandish theories such as aliens, cultists or the chupacabra…then they'd give the real scientist fifteen seconds to show that a coyote's teeth can and will make sharp, clean looking cuts.

It's a weird format for a show. You give the majority of the time to the whackos, have a voice over guy who makes everything sound so serious and deadly, then cut in every ten minutes with someone who's actually qualified to point out that everyone else is a couple sandwiches short of a picnic.

However, the best part was when they got to the idea that Satanists were behind it.

A horse had got killed and ripped apart by coyotes or wolves, and two weeks later someone found some graffiti that said "Dead Horse" next to a pentagram. The clip from the local news network (that just so happened to be a Fox affiliate) claimed that his was 'proof of a Satanist cult in the area'.

As a sane human being, I thought that because the graffiti also consisted of a couple of pot leaves, a skull and 'Korn Rules!'…the graffiti was probably done by a bunch of bored, stupid teenagers…and not a satanist cult out to eat people's babies.

It was ridiculous. It's getting to the point where there's no point satirizing or spoofing anything anymore because it's impossible to make things like this any more ridiculous.

I think History should go back to documentaries about actual history instead of shows about alien abductions, area 51 and ghosts.