Periodically, a magazine that otherwise writes interesting and well-informed articles decides to run something wacked out. (Periodically? Get it? Haha.)

Ahem. An example of this is Wired, a publication which does a good job keeping up with the trendy side of technology. It’s read by people who aren’t really geeks but want to prentend they are when the opportunity arises. People like me.

Which was why I was bemused to see an undeniably non-technical article on their website: an article about crop circles. Alien conspiracies make the rounds every few years, so it’s not terribly surprising that I should see this one, er, crop up. What was surprising was that it was in Wired.

They go on to quote a Steve Alexander who is something called a “crop circle researcher”. I’m not sure I understand the term, but this scene comes to mind…


The faded red Ford Bronco pulled itself over the fallows of the field, slumping into a muddy puddle before dying. The ratcheting crank of the handbrake cut the air before early morning stillness returned to the farm. Two aging gentlemen jumped from the cab and made their way further into the field. They approached the edge of the corn rows carefully, partly due to the unstable earth, but mostly because of the mysteriousness of wide, sweeping patches which had been violently crushed and recrushed by some unknown force. English mist drifted past the shining headlights of the truck.

“Grain crop?” asked the driver, staying near the truck while his partner moved into the opening.

“Check.”

“Crushed in layers?”

“Check.”

“Geometric pattern?”

The second man paused, then said, “hard to tell from here, but I’d say yeah. Check.”

The driver nodded and removed a pocket guide from inside his trenchcoat. It was a frail book, with bundles of pages held together with paperclips. The cover had been completely laminated by clear packing tape, layered on in patches. The driver flipped to a familiar page and began running his finger down the tightly leaded lines. It was something he had done countless times before, but he had to be sure. He muttered to himself, “corn—compressed—geometry.”

The passenger of the truck returned to the safety of the headlight’s glow. “It’s got all the signs.”

“Yep. According to The Book, there’s only one explanation.”

“Aliens?”

“Check.”

Which is, of course, the only assumption one could make in these circumstances.

But before I delve into the more entertaining “making fun of people who believe it’s aliens” part of the essay, I’d like to draw a comparison of a different sort.

Crop circles are nothing more than the rural version of graffiti. Just about anything you can say about tagging also applies to crop circles.

  • They’re done secretly, often under cover of darkness.
  • They’re both illegal when done without permission.
  • Both have moved from cult status to popular culture.
  • They’re both forms of artistic expression.
  • They both destroy property in a superficial way.
  • They have both developed in complexity over time.
  • They both have groups of people trying to out-do each other.
  • They have both been seen to contain pop culture references.
  • They’ve both been used for advertising purposes.

It’s also interesting to note the differences:

  • Some people seriously believe crop circles are created by aliens—or at least not created by humans. Nobody believes graffiti was created by anyone but rebellious inner-city youths. Nobody blames disenfranchised, psychotic portfolio managers, for example.
  • Crop circles are considered beautiful, anecdotally moving people to tears. Tagging is considered an eyesore.

I guess what I’m asking is: am I the only one who doesn’t think crop circles are great? I will admit, the designs are impressive to see out in the field, but it’s a straightforward matter of some planning, math and surveyance. Come to think of it, well-done graffiti is more impressive than crop circles. Have you ever tried to control spray paint? It’s just about impossible. And tags are usually in color, at least.

The thing about graffiti is, it’s not mysterious and, arguably, its asthetic is not as well accepted as the more traditionally appealing geometry and rotational symmetry. Speaking of which, half the crop circles out there look like quilt patterns, not inter-galactic communcation.

And their medium is food! Does anyone else not think that’s lame? Sure, wheat is convieniently flattened, but it would be much more impressive to have large patterns appear six inches deep in granite—or the Moon, for that matter. But the aliens don’t do that, they use our food. They were late leaving Betelguese and forgot their rock laser, evidently. Although that clearly violates Occam’s razor because if they aliens were so clueless as to forget an important tool like that, how did they invent interstellar travel in the first place? We have to assume they have the capability of being impressive but choose not to. Obviously, one of two things is happening here: either it’s humans trying, like they always do, to get maximum effect with minimal effort, or these aliens are real jerks.

Either way, they’re still nothing more than glorified graffiti artists.

-Ted