ABC News Boosts Bogus Bigfoot
Posted by: Loren Coleman on December 15th, 2009
ABC News called me late last night for a reaction and some quotes on the Minnesota trailcam photo that the reporter said she wanted to add to their article for today.
I guess the reporter’s editor didn’t like my remarks. I said the “Bigfoot” looks bogus. Indeed, I said it appears that someone was trying to pull a prank on the trailcam owners.
My cautionary and skeptical comments were not included in the ABC News article.
Bigfoot in Minnesota? Trail Cam Snaps Pic of Sasquatch-Like Figure
Hunters’ Camera Captures Image Some Say Resembles Legendary Bigfoot
Casey Kedrowski said he’s always considered himself a skeptical sort of person, but an image captured by a trail camera in the woods of northern Minnesota has left him scratching his head. In October, Kedrowski, 20, and his brother Peter, 30, set up a motion-activated camera to take pictures of deer near their families hunting shack near Chippewa National Forest. But when they pulled out the camera’s memory card and took a look at the images, they couldn’t believe their eyes. Among the photos…
The above alleged Bigfoot was taken at 7:20 pm, on October 24, 2009, on a rainy night, by a game trail camera in woods north of Remer, Minnesota, according to the hunters who set up the camera.
Perhaps one of the worst, most uncritical parts of the ABC News article is the subsection entitled “Researcher Compared Minn. Bigfoot to Patterson Bigfoot.” Here we read that local Minnesota “Bigfoot researcher” Don Sherman “said the body proportions of the alleged Minnesota Bigfoot, in particular the arm length, are very similar to the Patterson Bigfoot.” Regarding the thing seen in the photo, ABC News reports that “he believed it to be Bigfoot.”
All I can say is that this merely continues the media’s need to push weak Bigfoot stories on an unsuspecting public. This image seems to have no solid foundation of evidence or links to hominology, and I find this growing media episode unfortunate.
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
I don’t know, it looks too costumy with a leather glove on the right hand and those long lower legs. I say fake. Comparing the Patterson image with this actor just smacks of phony Minnesota shenanigans. Nice try though.
They’ve got to be kidding! Look at the legs!
All I can say is it isn’t in a freezer.
Well, if it’s any consolation, the degree of ineptitude with which the media, in stark contrast to the legitimate press, is going to handle this is indicative of the quality of the news we get in all other areas, and explains heeps as to why we are constantly so ill-informed about nearly every issue of any import. Keep in mind that contrary to what many might think, their news branch’s primary purpose is not to enlighten us and keep us informed as it was once upon a time back when securing a broadcast license from the FCC was a way to generate lots of money by producing the other programming a broadcaster would create, but rather it is to generate profit and it does so by creating a “newsy” kind of entertainment that is made all the more compelling by injecting it with drama, outrage and hype.
If there’s a silver lining to this, it is that in the long run the audience will become a little more informed on the subject, possibly use the internet and stumble across some of the more in-depth sites (this one in particular, for which you should be rightfully proud of the quality and accessibility), and we can hope some will become more discerning. Keep up the great work. The demand for in-depth and level headed, rational, and even entertaining look at the more curious phenomenon that exist in the natural world and how they are percieved in the mind, continues to be expressed (withness the popularity of programming like Monster Quest) by an ever increasing number of people who are taking the time to ask themselves questions when they run across the unexplainable in their own expience. cheers.
I only watch TV news for entertainment purposes anymore. They stopped being a legitimate source for news a long time ago, if they ever were.
That’s annoying that they wouldn’t quote an expert. At least they quoted the wildlife technician online. Definitely looks like a bow suit or costume to me. I don’t think the arms look too long nor do I think the subject appears 7 ft tall.
Are you kidding me?!? Loren you should sue these idiots for defacing cryptolozoology, or stupidity or something! No wonder the general public looks at those of us interested in the possibility of something greater than what we know, as a bunch off kooks and nut jobs!
The reporter should be fired for giving stupidity a bad name.
Does not surprise me. This is why I avoid watching Tv news anymore (whether CNN, MSNBC, FOX or otherwise) and instead rely on the Internet for current events information.
At least there I can pick and choose from what “viewpoint” I can look at it from.
Dogu4—good post. You hit the nail right on the head.
Somewhere in the trailer parks of Georgia, two idiots are weeping. And Biscardi is en route.
Sadness.
It’s so clear that clothing(not even a gorilla suit, if this is a hoaxer and not a hunter, the latter of which I believe we’re looking at) is being worn, including gloves, that I’m stunned this even gets one second of consideration as Bigfoot evidence. Don’t blame the media; they simply look for ratings. Blame the hoaxers, or the people who have to come out and claim that an image like this, which is clearly a man, compares well to other Bigfoot evidence when everything else points to the contrary.
I am not a fan of the mainstream news either. CNN, FOX, ABC, GE, CBS, whatever.
It’s a shame that they find this bogus bigfoot “news worthy”.
It’s obviously damaging to the reputation of cryptozoology.
It makes me ever more skeptical of their agenda.