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Ep 55: Alien Encounters, Conspiracy, and the Unexplainable with Ghrey Mbenza
340 Plays29 days ago
The honorary third member of Hoodoo Plant Mamas, Ghrey Mbenza is back to talk about the 1994 Ariel School UFO Incident in Ruwa, Zimbabwe. We delve into conspiracy, truth, and paranoia and the need for curiosity when exploring the unexplainable.
Tasha "Ghrey" Mbenza (they/she/he), more recently known simply as Ghrey, is a black, queer, and autistic occupational therapist who is passionate about helping people of all ages reach their highest potential by identifying and building on their strengths. Ghrey is especially passionate about self-advocacy work with individuals from queer, BIPOC, neurodivergent, and/or physically disabled communities. Ghrey’s special interests include holistic cooking with a focus on creative plating, making music, attempting to DIY everything, and their newfound love for conspiracy theory deep dives. Ghrey’s career related special interests include mental health, emotional regulation, sensory processing, and self-advocacy skills specifically with children.
RESOURCES
- "Ep 43: Understanding Neurodiversity with Ghrey Mbenza" Hoodoo Plant Mamas
- "Ep 9: Stories From Our Mothers" Hoodoo Plant Mamas
- "Documentary explores the UFO sighting that changed the course of 62 children's lives" by Liz Tung. PBS.
- "A 1994 UFO Sighting by Children Changed Lives. What If This Guy Made it Up?" by Nathaniel Janowitz. VICE.
- "Children talk about witnessing the 1994 UFO landing at the Ariel School in Ruwa, Zimbabwe" YouTube.
- The Telepathy Tapes
- UFO TikTok
- "Orcas Sink Another Yacht: Why Killer Whales are Attacking Boats" by isabel Cameron. Newsweek.
- Paradise. Hulu.
- Our Oceans. Netflix.
- "Something strange is happening underwater, scientists stunned by mysterious marine events" The Economic Times.
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This podcast was created, hosted, and produced by Dani & Leah.
Our music was created by Ghrey, and our artwork was designed by Bianca.
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Transcript
Significance of Hoodoo Plants and Introductions
00:00:01
Speaker
Hoodoo Plants, Mamas. Get your soul fed and your spirit ridden. This here ain't no trend.
00:00:12
Speaker
I possessed the power from way back when. Back when folk was stripped from all of their kin, so they had to find the magic within. Ancestors, they gather my urge.
00:00:24
Speaker
I conjure it, my ulcer. Hoodoo Plants, Mamas.
00:00:33
Speaker
We just out here trying to water our plants and mind our business, you know? Everybody from the deep south, man, everybody can have culture like us.
00:00:45
Speaker
Hey y'all and welcome back to another episode of Hoodoo Plant Mamas. I am your co-host Leah Nicole. And I'm Dani B. Today we are joined by a returning guest. This is her third time on the show. You hear her voice every single time you listen to Hoodoo Plant Mamas.
00:01:01
Speaker
Gray, would you like to reintroduce yourself? Hey, I'm the unofficial third member of Hoodoo Plant Mamas. Yeah. No, I'm just playing. and um But yeah, I'm gray.
00:01:12
Speaker
i use all pronouns. I'm an occupational therapist. It's me. I'm bad. Eerie, we're excited to have you back. Thank you. Thank you. I'm excited to be back and talk all the things that I'm always rambling about. So thank you for having
Personal Updates and Gratitude
00:01:27
Speaker
me.
00:01:27
Speaker
Well, let's do a check and start with Gray. How are you feeling today? I am excited to be here. Excited to chit chat. I'm also navigating a little bit of a headache. um So kind of feeling under the weather, but I am overall okay. What about you, Leah? I'm gonna say same. I'm doing pretty good. I had like a very vivid dream this morning.
00:01:51
Speaker
i don't know. It just kind of put me in a better mood. I'll just say that. How about you, Dani? I'm doing okay today. i got on my bright colors, this cute little necklace. That I got from this artisan shop downtown That's like the sun And yeah I'm gonna be honest I made the mistake of consuming some news So I had like a moment today Where I was just like A few tears And then I just brought it back because you know what?
00:02:20
Speaker
We just got to do what we got to do. So I actually am feeling a lot better now. Drank some water, pull some cards, and I'm ready to chit chat about also my favorite shenanigans. So yeah, we can get into some gratitude as well. Leah, what are you grateful for today?
00:02:38
Speaker
I'm going to say i am grateful for this story that I'm writing. I'm writing another romance novel. And I think it's kind of hard to like write romance after you've gone through a divorce. Yeah.
00:02:53
Speaker
But I am grateful for this because it is reminding me of like the better parts of like relationships and and things like that. What about you, Gray? i am grateful for the sun.
00:03:04
Speaker
The sun is shining. The weather is warming up. The people are outside. It's definitely giving me quite a bit energy. So yes, grateful for the sun. Same, actually. I'm really grateful that the weather is Not as cold anymore. it's still a little breezy.
00:03:23
Speaker
And you know what? I'm not complaining because when you live in the South, that May through August heat is something serious. So I'm just thankful for this very comfy space that we're in. I am not ready for that like middle of the summer heat yet. So I'll take
Zimbabwe UFO Sighting of 1994
00:03:42
Speaker
this. Today we wanted to talk about UFOs and the unexplainable events.
00:03:48
Speaker
And I know, Gray, you introduced us both to the 1994 aerial school UFO sighting in, I believe it's Rora, Zimbabwe.
