“Does this have anything to do with Brandon taking bribes from the chicoms?”
Yes. These aliens are the weeds described by Jesus in Matthew 13. They are working through the CCP.
They have no compassion, sympathy, empathy, or emotion as their souls are missing an important aspect of consciousness. Thus they are weeds as their souls cannot grow.
They are not in physical bodies and are attaching to humans to hide on a mass scale.
They create an emotional mass hysteria in humans so they can move in as the logical aspect.
It works very similar to hypnosis where a person suppresses their logical aspect of consciousness and attaches/surrenders their emotional consciousness to another person/leader blindly, without discernment as they have no logical consciousness of their own.
They create an emotional mass hysteria in humans so they can move in as the logical aspect.
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I thought that was the job of the media.
By indwelling these complex human sensor mechanisms (like putting on a kind of suit if you will), aliens can not only see, hear, feel, and smell this planet, they can comprehend it with a vast array of emotions, drives/ambitions, fears, loves/hates, loyalties, betrayals, etc. And don't forget the sexual experience, which BTW seems to dominate much of the alien abduction experience.
As you mention, the aliens' lack of emotion makes this world seem flat to them. It is human emotions that bring it alive...and that is what they want. They want to co-exist inside of us so that they can share our passions (including compassion, sympathy, empathy) for life.
They want something we have that they don't have...life itself.