Aliens Or Aloe Vera? A South African Man's Photos Set Off Panic That Aliens Were Invading From The Sea
NY Post- There’s some thing in the water.
A South African man sparked hysteria among the online masses after they mistook his creepy pictures of dead plants for aliens emerging from the sea. His photos were shared to a South African Facebook group, where they’re currently scaring up hilarious responses, Kennedy News has reported.
“I was surprised [by the reaction],” Jan Vorster told Kennedy News of the extraterrestrial-seeming pics, which were snapped in his hometown of Still Bay, Western Cape. “I thought that people would have fun with it, but then it was very serious, some of it was extremely serious.”
He added, “A lot of people were scared of these alien-looking sea monsters. It was like ‘Jaws’ — is it safe to go into the water?”
Big week for the supernatural. Chief wrote about a potential UFO sighting in Wisconsin, and now a South African man's photos look like aliens. Literally Christmas come early for doomsdayers and those who still read National Enquirer.
While I'm still not convinced these are plants and think these things will just pop up and attack you at any second, the real layer to the story here is that the photographer set off panic when he posted them on the Facebook page.
The 62-year-old farm worker had taken pics of dead aloe vera plants — an evergreen succulent prized for its healing properties — that he’d lined up on the beach at sunrise, so that they evoked tentacled monsters invading the shore. He then posted the otherworldly pics to Facebook in an effort to raise awareness about environmental degradation.
“I thought I could use this as a metaphor for how people see these plants as aliens, but we are actually the two-legged aliens messing up their world,” Vorster described. “That was the idea.”
Unfortunately, Vorster’s eco-conscious photo op was taken literally after users thought that the expired desert flora were actually aliens making an intergalactic beachhead — reminiscent of Orson Welles’ hysteria-stirring “War of the Worlds” radio broadcast in 1938.
Turns out when scrolling at a rapid pace, if something looks like aliens people are going to think it's an alien. Can't really blame them for the panic , also can't really blame them for the confusion. I mean look at the fucking things... they are aliens. You may say they are plants, but they are actually fucking aliens. Hopefully this photographer takes a break from trying to scare people and just goes and shoots a nice sunset, or a snowstorm, or hell go work the mall and take photos with Santa. Anything but aliens buddy ... anything.