00:04:00
Speaker
Would you like to explain that? Yes. ah I have talked everybody's ear off about this UFO sighting. So,
00:04:10
Speaker
Thank you for giving me space to keep getting it off my chest. Based on my little unofficial research and looking at documentaries in September of 1994, at the Ariel School in rural Zimbabwe, there was an alleged UFO and alien sighting where there were a mass number of eyewitness testimonies from children of all ages.
00:04:35
Speaker
This was what I would assume to be like a primary school. um So you got... Children ranging from, i would say, like four and up all the way through like younger adults.
00:04:48
Speaker
And everybody reported that they saw ah UFO and they reported that they saw aliens. And they also were all reporting that they received telepathic communication.
00:05:00
Speaker
from the aliens. Not only did they report the sighting, they were reporting the exact same experiences during this experience. Experiences like down to the color of the UFOs, the color of the aliens, the descriptor of the aliens' faces and how, you know, they received the messages and exactly what the messages were saying. So that's the summary of this UFO sighting in Zimbabwe. And what's really fascinating is that they still haven't really been able to fully debunk it. People have tried to discredit it
00:05:38
Speaker
Some people just flat out don't believe it. I think academics and scientists can be really arrogant. And so they've come up with their own theories that still can't be verified. When it comes to the messages they received, I want to read an excerpt from an article that will be in the show notes.
00:05:56
Speaker
And it says a few of the children said it was about something that's going to happen as far as telepathic messages. Let me clarify. When Max said what that something was, the kids returned different answers, but all along the same thing.
00:06:13
Speaker
Pollution, one boy said, I think they want people to know that we're actually making harm on this world, said a girl with blonde pigtails, and we mustn't get to technology.
00:06:24
Speaker
Most chilling was the vision of a third little girl. It was like in the world, all the trees would just go down and there would be no air and people would be dying, she said. i think that in space, there's no love and down here, there is, which is interesting.
00:06:39
Speaker
So this was 62 children. 62. I was going to say, you can't get 62 kids on the same page like that. It is just not, I won't say it's not a thing, but it's not a thing.
00:06:53
Speaker
No shade to kids, but they I've been a kid. We not organized enough. And it's always the haters in the group. One of them kids would have been like, all right, nah, she came out here and told, we told us all to say this and I don't want to do it anymore because I don't like her. She didn't give me back my pencil or some shit. Like you just cannot get this many kids to cooperate like that.
00:07:16
Speaker
I want to say that, because I want to be transparent. We ain't trying to push no narrative. Like there has been thing. Allegedly a person that was allegedly one of the children that said they made it all up with their friend because they want to get out of class.
00:07:32
Speaker
That article, it was a vice article, which, you know, do with that what you will. But he basically said like, oh, we were just trying to get out of class so we can cock this up.
00:07:45
Speaker
You mean to tell me a child got 60 of his peers To concoct a consistent story Of telepathically communicating With aliens about environmental Disaster and pollution I'm not buying it and I also Think that this is probably either somebody That really wasn't there or somebody put Him up to it because they really cannot Debunk this because a lot of them Still won't deny it even Then there were people that said He's lying we know what we saw
00:08:18
Speaker
so That is interesting. actually had not heard that there were children reporting
Global UFO Sightings and Messages
00:08:24
Speaker
that before. No, it was it's literally one. And in the article, it says his confession could not be independently verified.
00:08:32
Speaker
So to me, this entire article, Loki, could be discredited because how are y'all pushing what's supposed to be journalists and you can't independently verify his confession? What does that mean? Mm hmm.
00:08:44
Speaker
Yeah, you know it's also very telling because one of the documentaries that I was watching had talked about how traumatic that this was for a lot of the kids.
00:08:55
Speaker
A lot of the kids had to stay home from school for and like a number of days. A lot of the kids were terrified. Like they expressed as being terrified.
00:09:06
Speaker
If you make up a story, you're not going to. continue the story of being terrified past about an hour. Like if you succeeded to get out of your schoolwork, mission accomplished, kind of forgot about the mission now. But this is something that was actually following the those children over the course of several days to years to, like you said, now there they're adults now and they're still sharing that this is their truth. This is really what happened to them. This is their experience. You talked about being terrified. I saw a video that was like a year or so after it happened.
00:09:42
Speaker
And they were like, yeah, we've had nightmares about these things. But even then, I think a lot of them were talking about like, this was scary for us. This was traumatizing, but they felt like they had a mission now, like,
00:09:55
Speaker
we got work that we need to do. You're right. There was a quote directly from one of the kids. They said, we can still prevent it. I think the thing that was terrifying for them was the realization that we are messing up the world. Like we're messing this up and it is on us to fix this thing.
00:10:14
Speaker
You, you shared that like some of the kids had these really vivid visuals of what was going to happen in the world. No air. Like,
00:10:24
Speaker
Imagine feeling like one day I'm going experience a world where I can't breathe, where the trees are falling. Like, that's terrifying. I don't even really think that they were afraid of the aliens per se, because at one point when they were interviewing those children, i want to say almost all of them said that they would be willing to meet the aliens again.
00:10:44
Speaker
Like, they would be excited. They had follow-up questions. They were curious, and they think that the aliens were also curious. So... Yeah, like, i think that they were just really impacted by the experience. And I think that some people are taking it as though the kids were fearful of the aliens. But the way that I perceived it, the kids are afraid of the message that the aliens brought.
00:11:07
Speaker
to them about how we are treating the earth. When I was looking up this, there were like people in the comments talking about other places where this happened. And so this happened in Westall School on April 6, 1966 in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, where a group of kids also saw aircrafts in the sky, but the government came in and they were like, oh, our radars didn't pick up any flying aircrafts the newspaper said it was a weather balloon and the landowner where the crafts supposedly came down and like left like circles burnt into the grass he ended up burning his land because he didn't want anyone looking around for clues and so you know people are like oh did it really happen who knows I think this the aerial school is like one of the first times that like we have
00:12:00
Speaker
Not only like a whole group of people talking about this, talking about the same story, we also have it documented. And then we also have adults that believe them. Right. Because you had to believe them to continue to interview them and try to get their side of the story.
