Hoax Revealed: Luxembourg Bigfoot Videos
Posted by: Loren Coleman on March 21st, 2008
March 21, 2008 ~ Breaking news ~ The Luxembourg Bigfoot has been revealed to be a hoax via a new video confession, in which the origins and costume are shown.
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 seriously doubt that I will ever believe a photograph or video clip of Bigfoot to be legitimate without some other form of corroboration. DNA evidence or even a body are probably the minimum standard now due to all of this hoaxing.
Too many folks are making a cottage industry out of fooling the advocates. This is probably not a bad thing in the end as if proof does manage to be found for this cryptid it had better be beyond reproach.
MDI: don’t think I can share your view that hoaxes like this invalidate all photo and video.
This was sham pretty much from first frame. (This guy is possibly the worst videocam user in the history of the medium, if he wasn’t deliberately trying to avoid giving us three seconds of clear view.) Nothing like THIS could ever be accepted.
That’s not saying that it’s impossible to come up with something compelling. Of course someone HAS. But we’ve talked Patty to death here. 😀
I don’t believe this video is real because it’s only a video.
What I need to be convinced is some other form of corroboration like DNA evidence that proves Frank is real. This studio story is too bizzare to be real.
Sorry but there are too many anti-Bigfoot video hoaxes out there and I’m feeling suspicious.
I was always pretty suspicious of these particular videos, so I’m not that surprised by this news. I’m with DWA that because these are fake, it does not necessarily invalidate ALL video evidence. I do however, think that it should reinforce the importance of being critical when examining these videos. There were a lot of believers who were quite irritated that anyone could possibly doubt these videos when they came out and to me that is the wrong attitude to have.
I imagine some people might be disappointed that this video was debunked, but they shouldn’t be. I’m happy that the truth was reached with these videos. Reaching the truth is a great thing. We shouldn’t have a need for these things to be one thing or the other, just that the answer is reached in a scientific, rational way, for good or ill. True discovery should be the driving force, no matter what the conclusion may end up being (in this case, a hoax). I’m glad that this particular hoax was sniffed out and can be discounted as any sort of possible evidence. No disappointment, just on to the next one, maintaining a critical approach and an eye towards the truth.
My overall opinion about these kinds of videos is that a truly open-minded, scientific first reaction to seeing them and being asked what it is should be “I don’t know.” NOT “It’s a sasquatch, why can’t anyone see that?!”, and NOT “It’s a man in a suit, sasquatch don’t exist.” If one wants to maintain an attitude that is conducive to exploring the truth, I think one can really only say “I don’t know”, and maybe follow that with “but I’d like to find out.”
ummm did we ever really think this was real? I know I never did.
Who actually took this seriously and accepted it? I mean, Luxembourg????
Why doesn’t this surprise me?
Of course, this does not startle any of us, but it is always good to have a visual confirmation.
Let’s see, I think I used the words “big boring hoax” two years ago about this one.
These hoaxers are frustrating, let alone the fact that they are taking a big chance of being harmed.
I hope that it doesn’t take someone being shot to wake some of them up to the fact that there are people out there who are eager to bring in a Sasquatch body.
This Guy is sooooo proud of himself. I told him off on You tube a couple years ago or at least somebody who had the nerve to put that ‘snowy’ bigfoot up.
Humans walk a certain way. That’s one of the first things that become recognizable to me, but there was so much wrong with that snow video. (I had never seen the forest video until right now that I’m aware of, but even that one has trademarks of a hoax). We need some sort of public deception laws to be written or something.
The costume is so dumb that’s why he kept the video blurry and indiscernible.
Great. Now the skeptical communities can rant once again on how believers were fooled into subscribing into something that few contemplated was real in the first place.
windigo:
See, that shouldn’t matter to any of us, should it?
The so-called skeptical community are:
1) rubes when it comes to the evidence;
2) ineffective at arguing their case;
3) not worth paying much attention to.
True Believers – including the kind of folks who would get taken in by stuff like this, and the kind of people who say the sasquatch is phony, but can’t give a decent reason why they think that – aren’t the kind of people any of us should be concerned with. They think what they want. What should it matter to us?
Calm exposition of evidence – such as is being practiced by such as the TBRC – is what will win the day here. The so-called skeptical community continually worries the same five or so pieces of evidence. Doesn’t this say something for the strength of that evidence, that no one’s been able to debunk it in the decades it’s been lying there? (Nod.)
The skeptical case against is pretty much not there. But they always will be. Better not to be concerned with them, I say. Donkeys bray, whether they get fed or not, right?
