While the reptilian type of alien is admittedly seldom seen, there does seem to be a sufficient recurrence of this peculiar serpent-like species to warrant further study by UFO and alien abduction researchers. Along with the infrequent encounters with reptilians experienced by abductees, a strange kind of mythology has also grown up around the subject, a mythology that involves some of the most extreme and paranoid conspiracy theorizing currently available in the marketplace of fringe beliefs.

In an attempt to gain some insight into just what these reptilian aliens are all about, “UFO” spoke to four different researchers and authors, all of whom differ a great deal in their understanding of the serpent race, but who nevertheless argue convincingly that something significant is going on that cannot be easily ignored. From the pragmatic abduction research of Dr. David Jacobs, to the folklore of Timothy Green Beckley, to the personal experiences of Beverly Trout, to the religious and sociological observations of Dr. Brenda Denzler, the range of opinions is wide and profoundly deep.

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Timothy Green Beckley

Timothy Green Beckley has been an author, editor and publisher of books and magazines on UFOs and the paranormal for more then forty years. His publishing company, Inner Light Books-Global Communications, offers hundreds of titles that deal with subjects like Nikola Tesla, nonhuman underground races, and conspiracy theory.

At the outset, Beckley wants it known that he has little faith in the fringe viewpoint of the reptilians as sexual sadists, for example.

“Some of the abductees talk about having sex with serpent-like beings,” Beckley said. “In fact, I remember being on a panel with Budd Hopkins several years ago in Minnesota, and one of the abductees on the panel was this middle-aged lady who claimed that the serpents were appearing in her home and performing rather lewd acts on her. But to me, stories of breeding serpents seem a bit ludicrous.

“I would have to have an awful lot of evidence,” he continued, “to prove that long-tailed, hissing serpents of any size, shape or description are coming here and having sex with humans. It seems like a bizarre fetish or fantasy to me. But that’s not to say that some people don’t believe it, because it does seem to be a common thread that runs through the more abstract areas of UFO research today. There are even a number of websites that deal with this in explicit detail.”

Which leads to the subject of David Icke, one of the foremost researchers to popularize the serpent paranoia that continues to be an integral part of current conspiracy theory. Icke’s books include “Children of the Matrix” and “Freedom Road,” and he has several videos available as well as being a frequent guest speaker on the conspiracy lecture circuit.

“In most of his books and videos,” Beckley said, “he describes these reptilians as operating behind the scenes and manipulating world politics. They use members of secret societies like the Freemasons and the Illuminati to do their evil bidding. Now, the way I understand Icke’s take on the reptilians is that they’re inter-dimensional beings on a different vibrational level than we are and they come here and possess human bodies, some of whom then have the capability of shape-shifting.

“There have even been reports of people,” he continued, “who have been at ceremonies, so-called ‘black magic rituals,’ in which members of various political hierarchies have been present. And they have seen these political figures purportedly turn into serpents. The Queen of England being one, and I think Dick Cheney being another. I’m sure that some people have seen George Bush turn into a demon.

“Some of these things are maybe not too farfetched,” Beckley said, laughing, “when you consider what’s going on in the world today. In all fairness, though, David Icke is a very articulate speaker, and he does make a good presentation. He almost makes it believable up to a point.”

Beckley also made reference to a Zulu chief and shaman named Credo Mutwa, whose tales of the reptilians and their longtime presence in Africa offer a new perspective to those of us in the West.

“Credo says that the Zulu have known about the beings who can travel through space and time for thousands of years,” Beckley said. “They arrived out of the sky. A race of people who were like lizards and who could change their shape at will. He believes that they have produced a powerful race of kings and tribal chiefs. And there are hundreds of fairytales in which reptilian females assume the identity of a human princess in order to marry into the tribe and become powerful in the Zulu nation.

“Credo talks about different caverns in which the reptilians reside to this day, and how they frighten people. Certainly when they’re in their lizard form, they’re supposed to be very horrific-looking. Bright red eyes and frightening glares, and they have the power to hypnotize and use mind control to their advantage. So they are presented as the ultimate evil in all of this.”

So is all of the conspiracy theory and folklore above just so much paranoia?

