Believers Response to Bigfoot Atheists

Editor's Note: This is a guest post by Jeffrey Kelley, an administrator for the Facebook group, The Squatchers Lounge! (Click on link to join).

You say there is no bigfoot? So ten thousand people have all been mistaken? Even if we say 90% were misidentification that still leaves 1000 credible. 70 years ago the hairy mountain man didn't exist yet now we know them as Gorilla. A simple mind is one that closes the books and says there is no more to find. Just recently with the discovery of the Billy ape great primates are still being found. Imagine that, the locals say there are 6 foot chimps living in the area no one believes them until someone gets lucky with HD video. It isn't that hard to contemplate that not everything has been discovered in North America. The great expanses of the Pacific North West to Canada leave millions of acres of territory for a population of less than 10,000 animals. Now let’s take a look at your argument.

10) The Photographic and Video Evidence is Poor.

To much of the community’s dismay this is actually a true statement; however, there has been enough evidence collected over the last 25 years or so that leads to a large enough collection to get a good picture of the existence in question. The Patterson film was taken at a distance because they came upon a retreating animal from a distance to begin with. The technology of the time period in which this was filmed leave much to be desired but in modern times this video has been documented by respectable persons in their field and have stabilized it in such a digital format that has given the world the clearest view of the film possible. Know biologists and scientists have seen and reviewed the film on many occasions and several agree that it is most likely a living creature in the video. There is other video evidence available that many feel are genuine bigfoot on film yet such an elusive creature is known to retreat the moment it is discovered, not unlike every other wild animal in the forest.

9) Bigfoot doesn't fit in the food chain

Bigfoot fits into the food chain just fine. 10,000 animals based over millions of wild acres in North America wouldn't make a drop in the bucket of the available food sources in the big picture. We have large population of black and brown bear that eat hundreds of pounds of food yet there territory is still filled with edibles and game to eat. The placement of 10,000 animals in North America is like 200 people in down town LA. Now granted the actual area that the bigfoot use for habitat will take a small hit but an animal that is 8foot tall and a 6 to 8 foot stride is designed to cover large distances and keep moving to find food and other resources. This is how we have learned to find the areas that they travel through.


8) Bigfoot is too big to go un-noticed.

Well the first point I would like to make is they are noticed by hundreds of people each year. If we say 90% are mistaken that still leave 10 sights of an actual bigfoot. With 10,000 or so animals across North America just how often do you think you will see one? It isn't like they moved into your neighborhood and now rent 20 apartments. If you are lucky there may be a small group or a single around any one particular area. As for new species discovery, well I mentioned in the opening about the Billy Ape. A 6 foot tall Chimp Line of Primate. The rediscovery of the mountain and low land gorilla, the panda bear. I could go on but I think I have proven the point.

7) No Bigfoot fossils.

This is an old ploy by skeptics. There are no great ape fossils found to date. Does that mean Chimps, Orang and Gibbons don't exist? Of course it doesn't. Bones need to be buried in just the right conditions for a fossil to form in the first place. Even persons buried in a cemetery do not turn into fossils eventually they decay into dust like 99% of everything else that dies naturally. We have many large species fossil record due to planet wide disasters that cause the conditions to preserve bones in that way.

6) Successful Breeding Is Unlikely

Here again you have the facts a little mixed up but I will be glad to give another perspective. The actual number of animals needed to sustain a breeding population is normally agreed upon to be around 5,000 animals. Even stating that, it isn't difficult to accept that bigfoot could breed much like bears do where a single male will claim a territory as large as 500 square miles and breed with any females that remain in the home range of the male, chase off any competition they would come across, while the female would raise young. At this point in study that is an answer we just don't have... Yet. There are cases where managed populations of much fewer animals have been able to locate and breed to increase the population. As for the sighting being of only a single animal that was simply what was seen. It doesn't mean there were not others close by out of sight. When you see a deer in a field it most likely isn't alone but part of a heard but you only saw the one so you just can't say.

5) Misidentifications are widespread

I will grant the proposal in this case that 90% of the sightings each year are misidentifications. With more than 1000 sightings reported, not even taking into consideration the ones not reported, that leaves 100 possible sightings, and lets even say 90% of those are seeing bears that still leaves 10 rock solid eye witness accounts of encounters with a large upright walking great ape that "looks like no human I have ever seen" as many have said. Sounds like a good enough record for me. There are 2500 Florida Panther yet they are almost never seen nor captured on game cam in over 20 years of looking and they have a much smaller land mass to exist in.

4) No sightings before 1958.

This is a complete farce. Native peoples in both the US and Canada all have local telling of "The Hairy Ones" as my great uncle used to call them. There are old documented cases from colonial times when large hairy creatures were seen. The foot prints from Bluff Creek have never been proven to be hoaxed. In fact know scientists have exact copies of them in their collections for study as well as hundreds of other tracks that have been collected in locations that a hoaxer wouldn't bother leaving for someone to find, not to mention the characteristics of those casted tracks are showing signs of dermal ridges like finger prints as casting techniques improve.

3) Lack of killings despite reward.

You have to be able to find them to kill them first. 99.9% of the sightings are by persons not expecting to see one, nor are prepared for such an event. A reward of $1,000,000 is child’s play as far as money goes for someone that brings in the first body. Media will pay tens of millions for exclusive rights to the first 24hrs of the event. There have been a number of them shot dead. Mostly out of fear or reaction more so than the targeting of the bigfoot. A large fast moving primate is as hard of a target to hit as there is, as well as the fact they are rare as we discussed above with the deducted amount of sighting of actual animals being 10 each year. You can't have it both ways that we see 10,000 sightings and call them misidentified.

2) Bigfoot is a Hoaxer's Paradise.

While I agree with your statement you cannot take the absolute worst example of a subject matter and claim the matter closed. Although people like Rick Dyer and Tom Biscarid among others may have embarrassed themselves by covering a rubber bigfoot suit in opossum guts to attempt to defraud everyone, those are the worst of the worst. There are quite a few researchers that are in the woods attempting to find the evidence to lay on the table for everyone to examine and decide for themselves. Viral bigfoot hoax videos have been a way to drive traffic to websites and YouTube channels. This is nothing new.

1) Lack of Physical Evidence

There is plenty of physical evidence for the existence of a non-listed great primate in many parts of the world and in the US. Hair samples, mucus samples, as well as possible blood samples have been submitted. DNA labs are not in the business of classifying or announcing new species they simply look at the sample and attempt to catalogue it in the known science world. Most of the samples tested in the past are simply placed in the unknown animal column as that is all that can be done. Hair samples have been studied and while the hair appears to have human like qualities it has a structure than humans do not have. Anyone that has woodsman skills knows dead animals do not last long in the wild. Studies have been done that a full deer carcass can be devoured and scattered in under 7 days so much so that it cannot longer be identified. Simply when they die like all the other animals of the wilds they become food for others. When was the last time you came upon a dead bear body that has been there for months? I would venture to guess never.

To wrap things up I am not attempting to convince anyone that Bigfoot exist. All I am putting forth is first some factual information on the subject and to refute the Atheists of Bigfoot. It is fine if you don't believe by why try to convince others of your beliefs. The simple facts are plain. Anthropologists agree it is possible, Primatologists agree it is possible and there are enough food sources to sustain a population. I simply conclude with the question... Why not?