00:12:15
Speaker
And then I do want to say that around March 19th, 2025, there were videos circulating of aircrafts off the coast of the United States. So I saw one. My algorithm showed me this black couple.
00:12:31
Speaker
on Daytona Beach who saw a bright light come out of the ocean. And then there were these smaller, circular ones around them. And it was a similar account to the Zimbabwe children who also talked about when they had saw the UFO, there was this big central one and then these smaller ones around them.
00:12:48
Speaker
And so I was like, is this happening? I've heard other people say that there was an account in New York as well, but I didn't find that. But I did find this one, the Daytona Beach
Personal UFO Sightings and Skepticism
00:12:58
Speaker
one. And it was Black people. This is my first time seeing like...
00:13:01
Speaker
Black people talk about it. So I was like, I believe them. I'm going to believe kids and I'm going to believe Black people all every time. You were talking about how there were adults that believed the kids too because they continued to interview.
00:13:17
Speaker
And that was something else that stood out to me. Like even when the teachers, because during the the aerial school UFO sighting, there were no adults on the playground. There was just one, you know, single adult that was, I think, supervising their their outside time.
00:13:34
Speaker
um The rest of the adults were inside. And so when they... interviewed those teachers, the teachers were even saying something happened to these children.
00:13:44
Speaker
Like when they came back inside, it was so significant that even the teachers believed them immediately that we don't know what happened. We didn't see it but something happened to all of these kids. There was a shared experience here and it was undeniable.
00:14:01
Speaker
So that was very telling. For the adult that was out there with them, that did they see anything? i cannot remember. i don't think that adult saw it. oh You know what? What I do remember is i think that particular adult that was outside supervising said that there were some children that approached this adult. don't remember, man, woman, whatever.
00:14:24
Speaker
But this particular adult didn't believe them at first until they were extremely adamant. But by the time that this this person went to go check it out, I think they had kind of like missed the opportunity to actually witness it.
00:14:38
Speaker
I believe that's what happened. So two things. I'm curious about the government quickly discrediting the children in Melbourne And this man ah burning his land because it feels like, did the government make you do this?
00:14:54
Speaker
I don't know if they pay you or they bullied you. It's a possibility. Maybe the American capitalism in me is coming through, but you could have made money off of this.
00:15:05
Speaker
You could have made money. You could have been like, all right, y'all could come over here and look, but that's going to $500. People would have paid you to come over there and explore. But the fact that the government tried to quickly come in and squash it, talking about a weather balloon.
00:15:23
Speaker
so Okay. The second thing I wanted to say about the 2025 video with the black couple is I was in the comments because with videos like this, I to see what the people saying. And I didn't see anybody actually denying it either or trying to debunk it.
00:15:38
Speaker
But I did see the girl respond to someone or the one of the people that's part of the couple saying, Say, yeah, they were trying to get inside our hotel because so-and-so was saying he could telepathically feel them trying to get him to open the door.
00:15:55
Speaker
And I was like, why is nobody addressing this? Because she, like, he could feel them telling him to open the door. Okay. Yeah, this is wild. You know what I mean?
00:16:07
Speaker
I'm one of them people where I'm like, everybody ain't lying. There's no way. I mean, just like we said, you can't get a group of 62 children on the same page is the exact same as saying you cannot get children, adults from different like regions of the, of America to be on the same page, to be sharing the same exact experience.
00:16:30
Speaker
Yeah. I don't know.
Governmental Cover-Ups and Texas Speculations
00:16:32
Speaker
I can't say that I don't believe it. also, this is reminding me that I had an experience. Granted, don't know if what I saw was a UFO or aliens, but there was an experience when I was living in Seattle.
00:16:46
Speaker
um there was a group of friends and we were like having this outdoor barbecue on on the rooftop and it had gotten dark. And we had downloaded this stargazing app. We were all like pointing our phones up to the sky, looking at the constellations and everything, having a grand old time.
00:17:04
Speaker
And then there was a moment where we saw like this odd light and then we saw it kind of disperse into mini lights. And, And we all stopped at the same time and were like, do you see that?
00:17:18
Speaker
And all of us were in agreement. We see this. And then it trailed like it kind of in the same way that birds will like flock into a pattern and move across the sky.
00:17:29
Speaker
The lights kind of like created this pattern and then just like trailed into the sky until it disappeared. And we were all like, so did y'all see that? But we didn't know what else to do with that information.
00:17:42
Speaker
it was just like, we see it? What is that? I don't know. So for me, I'm just like, am I really seeing what I'm seeing? And that takes me back to this whole idea of the government like trying to cover things.
00:17:55
Speaker
One way that is just like this foolproof way of getting people to like cover these things up is to just make people second guess themselves.
00:18:05
Speaker
When I was listening to some of those children talking, they mentioned whenever I shared my truth with the adult in my life,
00:18:16
Speaker
They didn't believe me. And when I heard how that impacted those kids, what the kids reported was, then I started to wonder if I saw it was really true. And I'm like, I don't know. think the government kind ate when they started making us gaslight ourselves.
00:18:33
Speaker
They did a thing there. That happens in all facets of like when children are abused and people trying to convince them what they know happened didn't happen. There was another incident that you told me about with Well, maybe JoJo mentioned it. Oh, yeah. But you actually was like not fucking with it at the time because it was that scary. So I'm interested in hearing about that story. See, now that we're having this conversation, I'm like, wait, are the aliens trying to contact me?