“Paranoia can be fun,” Beckley replied. “It can be escapism. And somebody’s always going to come up with a theory about something. I don’t think we should sweep it under the rug, but we’ve got to use common sense as well. A lot of this does go over the line of common sense. If you’re going to do research into this, go into the historical stories and the first-person accounts of some of the abductees today, but be very careful when it comes to drawing conclusions on this. When we start talking about serpents and reptilians, we’re really walking on the wild side. There are a lot of evildoers right here, and we don’t have to blame all of this on serpents.”

Dr. David Jacobs

For the past eighteen years, Dr. David Jacobs has ranked as one of the top abduction researchers in the entire field. His books on the subject, “Secret Life” and “The Threat,” are considered definitive works of unimpeachable clarity and rationality. So what does he have to say about the reptilians?

“The reptilian,” Jacobs said, “from what we can tell, does not participate in the standard abduction procedures with the regularity that the insect-like ones do or the gray aliens do. ‘Reptilian’ is a subjective kind of image, in a sense. One person’s reptilian is another person’s ‘really ugly person.’ So we do not really have a handle on exactly what a reptilian looks like that everybody can agree upon. We’re dealing with a range of facial features, primarily.

“Reptilians almost always scare people,” he continued, “whereas the other ones might not scare them to the degree that the reptilian ones do. So, because of that fear factor, there’s always a kind of subjective judgment about the quality of the reptilian’s personality or essence. Now, do the reptilians want fear? We do not have a substantial amount of evidence suggesting that the reptilians do anything to engender fear. In other words, they don’t attack people. They don’t threaten people, at least in my experience with investigating them.”

In spite of the fact that the reptilians, probably because of their looks, often cause the subjective fear Jacobs describes, they are still just another part of the overall abduction package.

“They’re all part of this program,” he said. “They’re seen in the company of the insect-like ones, of the hybrids, and of the gray aliens. They’re all working for the same goal, they’re all onboard the same ships, they’re all essentially doing the same thing. That’s the bottom line. You’re not dealing with reptilians from another planet that have a different agenda and are here for a different reason. You’re still dealing with a mainstream part of the abduction phenomenon. It’s only different in terms of the shape or the physiology of the being.”

Even among sincere experiencers, Jacobs said, there is often confusion about whether they’re seeing an actual reptilian, especially in the abductee’s first few hypnotic regression sessions.

“People tend to say things that aren’t true,” he explained. “They confabulate, although they don’t realize it. They’re not trying to lie or anything like that. But they do it in characteristic areas, and the number one area is ‘description of aliens.’ You have to always keep in mind that, when they say, ‘Oh, this one looks likes it’s a reptilian,’ are they actually seeing a reptilian at all? Now, if you’ve had ten sessions with them, and they say this one looks like a reptilian, that’s a different story altogether. Then you can see that they have seen a reptilian. The fact is, though it is uncommon, it’s common enough that we do have a body of evidence for them.”

Jacobs said he plays close attention to accounts of the reptilians when he feels he can trust the abductee’s memories.

“When I find someone who says, ‘This one looks reptilian,’ I question them closely, because I’m interested in this. I need to know what role they play. I have no stake in them being there or not being there, but I do have a stake in finding out what is going on with them, so it attracts my attention when somebody says something like that. We’re still learning a lot about the abduction phenomenon, and this is one of the areas that we wish we had more knowledge of. Right now, though, it’s still a little bit of guesswork for us.”

Beverly Trout

Beverly Trout has been the Iowa State Section Director for the Mutual UFO Network since 1995. In April of this year, she delivered a lecture on the reptilians at the Ozark UFO Conference in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, in which she spoke of her personal abduction experiences with the serpent beings.

Trout explained that when she underwent hypnosis in 1993 with a psychiatrist who was also a MUFON member, reptilians were the farthest thing from her mind. She recalled being a child of around twelve or thirteen, in the 1940s, back on her father’s farm.

“My father had me working out in the field with him at a pretty early age,” she began. “In fact, I started to drive a tractor when I was about nine. One of the things I always did was to be out in the hayfields, driving a tractor with a hayrack on behind. On this particular day, there was a man up on the hayrack and my father was on the ground. At least that’s my perception. I understand that perception does not always represent the actual, but that’s my perception, and it’s all I’ve got to go with. I’m getting this through light hypnosis, this somewhat relaxed, focused state.

