This panic reminds me of two events: the “clown panic” of 2016 and an incredibly odd car accident in 2023. The former was certainly a phenomenon fueled by the internet. In the US, UK, and Australia, there were reports of clowns in places where clowns should not be.

These weren’t normal clowns either, they were scary “It” style clowns. There was one sighting, then another, then the clowns were everywhere. The internet seemed to shovel fuel this coulrophobic panic, but there were never any armies of clowns.

Halloween and costume stores pulled clown outfits from the shelves, even McDonald’s issued a statement saying that their mascot was going to have a lower profile.

To be clear, there were some actual clown sightings, but we must understand their context. The very first was in 2013 and the “scary” clown was a character in a movie being filmed then.

Most of the reported sightings amounted to nothing and, for those in which the police did find a clown, there was no crime involved. Reports of clowns luring children into the woods or the sewers (which is the actual first murder in Stephen King’s book “It”) were judged to be fictional. Then, it just stopped.

With the panic over the drones, I want to know what people who are panicking think is going on. Rather than telling people there’s nothing to worry about, I’ve been asking people this question.

The only thing causing the panic was the reporting of it. In this case, the lights in the sky were just lights in the sky. They were not doing anything other than being in the sky.