00:19:01
Speaker
Because this is too many little random moments that I'm like, I forgot that happened. So several years ago, I don't even remember what year it was. It was pre-COVID. I know that my partner at the time and I, we were driving, it was dark and it was kind of in the like, it was an up and coming area. So it was still pretty rural, but one of those areas where there's like construction still happening, we're driving down the road and we both see this like neon, like illumination in the sky. And it wasn't, it was no regular like airplane light. It wasn't none of that. It was like, again,
00:19:41
Speaker
what the hell is that in the sky? Do you see that? Or am I tripping? Am I making this up? And my partner at the time saw it and was spooked. Again, that was back in the day before I started being heavy into conspiracies and really overthinking everything.
00:19:58
Speaker
i was ready to just wrap it up and pack it away and never talk about it again. Cause that was terrifying. And I like she literally asked me in the moment if I was seeing it and I was like, yeah, nah, like let's not talk about it.
00:20:10
Speaker
Like, let's just let's just let that go and pretend like it never happened. Terrifying. But now, you know what? I think the aliens is trying to chit chat. I've been saying some going on in Texas. OK, I don't know if we got any Texas listeners, but I want y'all to know.
00:20:25
Speaker
And if the government listening, y'all up to something over there. From the fact that y'all little light machine, because I'm convinced that y'all actually got a light machine over there.
00:20:37
Speaker
Because it be light outside for too long over there. Okay? Every time I would be on FaceTime with y'all, like back in the back in the day, a few years ago, it would be like pitch black in Mississippi.
00:20:53
Speaker
Like, it would be like 8 p.m. Why the hell the sun's still out at 8 p.m. in Texas? What's going on here? That's all I'm saying. Some suspicious happening in over there in that state, among other things. Don't get me started. cause to see Now we're going to exit UFO territory and then enter. I think there are people simulating everything.
00:21:16
Speaker
And this is a... don't know.
Conspiracies on Environmental Manipulation
00:21:20
Speaker
I've gone down a rabbit hole about um cloud seeding, which is just something that's new to me. So maybe it's not new to the rest of the world.
00:21:30
Speaker
But I recently learned that cloud seeding is a way that like they control or influence the weather. And like it is a... legitimate, well-known thing that's happening in the world where they drop, you know, certain chemicals into the clouds and that influences, you know, rain or whatever the case may be.
00:21:52
Speaker
So these things are happening. This is why i don't understand why people think chemtrails is such a controversial conspiracy because, know,
00:22:06
Speaker
There's always a little truth in this. And I'm with you. When Black people start saying like they notice something, I believe them. people are saying when they come through with these planes and you see that little line in the sky that smoke, it seems like all hell breaks loose within the community.
00:22:25
Speaker
It goes into like other conspiracies around like how guns get in the community because there's conspiracies around that which We call in it a conspiracy because it can't really be proven and it sounds ridiculous, but like, yeah, who bringing the these teenage, these young teenage black boys, black and brown boys, ah military grade guns, how they getting them?
00:22:50
Speaker
Because these are guns that would be locked up in a facility, like with some kind of high security. How would they be able to get to those facilities and break in there? Where are they getting it from? Who's bringing them to them?
00:23:01
Speaker
They ain't got the money to pay for them, a lot of them. So I'm just saying, like, when people have these conspiracies, it's for a reason. Because some shit just don't make sense when you really think about it. And y'all want to convince us that that people are just inherently bad because of their race or because of how they grew up. When it's really like, no, somebody is...
00:23:23
Speaker
pulling the strings. I hate to make it about neurodivergence all the time, but it just reminds me that like society really has taken on this honestly very toxic habit of masking and ignoring the reality of things.
00:23:42
Speaker
And it has become so normalized for us to ignore the reality of things that whenever these conspiracies come up, the response from the masses is, nah, that can't be true because we ignore the reality of things. That is what we do. We don't, you know, we don't question things. We don't ask, you know, we don't follow up on things that don't have this hard core evidence and proof.
00:24:08
Speaker
And I think that that keeps us in the dark a lot of the times in a way that honestly is just not beneficial to us.
Religious Indoctrination and Openness to Beliefs
00:24:14
Speaker
Like you're absolutely right. They're conspiracies. Yeah. Because we really not doing the work to find if it's the truth or not.
00:24:21
Speaker
And that's that's quite unfortunate. Because I do think a lot there's a lot of truth to conspiracies. You know, they talk a lot about movies and different films. Like being kind of this way that whoever, right? Can't always say the government, but whoever's in charge kind of put the truth right there in our face without telling us what the truth is.
00:24:45
Speaker
Now when I go back and I like watch films that I used to watch, I'm like, nah, it's literally right there in our faces. Like you mentioned the chemtrails. There was some cartoon from the 90s where there was just like a little sign about chemtrails just right in the corner.
00:25:00
Speaker
And I was like, a minute. Like, are y'all telling us what's really happening right now without telling us? It also makes me think about the series. There's a Hulu series called Paradise.
00:25:11
Speaker
I don't know if y'all have seen or heard of it. But that series is basically telling us that there is a made-up world where they are in control of the sun cycles. They are, like, everything is just a simulation.
00:25:28
Speaker
And the people are kind of just choosing to exist in that world post this really, like... apocalyptic downfall of the world like they created this world knowing that the world was gonna I don't know go to shit like the kids were trying to warn us that saw the UFO that sounds familiar don't it Leah it sounds incredibly familiar yeah I wrote a whole story of it like that get your coins because somebody somebody somebody read that book and get your coins
00:25:59
Speaker
don't know. Maybe we have the same dream about it. Maybe it's just the truth. And y'all are all receiving the message. Listen, because now I'm about to get into my telepathy ah bag.
