Editor’s note: Keith has been writing to this website since 1997. We have never printed one of his letters, on the grounds that he is a known sceptic and possible plant. Noreen says that is “not balance, Warren, that’s a wall”. So here it is. Keith’s words are as he sent them. Mine are in square brackets. Mine are also correct. — W.D.
To the so-called Collective,
I write as a resident of Wandoona for forty-one years [I’ve been here fifty-three, Keith, and I was born in the house] and as a man who believes that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. [A cow went up in a beam. I have the tape. That is extraordinary evidence. What you require is extraordinary evidence you personally agree with, which is a different thing and not science.]
For fourteen years this website has told the world that the township of Wandoona is the centre of an alien cattle abduction programme. [Not the centre. A centre. We’ve never claimed to be the centre. Pine Gap is the centre.] It is not. [Says who.] It is a town of three hundred people with a pub and a silo. [312. And falling. Draw your own conclusions.]
Let me address the so-called evidence in turn.
The Beryl tape. I have seen the tape. [Once, in 1996, at the Royal, from the back, and you left before the beam.] It shows rain, darkness, a light source consistent with a vehicle spotlight on the ridge, and a shape that could be a cow, a calf, a feed bin or a large dog. [It is a cow. It has an ear tag. The ear tag is QLD-0447-B. I have the ear tag records. I have shown you the ear tag records. You said the records “could be anyone’s”. They are Beryl’s, Keith. That’s what records are.] Mr Doolan sold a number of cattle at Roma the following week. [Eleven. Not twelve. Count them. Noreen’s receipt says eleven. Nobody has ever explained the twelfth.] [Noreen has asked me to note that there was no twelfth, the receipt says eleven because eleven went. I have noted it. I have also noted that this is exactly what the receipt would say.]
The Burnt Circle. The circle in the Top Paddock is where Mr Doolan burned tyres in 1993. [One tyre. One. In 1992. On the other side of the paddock. The circle is nine metres across. You cannot burn a nine-metre circle with one tyre, I’ve tried.] [Noreen says I should not have written that I’ve tried.]
The Men in Beige. These were two officers from the Department of Primary Industries conducting a routine tick survey. [A routine tick survey. The day after. At 10:05 am. In a white Commodore. Asking for “the tape”. What tick lives on a tape, Keith.] They left a pamphlet because that is what they do. [About drought assistance. We weren’t in drought. A tick survey leaves a tick pamphlet. These men did not know what they were pretending to be, which means they were pretending.]
The saucer nest. Cattle. [Clockwise cattle. Explain the clockwise. You never explain the clockwise.]
Ms Mangan’s “implant”. I say nothing about Ms Mangan’s implant except that she worked at the newsagent. [Cheryl has asked me to say that she will see you on Tuesday, and then she remembered you’re banned, and then she said “good”.]
The Faraday Unit. Mr Faraday [Doctor] is a retired television repairman [and a Doctor of Ufology] who has invented a unit of measurement [discovered] that he will not define [cannot be defined in terms you’d understand] and that only he can measure [with the Dick Smith light meter, which anyone can buy, so that’s a lie for a start]. A number with no definition is not a measurement. It is a mood. [Fourteen is not a mood, Keith. Fourteen is fourteen.]
I could go on. [You do.] The crop formation was Hennessy’s boys with a plank. [Plank never found.] The Wandoona Lights were RAAF flares. [Same night as Phoenix. Same number of lights. Same arc. Either the RAAF was doing flares over Arizona too or you need a bigger explanation.] The Christmas orb was dust. [The roof has not been checked. Nobody will go up. Why won’t anybody go up, Keith. You go up.] The Min Min lights are refracted headlights, which is a documented phenomenon. [Documented by who. The Bureau. Who stopped replying in 2012. You can’t cite people who’ve hung up.]
I do not write this out of malice. [You write every fortnight.] I write because a town is being made a laughing stock [the town has a Most Suspicious Cow competition that draws four hundred people a year, that’s not a laughing stock, that’s tourism] and because somewhere out there a vulnerable person is reading this site and believing it. [Yes. Me. In 1994. Because it happened.]
I was banned from the Tuesday group in 2003 for asking questions. [For asking Cheryl “what if it was a dream” eleven times in a row. That’s not a question after the fourth time, that’s a chant.] I am not a plant. [That’s what a plant would say.] I am not from the Bureau. [That’s what the Bureau would say.] I am a retired maths teacher who would like, just once, for somebody at that pub to say “you might be right, Keith”. [You might be right, Keith. About the tyres. It was 1992. Everything else, no.]
Yours in reason, K. Rowbotham Secretary, Wandoona Rationalist Society [Also the President, Treasurer, and the only person who’s been to a meeting.]
Editor’s postscript: Noreen has read the above and says the annotations are now longer than the letter and that “this is not what balance means either”. She has asked for a right of reply to my reply to Keith’s reply. The Collective is considering whether this would be balance or an escalation. Dr Faraday has measured the letter at 2 Faraday Units, which he says is “high, for Keith”. Status set to DEBUNKED BY THEM, because that is what Keith thinks he has done, and we believe in recording what people think, especially when it’s wrong. — W.D.
Document U8MC-10-0206. Status: DEBUNKED BY THEM. This file is retained indefinitely, or until the Men in Beige ask for it, whichever is never.