2020 continues to barrel forward, and is now beginning to resemble an episode of Rick and Morty, having delivered a global pandemic, swarms of locusts, an invasion of “murder hornets,” Pentagon-approved footage of U.F.Os, and a green glow that recently appeared around Mars – now, the Loch Ness Monster is making an unexpected comeback.
The above photo, taken by tourist Steve Challice of South Hampton, has drummed up excitement among the monster-hunting community; author Roland Watson, who runs the Loch Ness Mystery blog, stated:
“If this is a genuine picture of a creature in Loch Ness, it would easily rank in the top three of all time.”
With all of these surreal events constantly simmering in the background, the appearance of the Loch Ness Monster seems almost expected. But, like so many of these unusual, clickbaity news stories, it’s just a meme, taken seriously by only the most dedicated of cryptozoologists.
And even they have their doubts. Watson went on to say:
“At this point, I am in an ongoing conversation with Steve as to the objections and concerns I have about this being a photoshop picture. So we will see where that takes us.”
Amusingly enough, Steve Challice never actually claimed this to be a photo of the Loch Ness Monster – he clearly describes the subject of the photo as a “big fish,” only posting it online so that others could help him identify the species.
“I started taking a couple of shots and then this big fish came to the surface and then went back down again … My guess would be that what I captured was a catfish or something like that. As seals get in from the sea then I expect that’s what it is and that would explain why these sightings are so few and far between.”
But the Loch Ness Monster has a history of dodgy photos blown out of proportion; one of the most famous images of the beast, the “Surgeon’s photograph,” was eventually admitted to be a mischievous prank, nothing more than a toy submarine, with the head and neck sculpted from wood putty.
This map shows the amount of cryptids lurking in the United States alone, lake monsters being significantly overrepresented; it’s easy to look into the murky waters of a lake and imagine a Lovecraftian entity lurking beneath.
Sadly, if the Loch Ness Monster were to exist in 2020, it would be more likely to be declared extinct, another victim of climate change, rather than randomly popping up to scare tourists.
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