00:26:11
Speaker
But maybe telepathically, people are receiving these messages and and in trying to share those messages in whatever way that they can. I don't know, Leah, maybe you know a little something that we don't know and you decided to put it in a book.
00:26:25
Speaker
dear you So a lot of what you're saying, Gray, is what I want to talk about in the second part of the show. So let's take a break real quick and then we'll get to that.
00:26:39
Speaker
Let's get into some ways you can support the Hoodoo Plant Mamas. One is through our bookshop where you can buy the books that we previously discussed with our Writing the Spirit guests. We also have a Hoodoo Beginners Guide as well as our top reading picks.
00:26:53
Speaker
We also have our top tarot cards and oracle card deck section. So check that out too. You can also buy Leah's books. On Bookshop, every purchase you make helps support our show. Check us out at bookshop.org slash shop slash Hulu Plant Mamas or hit the link in our show notes.
00:27:12
Speaker
Other ways you can support us include rating and reviewing the podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Follow us on Instagram at Hulu Plant Mamas. We are no longer on the app formerly known as Twitter.
00:27:26
Speaker
So yeah.
00:27:30
Speaker
You can also check out our Patreon where we share exclusive video plant and spiritual content for only $3 a month. If you prefer a one-time donation, you can donate via cash app, cash tag, who do plant mamas or our PayPal who do plant mamas at gmail.com. Let's get back to the show.
00:27:54
Speaker
Before the break, we were talking about conspiracy theories. And I think when you talk about conspiracy theories, there's always this level of secrecy involved because a lot of our education is about discrediting anything that isn't of the material world, like you were saying earlier, Gray, which I always think is interesting in the United States because like here, ah sky daddy and his wizard son born of a virgin, 100% real.
00:28:20
Speaker
Everything else is fake and make-believe. And often, i think it can be really hard to talk about these things because when people see you engaging with the conspiracy theory, they start discrediting anything you've ever said or done because now you're engaging in bunk science.
00:28:37
Speaker
This belief is what fueled a lot of my like ah novelette antenna. And the short story, for me, is becoming more and more real every day because when I was writing that, I was writing about conspiracy, paranoia, and truth.
00:28:52
Speaker
And because Monice was experiencing a different life because she's neurodivergent, she's disabled, she was quote unquote insane. But then you like have to start thinking about what our country thinks is sanity.
00:29:06
Speaker
And they're like, oh, people suffering because they don't have enough money eat. That's perfectly sane and reasonable. You know, killing people because of the color of their skin.
00:29:17
Speaker
That makes a lot of sense. Right. Spending 80 percent of our lives working, doing meaningless work to get permission to do things that like our ancient ancestors could just do, like make their own food, build their own shelter, fish and hunt. You have to get a license to fish and hunt.
00:29:32
Speaker
Right. Like the entire way that our society is structured is insane. And so from my point of view, I'm like, why is it so hard to believe in aliens, in mermaids, in dolphin communication?
00:29:46
Speaker
Like, why am I the crazy one for believing in this? I did like your idea that maybe we're all tapping into the same sort of downloads, right? Because when I'm thinking about aliens communicating telepathically, this was before I even heard of the children in Zimbabwe who said the aliens were communicating with them telepathically.
00:30:08
Speaker
I have read about this in intent. Well, actually came to me because I got really high. Yeah. And I was thinking about aliens who were communicating tele telepathically when I was really high. And so I wrote about that an Antenna in early 2023. And then a few months later, I read the same thing in The Sound of Stars by Alicia Dow.
00:30:27
Speaker
And then a lot of what I wrote about Antenna popped back up when you introduced me to the telepathy tapes in late 2024. and then they had an episode in that series, which reminded me about The Kindred by Alicia Dow, which I think Alicia Dow is onto something.
00:30:43
Speaker
But I'm like, maybe we're all tapping into the same sort of things. And so we're all sharing a similar message. I have to agree. Like, I have so many thoughts about everything.
00:30:55
Speaker
um but what ill ill I'll start by saying is that the people in power, the people that are benefiting from the way that our society currently exists, seem to continue to reinforce the things that we, again, have normalized the way that we don't believe certain things if we don't see it um or if we're not used to seeing. Because sometimes we see some things and then we will convince ourselves that we didn't see that thing simply because of the ways that we have been molded
00:31:32
Speaker
to respond to those types of experiences. And I'm so glad that you brought up religion because as you were talking, I was kind of like going back in my own experience and remembering the ways that my mom and my maternal grandmother would always say when it was time for me to go to college,
00:31:53
Speaker
The one thing that they made sure to tell me over and over was don't go there reading and like trying to learn things outside of what you're going to school for.
00:32:04
Speaker
You're going to school to get your education. You are not going to school to learn things outside of your religion. You know, you are not going there to learn anything outside of what you have been taught and how you've been raised.
00:32:17
Speaker
And so now when I self, when I like reflect back to growing up, It was just this very rigid belief system that was ingrained in me. And the hope and the goal was that I maintained that rigid belief system and anything that veered away from that or that differed from that, my response was supposed to be immediately discredit it, to ignore it and invalidate it.
00:32:43
Speaker
Instead of looking at it with a lens of curiosity, which is what we saw those Zimbabwean like children ah the children that were in Zimbabwe, they were looking at it from a viewpoint of curiosity.
00:32:56
Speaker
They had an experience and they were like, This is what I saw. i want to see the aliens again. Like I have questions. I'm sure they have questions for me, too. We know what we want to know.