The hoax is obvious within the first minute. Any large cryptid species surviving in a place like Luxembourg would need to be much more aware of its surroundings, or it would not remain ‘cryptid’ for long. With the amount of noise he is making while filming it (obvious rustling of leaves heard in the first scene) you would think that the bigfoot would at least turn around to see what’s there. But instead it remains with its back turned a few feet away and allows itself to be filmed for so long by a noisy pursuer…conveniently with enough leaves slightly concealing it…
There really is no need to “reveal” this footage as a hoax, the “bigfoot” does a good enough job of doing so itself.
The first time I heard of and saw the ‘Luxembourg’ video I assumed that Luxembourg was a township in Montana or a county in California, US geography not being my strong suit. Well, there are loads of Bedfords, Norfolks, Hamburgs, Paris etc all over the States.
The actual country Luxembourg is about the size of my window box, although admittedly it is more picturesque. I believe I already told you about my parents’ meeting with the Luxembourg Olympic marathon hopeful on a previous blog. I know you should never say never, but come on …bigfoot in Luxembourg???
And next… Japanese tourist films sea serpent in Trafalgar Square fountain -London police baffled!
THE WORST. This makes the “Ivan Marx Sasquatch woodland frolic” nonsense look like top shelf gold! And I mean that lovingly. 🙂
This sort of nonsense is the sort of thing that casts serious doubt on the scientific value and credibility of anyone serious about cryptozoological research.
In all honesty its hard these days with modern technology to tell fake from real.
There could be alot of evidence passed over as fake that may be genuine.
Surely this sort of thing must be illegal, misrepresenting to the public, scamming or something.
I just get real steamed at this sort of thing as this casts doubts on getting cryptozoology classified as a “real science” by the scientific establishment like serious hard working researchers like Loren, Jon Downs, Karl Shuker, myself and I could go on with many other names.
Yes the hoaxes are good for a laugh but what would happen to scientific credibility if they started to suddenly announce there were habitable planets all through the solar system we just hadn’t spotted them, then to turn round and say “na sorry just kidding” the credibility of astronomy as a science would be out the window.
Sheeeesh
Thats my little blood boil tantrum over with.
I just wish hoaxers would realise they are doin more damage than good.
Tony Lucas
NZ Cryptozoologist
DWA, I thank you for your perspective, and you make some wonderful points. I suppose that my feelings are driven by the superficial approach that the scientific community approaches the subject. I have been investigating Sasquatch for quite some time and I have yet to meet a skeptic using empirical methods who actually respects and the phenomenom, while understanding that all is not known to the scientific world. I know I should be used to it, but sometimes it helps to vent my frustrations.
windigo:
It surprises me that proponents can keep their tempers in the face of what they have to put up with.
(I don’t keep mine very well. Maybe I’m filling a niche here. 😀 )
The discussion might get somewhere if skeptics were to finally recognize that they are advancing a thesis in a scientific debate – and that when you do that, you are obliged to back it up with evidence, or you can’t call what you are doing science. That single point – that skeptics think it’s OK to propound cloud-cuckoo “mundane” explanations, while holding proponents alone to being serious – well, that ain’t kosher, and is responsible for every hair of mine they put out of place. Proponents KNOW they have to put forward the evidence; this they have done admirably. But if you are saying it’s ALL a fake, or some sort of other false positive, which you are if you are skeptical of a cryptid’s existence, you DO have to explain how the heck you have come up with that (hint: the evidence seems to point strongly to your being wrong), and simply repeating proponents-must-prove (they all but have; where’s science when you need it?) simply does not wash.
I keep hearing that proponents have gotten nowhere – when all the evidence I see points to who really hasn’t found anything new to say in 50 years.
Soldier on.
Regardless of how many people did or didn’t believe the video was real, it’s yet one more in an ever-growing list of Bigfoot films and videos shown to be hoaxes.
And the list of Bigfoot films and videos proven to be real? ZERO.
Maybe next year…
Very well said Tony (nzcryptozoologist), I agree 100%. With regard to the idea of habitable planets, just look at what was recently happening with the latest NASA footage, allegedly showing a “bigfoot” image on Mars. That sort of inter-galactic cryptid nonsense will simply provide fuel for anybody opposed to establishing cryptozoology as a “serious science”…But the fact remains that as long as new species are being found anywhere (on Earth) as is happening all the time, there will always be a credible place for these discussions!!!
I don’t see that these videos did any damage at all. Who took it seriously in the beginning except the fanatics, and the turn-to-dime fortean magazine industry?
You’d have to be ill-educated to believe Luxembourg can sustain such creatures without getting noticed. Without stories, rumors or fairytales.
As for laws; there _are_ laws (at least in Europe) against forgery, but following suit depends on financial losses or harm proven to be a consequence of the hoax. This, however, is nothing but a prank.
Has anyone seen the film “The Legend of Bigfoot” by the way?