"Alien Killed In Pakistan"

Or so people keep saying.  Again -total rubbish.  I think this posting by Erika makes some great points including the "forced perspective" issue I've mentioned before.

Yes, the locals DO know about pangolins but they kill them because they can cause damage to the cheaply made houses -that is NOT and can NEVER be an excuse especiallyt when locals KNOW these are protected species.

And pangolins as people killers? Please!

http://weirdanimalreport.com/supernatural/article/alien-killed-pakistan

 

This video has been making the rounds recently. It supposedly depicts an "alien," which was killed in Pakistan. The video is just someone holding their camera up to their computer screen, on which we see a picture of a large creature in the foreground, with some people in the background.

The first, most obvious thing about this picture is that it suffers from forced perspective. Forced perspective is what happens when you have a big discrepancy between the foreground and the background in a photo. Like when tourists take photos in which they appear to be holding up the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

The creature is clearly in the foreground, and presumably being hung up in the air. This makes it look a lot larger than it really is. This is a common characteristic of supposed "monster" pictures, and it is a good thing to learn how to spot.

As for the creature itself, it is actually a pangolin. Pangolins are secretive, nocturnal animals which are larger cousins to the American armadillo.

You don't ordinarily see a pangolin from the perspective in this photograph. However, note the animal's cone-shaped face, its extraordinarily long tongue, its paws with two giant claws, and of course the overlapping scales. This is quite clearly a pangolin, and judging from its posture it has been strung up with a rope under its armpits.

Pangolins are endangered throughout their range. In Africa they are killed as bush meat. In India and Asia they are killed because Chinese Traditional Medicine considers pangolin meat and scales to have medicinal properties. Their meat is also treasured in China as a delicacy.

I did a bit of sleuthing online and found this article from July 2011 about a Giant pangolin being killed in a Pakistan village by terrified villagers. There is a common misconception among cryptozoologists in the west that "the people live there, so they must know all the animals in the area, and if they don't know what it is, then it must be a monster or an alien." But in this case, this is manifestly untrue.

Giant pangolins are rare, certainly, but that can't account for the villagers being so terrified at the presence of this harmless animal (pangolins don't even have teeth!) that they beat it to death with rocks, hung it up in the town square on display, then tossed its carcass into an empty field for stray dogs to eat.

I strongly suspect that this is that pangolin. The poor thing. RIP, pangolin.

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