00:33:07
Speaker
You know, like, how do we connect? What can we learn from each other? But the people in power have really ingrained in us that, like, it's not OK for us to be curious about the things that we've not been told. And even like, if you are curious, then you start questioning your sanity.
00:33:25
Speaker
And it's always the fear of like, if I reveal too much about what I've seen or experienced, they're going to disappear me. Like they're going to lock me up. Yeah. I mean, that's why our current power structure is trying to eliminate anything related to education, defunding the library. Like some of it is like,
00:33:46
Speaker
I keep trying to figure out like, how do y'all think this makes sense? Like, why is this considered wasteful? Anything that's meant to educate and support people. And it's funny because like ah parents will talk about kids getting indoctrinated. But the problem is they don't care about kids getting indoctrinated. They just don't want anybody else to do it.
00:34:07
Speaker
They want to be the ones to indoctrinate. And it's fascinating because if God, this is a spiritual podcast, so it's not even a matter of not believing in God or deities and that kind of thing. But if your religion, if it's so real, if you're so convicted by it, why are you trying so hard to like force everybody else to believe that?
00:34:36
Speaker
Like, why is a part of your Agenda to just force all of us to submit or conform to this. If it's supposed to be about free will, if you're, you know, it's so, it boggles my mind. And I also just...
00:34:53
Speaker
Kind of like what you mentioned, Leah, like, I actually don't think these people believe this stuff. I don't know what they believe. Because if I really, when I was a kid and probably the same thing for for you, Gray, i was scared. I was scared of going to hell. I did not want to be a bad person, actually. And anytime I did something, even as small as telling a lie, I felt horrible.
00:35:19
Speaker
So that's how i know these people aren't really convicted. By their religion like you really don't believe it because those of us even those of us that have been delivered from the indoctrination i can honestly say that religion has had a big part to do with my like the core of my like moral values even to this day.
00:35:43
Speaker
Even to this day, I can't pretend like that hasn't impacted it. so I agree. I do agree. i This also making me think about... Now I'm thinking about the telepathy tapes.
00:35:53
Speaker
I don't know how much the rest of the world knows about the telepathy tapes, but just quick summary, the telepathy tapes was a podcast or is a podcast that... Kind of a shining a light on autistic abilities to communicate telepathically.
00:36:08
Speaker
And there was a a part of that podcast, which one of the autistic um kids, I think it was a kid, if I'm remembering correctly. mentioned that we're kind of, and this is my own summary of what they said, but we're kind of just like making a lot of distractions in our conversations around like religion and God. And we're doing a lot, we're having a lot of conversations that are very divisive when we're all kind of talking about the same higher power.
00:36:40
Speaker
and it's not beneficial for us to like live in a communal way, to live in a way that is, in harmony with our each other as humans and also in harmony with the world, the earth around us.
00:36:53
Speaker
And I, again, i just think that the people that are in positions of control have a hand in that intentionally because it creates, again, it dev divides us. It puts us in places where we're Whenever we have what appears to be misalignment in our morals and our values, it just keeps us divided and disconnected in a way that I think, had we not had the level of influence from people in power, people with money, if we're going to be quite honest, maybe we would all be a little bit more connected together.
00:37:27
Speaker
Whether it would be telepathically, whether it would be connection to the earth, whether we'd be connecting to aliens, all of the above. Like, I think that those things are possible.
00:37:38
Speaker
Like you said, Leah, like there may be some truth to maybe we're receiving the same downloads, but ah there's a lot of things that are happening in the world that kind of keep us from leaning into those things and actually understanding what those things are.
00:37:53
Speaker
Which I just, it's quite unfortunate, if I must say. Something else i really liked about the telepathy tapes was kind of how it expanded beyond just telepathy with autistic people and their caregivers to like, there were people who were like, oh, you know, I can tune in, talk to people who are dead.
00:38:14
Speaker
I can also talk to animals and things like that.
Animal Resistance and Environmental Awareness
00:38:17
Speaker
And it really reminded me of like when I... used to be with my ex-husband and our cat.
00:38:25
Speaker
I was with her every single day for like five years. And i would notice certain things that she would do. And I would tell him, oh, she likes this. She doesn't like that. And he was like, how would you know? I'm like, because I'm with her all the time. She's constantly communicating with me.
00:38:41
Speaker
She doesn't say, hey, I like this, but like her body language would change. It's like, or Or she would, she's very vocal, so she would just start meowing or things like that to show that she liked or didn't like something.
00:38:53
Speaker
So it was like, you can non-verbally communicate with people and with animals. Like, that is a type of communication. But I think oftentimes, because we live in this society that views, like...
00:39:07
Speaker
Language as the most important view, like nonverbal people as not people. That kind of also translates to animals. If they can't communicate with you in the same way, they're not as intelligent as you are.
00:39:21
Speaker
And something I thought was really interesting was a few years ago when the orcas were attacking the yachts. I was looking it up for this show and it said that since 2020, a group of juvenile orcas, also known as Iberian killer whales, have rammed into boats near the Iberian Peninsula at least 673 times.
00:39:42
Speaker
The attacks have primarily targeted medium-sized sailboats under 12 meters long, focusing on their spade rudders. This behavior has caused at least seven vessels to sink.
00:39:54
Speaker
And Robert Powell, who was a British yachtsman whose yacht went down, said that these orcas were not playing. And he described the attack as well organized and coordinated in a social media post. And I was like, no, because they know what's going on. They know what's happening to this planet. And they're tired of it too.
