Valiens, you ask a very interesting question. Why did "it take so long" to finally get fed up with the field?
I was confronted with the mystery by a fantastic sighting of the phenomena when I was in high school. Many years later, after college, after the Army and while I was a police officer I was confronted with the mystery again while investigating several cattle mutes. (Even though I did not connect the UFO mystery until years later.)
In 1986 I was wounded in the line of duty and I ended up medically retiring. It was along this time that I purchased my first computer and ran into several guys that were involved with MUFON. I also stumbled across Compuserve's Issues forum and discovered UFO's online, sort of.
I had this free time and because I saw this as a genuine mystery I decided to "jump in" and see what I could make of it. Since I had "cut my teeth" on mutes that was the area I started with. It was not long before I discovered what appeared to be a few human mutilations. I conducted an investigation into that that lasted several years. You can still find some of that on the web.
When I met my wife she was publishing UFO Magazine, and I saw that as a wonderful vehicle to "educate the mainstream media" which I saw as part of my duty. And believe you me, I really tried. Back in the early to mid-90's I did lots and lots of TV shows and I always tried to present this as a genuine and legitimate "vastly underreported" subject. I did CNN, NBC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, Sci-Fi (a no-brainer) and butted heads with all the named skeptics. Klass, Oberg, Sheaffer, Shermer, Larry King, Pat Buchanan, hell I don't even recall all the guys and shows I did. It didn't matter what the case was, they were pre-disposed to laugh at it.
I broke two huge cases in the early 90's, of national importance and interest ... STS-48, the space shuttle encountering a UFO in orbit with what appears to be a weapon being fired at it, and Phobos II, the Soviet Russian probe to Mars which was destroyed in Mars orbit. (The Russians told me this, not what I determined.) I broke the original story on "FASTWALKERS" with Lee Graham and Ron Regher. My talk show, UFOs Tonite! cut the path for all talk shows that followed. It will sound like I'm bragging but ... I was doing UFO shows back when Art Bell was still doing political talk on satellite radio. I interviewed everyone in the field. Remember the alien autopsy? I first heard about this in 1993 while I was in Vienna, Austria speaking at the "First World UFO Conference." Phil Mantle brought it to my attention. Later (about a year) I received a call from the UK about this, and I first took it to Bob Kiviat at Fox TV. I was supposed to be the guy to investigate the camera-man but Kiviat and Fox told me they had no money to pay me. I told them then "tough sh*t" I'm not doing it for free. There were only 3 of us doing the magazine and I could not justify this when I knew damn well they had money. Johnathon Frakes sure as hell didn't do it for free.
And all this time I was busy trying to clean out (or expose) the bull-sh*t artists in the field. Bill Cooper, Mel Noel, Harley Bryd Johnathon Reed, Dan Crain, Serpo, S/4, hell the list is endless. Vicki and I ended up taking on partners to keep the magazine going and they did not share our "pure vision" for our "take" on the subject and field. Finally I asked myself one question .... WHY BOTHER ANY MORE? I felt like the little Dutch boy trying to hold back the sea by jamming my little finger in the dike. Just simply wasn't worth it any more. And the other thing was pretty simple ... most of the drones in the UFO research field didn't act like most of them gave a sh*t about how the field was slipping deeper into the sh*t... so I hope this answers your question.
Don Ecker
