David Hatcher Childress Returns

[Kieran]

The show was terrible I cringed often truly. There is zero evidence creatures like this exist today anywhere on the planet. David is a boring speaker, and you can tell he believes some of the stories he tells, that eight foot giants hairy giants do exist and are roaming the forests of Tibet, and elsewhere. UFO's as far as I am concerned is a believable topic, for a number of reasons, you disagree fine, but UFO evidence is not occasional evidence we get every year or five years we have data that is sixty years old, that has come from every part of the planet prove that we have a real mystery which is yet unsolved.

I wouldn't buy his books either too due to his lack of critical thinking. There is evidence however a Bigfoot type creature lived a few millions of years ago, but it is long stretch to believe that same creature is still living and breathing today.

As for Giant humans living in the past. Battles, feuding, and War was common place in the past and a man of great height and build I guess would be admired even more so if they were great warriors for the tribe or clan!! The numbers of humans living in the past compared to today would be lower and big tall men or women would stand out from the crowd and be called a Giant.

 

[xLordSummerislex]

And Star Wars movies. When he lumped Chewie in with other (supposedly) true stories about Bigfoot-human interaction, I actually looked at my iPod in total disbelief. I don't know what I expected my iPod to do about DHC's bizarre thought process... I just... didn't... know where else to turn at that point...

To be fair to DHC, I took this to be a general illustration of the archetype of the Big Hairy Monster in various cultures at different time and places, rather than a direct basing of Chewbacca on Bigfoot.
Interestingly, Yowie witnesses often use Chewbacca as a reference point for what they've seen (going through the sighting catalogue in Tony Healy & Paul Cropper's excellent book on the subject, it's probably the second most common comparison after "upright gorilla", certainly post 1977) but it's quite rare in discussing Bigfoot sightings, could this be because people in North America know what a Bigfoot "should" look like?

 

[FletcherMunson]

To be fair to DHC, I took this to be a general illustration of the archetype of the Big Hairy Monster in various cultures at different time and places, rather than a direct basing of Chewbacca on Bigfoot.
Interestingly, Yowie witnesses often use Chewbacca as a reference point for what they've seen (going through the sighting catalogue in Tony Healy & Paul Cropper's excellent book on the subject, it's probably the second most common comparison after "upright gorilla", certainly post 1977) but it's quite rare in discussing Bigfoot sightings, could this be because people in North America know what a Bigfoot "should" look like?

Good point. Assuming this is what he meant, employing the word "archetype" would've been helpful. As it stands, he sort of drifts into the Star Wars movies a bit too seamlessly. But, whatever...

Maybe I didn't give him the benefit of the doubt because I checked out a little bit after he said he wasn't an expert in apes or other primates. While I understand that becoming such an expert in addition to keeping track of the Bigfoot phenomenon would take a lot of time, this admission left me wondering if having such knowledge would be beneficial for a researcher like DHC. Now, before anyone raises their daggers, that is an honest observation, not some sarcastic recommendation. Would diving into research about known species of apes and primates be helpful in ruling out conventional explanations for Bigfoot sightings?

 

[xLordSummerislex]

I think you're pretty much correct- he did get a few basic biological facts incorrect, knowing about primate biology etc would be helpful to an extent, but if, for sake of argument, Bigfoot did exist, the environment they exist in is quite different to known great apes so I'm not sure how much would be transferable- and that's assuming it turns out to be an ape, rather than say, something much closer related to humans (or something else entirely). Also, in many of these environments, known primates are unlikely to be behind the sightings (though there are stories of feral chimps in the Everglades that escaped from the set of a Tarzan film in the 30s, so they could, in part, explain some of the skunk ape sightings).
To be honest, when it comes to the subject of Bigfoot, he wouldn't have been the first person that would have come to mind- someone like Jeff Meldrum would be good at discussing the forensic aspect of mystery primates- there's is some intriguing though far from definitive evidence out there. Maybe an idea for a future show?
While I'm open to there being flesh and blood unknown primates out there (I think the orang pendak is a good candidate for a real species for example), I think we have to look elsewhere for the explanation behind some of these creatures, for instance- there are sightings of Bigfoot type creatures in the UK that if they occurred in the Pacific Northwest, they'd probably pass into the body of bigfoot lore without much comment, but in the UK there's absolutely no way an unknown species of primate could have persisted. I'm not saying these are necessarily paranormal, but we would need to think in terms at least of some sort of cultural phenomena. It does seem to be where there's people, there's big hairy monsters.
But to go back to your point, I think as well as zoology, knowing a bit about psychology, perception, and at least some basic science are pretty much required right across the board.

 

[CapnG]

And Star Wars movies. When he lumped Chewie in with other (supposedly) true stories about Bigfoot-human interaction, I actually looked at my iPod in total disbelief. I don't know what I expected my iPod to do about DHC's bizarre thought process... I just... didn't... know where else to turn at that point...

Some guy talking crap about Bigfoot and Chewbacca on a podcast?

There's NO app for that!

 

[CathGal]

I dunno. Last few times I heard Childress I was completely bored. Same ole' stuff over and over.