00:40:13
Speaker
And they are taking action. But like, whenever I say that people think that I'm crazy, but I'm like, no, they know what's going on. They are on this planet too. And they are fighting back. They know what's going on.
00:40:25
Speaker
Okay. I watched our oceans. I don't know if y'all know about our oceans on Netflix. Um, Obama, I believe produced and narrated our oceans.
00:40:38
Speaker
And I was thinking the same thing. If you watch and you just kind of observe the way that the animals in the ocean are existing, they are accomplishing the same things that we're accomplishing in a world where we prioritize verbal communication.
00:40:52
Speaker
i don't know when we got to the the point where we said English, spoken language is superior, but there are so many forms of communication happening and so many forms of life that are achieving so many things without the level of spoken and communication that we have. You're right. They know what's going on.
00:41:16
Speaker
so get to the thing about orcas and like animals communicating One thing I'm starting to be convinced of is that environmental disaster is going to precede human-led revolution, particularly in the United States.
00:41:35
Speaker
Because we're too, like a lot of people are just too but brainwashed. And I think it's starting with the animals, like the fact that there are certain ocean animals that have never been seen that are coming to the top because of environmental shit.
00:41:49
Speaker
I really feel like the animals and like non-human, specifically non-human animals are really going to be the thing that like pushes things over the edge because we are destroying their habitats and stuff and their ability to be alive.
00:42:07
Speaker
And that might be the thing that forces us to all have to work together against the rich and put aside our hate.
Technology's Disconnection from Nature
00:42:15
Speaker
Now, of course, there'll be a few that have to get hairy to open. There are going to be a few that can't come because they are just too committed to being hateful and nasty.
00:42:24
Speaker
But then they're going to be the ones that genuinely want to stay alive and they know they need the people who have struggled the most in this country or they're going to die because we know how to survive. But yeah, I'm not the first person to say this. People are always saying this. The the earth will heal.
00:42:40
Speaker
It will purge us if it needs to and recalibrate. And so when I think about those kids talking about the trees falling and there being no air, I think that is the earth shutting down, getting rid of us.
00:42:56
Speaker
And then it's going to come right back. It's going to come right back. we And maybe a different iteration of humanity will come. But off of that tangent, also want to address the communication thing because that's so true. And it um this idea that verbal communication is superior does connect to pete the way people see animals and sort of this lack of value people put in animals.
00:43:21
Speaker
People really don't see animals differently. They don't see trees. Trees also communicate. This is a scientific, like it's been proven by scientists that trees communicate and they communicate with each other.
00:43:35
Speaker
But people don't see these things as living beings, although trees, for one, are the reason we're alive. i don't understand why anybody would be okay with trees being chopped down.
00:43:47
Speaker
But when you truly don't believe trees, that we're all in the ecosystem. You really believe Trump gonna be the one to keep us alive or you're some politician, Democrat, Republican, whatever. None of them people can keep us alive.
00:44:00
Speaker
The earth has to. This is the thing at its core that we have to take care of, the animals. When animals start going extinct, especially in 2025, like niggas need to be scared.
00:44:11
Speaker
Although I'm convinced a lot of them not, they just hiding. Child, I just know them trees be looking at us like, just y'all wait. Cause we about to turn the oxygen off in about 10, 15 years. Okay.
00:44:24
Speaker
Like, yeah, I don't know. I'm concerned, though, because I feel like technological advances is getting to a scary point for me.
00:44:37
Speaker
I'm kind of, like, in a place where... I'm super connected, you know, with the internet and with technology. But because of the time period that I was born and raised in, I still have some level of attachment to the world before this big, like, advance in our internet access and things like that. And so I'm realizing that, like, there are a large number of people that actually don't know how to exist without
00:45:09
Speaker
the internet without technology and it reminds me of the statement one of the quotes that you read danny the kids were saying like we are abusing technology in a way that's going to be extremely destructive to our world and i've i've like been trying to make sense of that statement right like what does technology have to do with um the way that we're treating the world but I'm also realizing that technology is taking us away from our connection to the world around us.
00:45:40
Speaker
And therefore, we aren't even able to feed the world around us and allow the world around us to feed us because we just don't have any attachment or connection to it. like We're getting to a point where, man, we I feel like Danny, you and I were having this conversation recently where it was just like, kids don't even know how to play outside anymore.
00:46:01
Speaker
like Something as simple as A child knowing what to do when they're outside in nature is something that is not really in existence in the way that it used to be.
00:46:15
Speaker
Kids don't know how to hang out on a tree stump. Kids don't know how to go make a mud pie. Like there is just this level of disconnection to to nature that is very concerning with technological advances. It's making me want to get a flip phone and turn my internet off. It's also like polluting the planet. It's killing people. Like the fact that there's all these videos coming out of the ah Congo of these people having to pull each other out of
00:46:47
Speaker
These like holes that are literally it's almost like a landslide as they're mining for materials. And sometimes shit happens where everything will start sliding and they have to get people out of there. And sometimes it's people stuck in there.
00:47:02
Speaker
So as it's coming down, I literally saw a video as it was coming down. They were literally pulling workers out of the landslide. Children as well.
00:47:14
Speaker
Grown men. Little boys that don't even look like they weigh 90 pounds They ain't got no business out there No human does But y'all got babies out there And us in the Western of world A lot of people, they don't give a damn They don't give a damn It's all about luxury And I deserve this And I feel like it keeps coming up And stuff I'm reading Like this whole self-care shit And wrapping it up in capitalism Do you deserve nice things or do you deserve to live a, you know, a safe life, equitable life where you have everything you need? I don't know. I guess we, you know, I I'm trying to work on my language around that.
