Books: It Can’t Be People

It Can’t Be People:
Voices From the Inner Circle

By ‘Citizen D’
Independently Published (Kindle edition, £5.00)

‘I was floundering, and riled up at what I thought was another of our crew, flanking me but doing fuck all… but it wasn’t. It was the template of a man. Then we were toe to toe, and nose to nose… or we would have been if he’d have had one! Terrified, I lunged at it with my board, only for it to go straight through “him”. Then “he” kind of powderised, and “dispersed”…’

Since circle makers first set down their experiences in ink I have read of unexpected, odd and potentially anomalous occurrences in the fields. I’ve also been given first-hand accounts of them: sightings of red and orange lights; white flashes in the sky; tall figures and large, shadowy dogs; linear time seeming out of joint.

Weird shit happens out in the fields at night. Like it or not, it’s a matter of fact. But what do you do with that information?

It Can’t Be People, pulled together by former circle maker ‘Citizen D’, takes a selection of these tales as a means of suggesting there is a ‘“bigger picture” of interconnectivity’ between them’. He states these occurrences bear ‘all of the hallmarks of a genuine mystery’ which ‘is far deeper and more vital than the comparative mundanity of ‘aliens’ or other baseless proposals.’

Or, to put it another way: there is a mystery in the Wiltshire fields that interacts with human circle makers, and the stories in this title aim to show that this mystery is real.

If this all sounds familiar, it’s because it is. This is classic new-school circle maker talk of the kind instigated by Matthew Williams. Through the years he has repetitively spoken of being consumed by a nocturnal urge to make crop circles, and of laying down one particular formation under the noses of croppies whilst veiled under a misty shield. It Can’t Be People is full of this sort of thing: disappearing hills, helicopters all but landing in crop circles in the darkness, nocturnal disorientation, balls of light, semi-opaque forms, strangers on high streets inexplicably wanting to talk about crop circles. You get the gist. If that’s your thing, and you just want the stories, then there’s plenty for you here.

But don’t let your brains fall out of your ears.

It Can’t Be People can, at times, be an unnecessarily tough read. The individual contributions can frequently feel a bit out of kilter and wordy, which makes me suspect the contributors’ own words have been jazzed up by AI or the author, and not necessarily for the better. For example, I’ve never met a circle maker who would say, ‘But it was a glorious day, and nothing Gothic or funereal can happen on a glorious day, right? The Mediterranean heatwave and my hubris just conflated the ludicrous assumption that I was invincible.’

Neither have I met a circle maker who would observe, ‘An ’empyrean brethren’ didn’t happen to acquire the same gizmos, at the same time! And also, contrary to what you may be told, the complexity, from basic to Byzantine, didn’t have to be propagated in increments, delicately, “so as not to freak us out!”’

Come on now. Just reading those two quotes makes my brain hurt. If the dialogue has been sexed up, a skeptical reader will wonder what else has.

Leading on from this, any book that builds an argument around unevidenced testimonies deserves to be questioned by its readers. There are accounts within It Can’t Be People that seem to stretch credulity; the most notable example being a maker who suggests he was assaulted by a crop circle:

‘“You can’t forbid me anything. I helped MAKE YOU!”, I ‘replied.’ THWACK!! I felt like I’d been belted round the back of the head with a shovel! I staggered back several steps, retched, and nearly threw up on the spot. There was no assailant to be seen.’

Now, I’m not suggesting ‘Citizen D’ made this up, but I have to ask if somebody did. I don’t buy this particular contribution for even half a second. It’s ludicrous. Being generous, someone with half a brain was trying to rationalise why they felt ill, albeit in a rather superstitious manner.

I also don’t believe that strange, spectacular ‘corkscrews’ of light appear for circle makers out in the fields on a regular or even remotely-regular manner. Indeed, the circle makers we know just laugh and shake their heads on this one.

Both examples above play in to the biggest criticism I have of the book and wider new-school crop circle philosophy: the placement of the makers at the centre of a wider mystery is no less fantastical, or ‘woo-woo’ than the lines offered by the extraterrestrial believers on the croppie scene past and present. They’re way more similar than they would care to admit. Both belief systems are grounded in faith, superstition and wishful thinking.

All in, It Can’t Be People is a collection of stories from the fields, some of which are less believable than others. Does it prevent evidence for some wider mystery? Not in my opinion. However, if you can stomach these tales in isolation, add salt and ignore the overarching theory that explains them, or if you’re just a collector of crop circle literature, then this title may be something that interests you.