“They’re taking me onboard, and I’m perceiving that my father is just standing there by the hayrack on the ground, with a pitchfork in his hand, and he’s just moving that pitchfork back and forth aimlessly. He didn’t even know I was gone. Apparently switched off. The guy up on the hayrack—he’d been switched off as well, from what I could ascertain.

“And they’re taking me onboard, and they opened up an area that seemed to me that it was somewhat frontal, on the brain, because something that they already had in there, some device, I presume an implant of some sort, that there was a problem because there was swelling in the brain. They’re tinkering around in there and they’re introducing a little coil. Then the swelling goes down and everything is back to normal.

“And in the midst of this perceived incident, I remember sitting in the chair in the psychiatrist’s office, and for at least fifteen or twenty seconds, I was refusing to speak and say what I was seeing. Finally, I said, in a very meek voice, ‘Well, I guess I ought to say that there’s a reptilian individual standing in the back, and he’s in charge.’ Now, there were grays, so apparently this reptilian was in charge of some kind of a gray team. He was tall, well-built, and clearly in charge. Then, of course, they’re bringing me back and I’m seeing myself just plodding across the stubble in the hayfield and climbing on the tractor and everything went back to normal. My Dad began to get work done, and the guy up on the rack, and nobody knew I’d been gone.”

Trout’s story seems to add support to the statements made earlier in this article by David Jacobs. The reptilian, while he appears to have a different physical makeup than the grays, does essentially take part in aspects of the standard abduction scenario along with them and functions no differently than the more familiar guises of the aliens

Trout said she frequently has dreams, which she considers to be abduction experiences clouded over by screen memories, in which she finds herself surrounded on all sides by snakes.

In her Eureka Springs lecture, Trout also recounted the story of a friend of hers who has had frequent experiences with reptilian aliens. This particular experience began when her friend, for whom she used the pseudonym “Jack,” had gone to bed with his “significant other.”

“Jack was awakened,” Trout said, “and saw a reptilian individual in the adjoining bathroom door. The reptilian started out of the bathroom door and headed for the side of the bed where Jack’s bed partner was sleeping peacefully. Jack instantly sat up in bed and pointed a finger to the door and telepathically shouted, ‘Stop! You are not allowed into this space!’ At this point, something apparently gave this particular reptilian pause. He stopped and retreated about three feet and kind of stood or hovered just inside the bathroom, as if he was watching and waiting to see whether Jack would be strong enough to prevent him from reaching his bed partner.

“And here’s what I thought was an interesting thing. A ‘thought-stream’ permeated Jack’s mind, ‘Call out to the Archangel Michael.’ And instantly, he did. Silently, telepathically, but very succinctly, and very precisely stating the need for intervention and the action that he wanted. At this point, a beam of light energy entered the room and from it there came a sort of a shape, a shape holding a long rod of light that was at least seven feet high from the floor to the ceiling, which then confronted this reptilian individual. Jack’s perception was that the reptilian shrieked and then completely dissipated. The shape returned to the light beam and the beam retracted from the bedroom.”

Jack later told Trout, “Bev, I’ve had interaction with reptilians for years, and it’s been okay. It hasn’t been too scary. But I knew this particular individual meant no good.”

Trout went on to say that, “Jack’s not going to lump all reptilians into one single good or bad category. He’s cognizant of the differences between individuals. Immediately, Jack and I got into a discussion of the Archangel Michael part of the episode, and the pillar of light that seemed to appear in response to his very urgent request. Was it in fact an angel of sorts, or could it have been some aspect of Jack himself that became activated? Seemingly outside his physical self, yet perhaps stemming from his explicitly recognized need and his desire for action?”

As with most abduction narratives, one is left with more questions than answers. Trout reflected on her own ambiguous feelings about it all.

“It’s a kind of repulsion-fascination syndrome,” she said. “This is the dichotomy that I know I’m caught in the midst of. Repulsed by the massive manipulation, the intrusive interaction, and yet so fascinated that we don’t really want the aliens to go away. And I see this even in those who are out there to, let’s say, ‘demonize’ the aliens. I don’t think that even those abductees want the aliens to go away. As I said, it’s a dichotomy, and it’s not one that I’m necessarily proud of. You could even say, ‘Well, hey, where’s our self-esteem?’ In a sense we are manipulated, but for some reason or another we just don’t want this presence to go away.”

