Mermaids: The Body Found and Docufiction

[kickysnana]

I stumbled onto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mermaids:_The_Body_Found the first day it aired and it is the first time I have seen Docufiction http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Docufiction although most news programs now fit that category come to think of it.

It was a very slick well done and looked real. I have two people in my family growing up had a very hard time with TV vs Reality anyway. It bothers me that kids might see this and think they are getting real information because it looks like a documentary with real and enhanced documentation.

I noticed the tendency in our society over the last 10 years to accept fact as fiction when shows like Entertainment tonight starting doing political pieces ie "The Dean Scream" doctoring the footage and then making it something it was not but they made it become that for about half the population.

Trying to get it in context I could only think of the side show hoaxes a hundred years ago but this one had scientists participating as themselves (I think). The people were screen credited The people worked for NOAA at one time.at one time. It is possible that after seeing the whole thing they regretted doing it or have we crossed that line? I know that Animal planet takes footage, possibly out of order and makes a narrative to fit it to make it more dramatic.

I saw a really good documentary about the Churches in Germany and what they did and did not do about the rise of Fascism and Hitler. After the war there was a backlash against the Churches for not doing more to stop what is happening.

It makes me wonder about the German Scientists after the war. I know a lot of them went to work both in the West and in Russia. I met some entomologists who worked that the U of MN at a church I attended in the 1970's. They were having a trouble with ethics there too with laundering money through the church to avoid taxes and using some refugees in another scheme that was uncomfortable for the refugees and for me.

There was always corruption, always bad people, so maybe I am overreacting but I wondered if anyone else had thought about this.

[PDJane]

1. Yes, there is always corruption.

But it strikes me that the efforts to hide corruption and evil are getting more transparent, and that more people accept that it's the way it is. It doesn't have to be as bad as this. A lot of things are acceptable until we, the people, decide that they aren't.

[Marrah_G]

2. I loved it!

It reminded me of that fake documentary done on dragons a few years back.

I think you are right though, many people will see it and think it is real.

Blair Witch, The fourth Kind, even WWF wrestling...things a good number of people think are real.

[UnseenUndergrad]

3. The Cetaceanoid Hominids were ficticious...

But the sonic bombs of death may well be real... real enough to cause a number of prominent mass strandings.

I'm still watching it on YouTube, but the point I take from it is that whatever these things are doing to whales and dolphins, a (Human-esqe) sentient species would be affected just as badly, if not worse. It tugs at the heartstrings of the viewers, maybe having them emphasize with the real cetacean victims... and the plot posits that the US Navy could panic into committing a cover up if it was discovered that these tests weren't just killing protected species... but they were also effectively massacring populations of the only other living branch of the Human family tree.

No way to buy off the survivors, no effective way to make reparations even if the tests were stopped, not even any clue that they were sentient in the first place (before the capture of a live specimen) and, perhaps pustulating away in the minds of the most cynical of the militarys top brass, no way in hell that they were going to admit it if there wasn't a chance that they could just pretend it didn't exist.

[frogmarch]

4. My brother-in-law is Chief Scientist for

Oceans & Sr. Vice Pres. of Oceans International, and when I asked him about the scientists in the mermaid program, he said they were actors. He said the only factual event the program featured was the beaching of the whales. The rest was fiction, including the strange sound supposedly picked up with the beached whale cries. In reality there was no "body" and no skull to ponder.

I read the readers' comments at some of the news sites that ran stories about the mermaid show, and I was appalled at how many people had decided to believe the fake documentary was real despite having been told that it was fiction and that it was purely for entertainment. Other readers said they thought that even though the program was fictional, mermaids might actually exist.

I'm not the brightest person around, but compared to some people, I feel like a genius. It's depressing.

[kickysnana]

5. Thanks for the insight

People don't always come into shows at the beginning or read any information about them. I saw the last half first and was intrigued enough to catch it again.

[frogmarch]

6. I watched it from the beginning, and I

was perplexed for a while, even though I don't consider myself a gullible person. The footage showing the beached whales and the commentary about the Navy testing sonar devices, which many scientists really do believe caused the beaching, along with other bits of reality that were plugged into the show, had me scratching my head at times. I wondered what the heck was going on, since almost everything else in the show seemed very farfetched.

I thought it was entertaining, and I wouldn't mind watching it again, just to see those cool mercrritters zipping around in the water

[muriel_volestrangler]

7. I haven't seen it, but the description seems to fit 'mockumentary' better

'Docufiction', going by the description and one or two examples Wikipedia gives that I've heard of, should be something that could happen, but hasn't. But the basic scenario must be plausible. This sounds more like Ghostwatch - or Orson Welles' War of the Worlds.