Critique of Capitalism and Global Relations
00:47:57
Speaker
You deserve to feel good.
00:47:59
Speaker
Let me say that we all deserve to feel good. Do you deserve nice things? Well, what's a nice things? What's nice things, beloved? The diamond ring? Like, these are meaningless things, especially when it's happening off the backs of other human beings that you have been programmed to believe are not as worthy of life as you.
00:48:20
Speaker
Or you've been convinced that, like, well, they're over there, so don't got to think about it. The kids over there being bombed, they hospice and shit, that's not us. Yet.
00:48:33
Speaker
Because right now, a lot of people not fucking with the United States. And a lot of and and I think people think like, well, we gonna be okay. They wanna be us. We the Beyonce of the world. We're not.
00:48:45
Speaker
We're not. Heavy on the yet. Y'all not concerned that all of Europe is banning together against us? We here because of Europe. They started this shit.
00:48:58
Speaker
Beta David Ruffman, what you talking about? like
00:49:03
Speaker
I think something else that people forget is like the U.S. s has the largest military in the world. And I think a lot of people are like, oh, if something bad happens here, somebody is going to come and save us. It's like nobody's going to fight the U.S. military to save us. Like we are...
00:49:21
Speaker
By ourselves. Yeah. We may have the largest, but child. For now, for now, you pissing off everybody. We can't take the whole world. We simply can't.
00:49:32
Speaker
With the stuff that I've been reading in the news and the fact that I was in tears earlier, y'all either come get me. Or let me be. No, but all of this is is honestly making me think of like, what is it that we can do?
00:49:47
Speaker
Given that there have been some like very clear messages, whether it's be from the aliens or, you know, from our ancestors or the earth or whatever, telling us that like,
00:50:02
Speaker
destruction is on the horizon babes what you gonna do like it makes me wonder like what is it that I can do to be intentional with the way that I'm connecting with um all forms of life around me with the people that are in my life with the animals that are in my life with the earth that is near me like how can I be really really intentional so that I can I don't know do my part because the kids kind of ate when they said you know we have work to do We do. It's not just the kids. Like, shout out to the kids being in a place where the veil really is thin and they can receive those messages and believe what they're being told.
00:50:44
Speaker
um But us as adults, like we're also in a position where, you know, maybe we can be intentional to to try to get that connection back that the kids do have. Because we we can, if we really work to do it.
00:51:01
Speaker
But we gotta we gotta to do something that is something that feels a little bit different from what the rest of society is doing so that we can actually, don't know, make some type of meaningful meaningful change and strides to really love on the earth in the in the same way that the earth has really been. Honestly, this is a toxic relationship that we have with the earth and the earth has given us far too many chances.
00:51:25
Speaker
We need to do better. Yeah, we gonna have to get off line. Ugh. Y'all can just be mad. Y'all gonna have to put the phones down and talk to each other. i agree, honestly, with both of y'all. I have been trying to get more offline, deleting my social media accounts.
00:51:44
Speaker
Because I do think that, like, i don't want to say technology will be the end of us, but it is very destructive, not just to...
Call for Environmental Action
00:51:52
Speaker
Not just to the earth, but to our relationships with each other.
00:51:56
Speaker
and so, yeah, when I think about the message that the kids have, especially in terms of like, we need to get it together. We're not going to be here for very much longer. Yeah, that's basically it. We got to get together.
00:52:08
Speaker
i mean, same. um Disconnecting from the internet is hard, honey, but it's given addiction and and I need to be intentional with the way that with the relationship that I have with the internet.
00:52:19
Speaker
I think one of the ways that really feels like it's just extremely fulfilling, especially for someone who... like thrives on connection.
00:52:31
Speaker
For me, it's been feeling really good to just have these really in-person connections and using the internet for connection, kind of like this, like having opportunities to have conversations like this when I am engaging with technology and the internet and when I'm not like finding ways to really connect in person. And don't know, I want to go back to, i want to go back to the old days. Like,
00:52:54
Speaker
Where I am maybe sitting on a tree stump playing hide and seek with my friends. Like more of that. More of that and more joy because also don't want to enter a space where I'm so anxious about the potential destruction that's on the horizon where I'm not allowing myself to just exist i think like that's what i want more people to do is like yo let's just exist again like let's exist out there in the real world again we don't have to exist on the internet even if we're not doing all this major let's repair the trees and heal the go outside and exist talk to people you know and enjoy and eat and commune and all the things because those are things that
00:53:39
Speaker
A lot of us, especially from the South, we grew up doing that. Having Sunday dinners, like having meals together, laughing, cackling. More of that, please. That is all I want.
00:53:50
Speaker
Amen. That's what we're going have to do. And that's what we'll eventually be forced to do. I'm trying to keep the faith. I'm trying to keep the faith because I'm convinced that A part of our undoing is going to be moving backwards and reclaiming or rediscovering new ways of being alive that are not so attached to technology. Because eventually, like this technology movement is almost trying to phase humanity out.
00:54:23
Speaker
It's almost trying to phase us out. You're taking people's stories for the AI training. You like it's just kind of like, well, what what is our purpose at that point when you're taking everything and putting it into technology and trying to reproduce it that way?
00:54:40
Speaker
So, yeah, I pray we all find our way back to the ways of our ancient ancestors. I'm glad you mentioned that, Leah. I really do. Pray that we do that. And yeah, that's it for today. If you like this episode, you can like, rate, and review Who Do Plant Mamas on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
00:55:00
Speaker
If anything from the show resonated with you, make sure to share it with us on social media. You can find us on Instagram at Who Do Plant Mamas. Thank you for listening and we'll see you in the next episode. Bye, y'all. Bye. Peace out.