Dr. Brenda Denzler

When Brenda Denzler earned her Ph.D. in Religious Studies from Duke University, she wrote her dissertation about the UFO and alien abduction movements. The dissertation was eventually published in book form by the University of California Press in 2001, and is entitled “The Lure of the Edge: Scientific Passions, Religious Beliefs, and the Pursuit of UFOs.”

“In specific,” Denzler said, “it was about the ways that the UFO community, especially abductees, use science and religion as frameworks for trying to understand these experiences.”

When asked whether she had run across the reptilian phenomenon in her own research, Denzler said, “It showed up to some extent. At that point in time in the history of the development of the idea, people were reporting mostly encounters with gray aliens. There were accounts of reptilian entities, but not as frequent, and the significance of the reptilian type versus the other types had not been really elaborated much at that point. This is in the early and mid-1990s. At that point, the idea of what it might mean to have an encounter with a reptilian alien had just not been elaborated.”

Since then, a different picture has begun to emerge, according to Denzler.

“I’ve read much more about them since then,” she said, “about people who believe that they have had encounters with the reptilians. The reptilians have taken on the status of the quintessential bad boys in the panoply of UFO entities. There are some people who have reptilian encounters and report them positively, and say that the reptilians are getting a really bad rap, but in general the idea is that the reptilians are nefarious, nogoodnik [spelling?] characters.”

The conversation moved on to Denzler’s view of the reptilian alien conspiracy theory.

“It’s much easier to point to a person or a group of people,” she said, “and say, ‘Them! They’re the ones who did it. They knew full well, at the outset, what they were doing. They knew it was wrong. They had in mind to defraud all the rest of us, or kill all the rest of us, or engage in mind control and try to control the thinking of all the rest of us. They’re absolutely evil.’ It’s just much easier to do that than to think systematically and in terms of systems.

“And so rather than a close and careful application of the idea that there are conspiracies, which there certainly are, you get this kind of globalized application of the idea that there are conspiracies because it’s easier. What the UFO community has done, in my opinion, is folded the idea of reptilian aliens into that whole conspiracy mindset.”

Meanwhile, there is a long tradition, at least in the West, that has always equated reptiles with evil.

“In the Judeo-Christian tradition at least,” Denzler said, “the image of the reptile has almost always been associated with Satanic forces and evil forces. And if you want to speak in terms of Jungian archetypes, certainly for the West, the image of the reptile is one of a dark image, a shadow image. So that gets folded into the whole conspiracy idea.”

And what about some of the wilder claims made by the conspiracy theorists?

“The idea that the Queen of England is a reptilian shape-shifter—I have read similar things, that key officials are really reptilians in disguise,” Denzler said. “Well, if they’re really there, and they’re that powerful, and that nefarious, then an equally interesting issue is why are they not prevailing? If they are reptilian aliens, and they have all of this alien technology, which is presumably superior to ours, what’s holding them back? Why aren’t they more out there?”

But Denzler doesn’t quite want to be seen as a debunker where the reptilians are concerned.

“It’s not that I disbelieve that people have experiences,” she said, “and it’s not that I disbelieve that there is some kind of entity or energy associated with this that we would call reptilian. That may very well be the case. I know people personally who say that they have had encounters with these kinds of beings.

“But the way that the whole idea of the reptilian gets melded into a grand conspiracy theory that pretty much explains everything in history and everything in the present and focuses on individuals being the embodiments of evil—that’s the part I find a lot harder to take one hundred percent at face value. I think that is an overly simplistic way of looking at history and of looking at current events, to say that the serpents are the bad guys and they’re controlling all the bad things.”

By Sean Casteel’s “UFO Journalist”. Casteel is the author of “UFOs, Prophecy and the End of Time,” “Signs and Symbols of the Second Coming,” and “Our Alien Planet, This Eerie Earth,” coauthored with Tim Beckley. All three books are available online at Amazon.com and Filament Books.