SPIN Panel Session: ‘Aliens Exist’ Dr Louise Pears & Dr Anna Miller

SPIN is delighted to welcome new speakers to our next SPIN Panel Session of 2026.

On 13th May, 3-4.30pm (UK time) we will be joined by:

The event will be held online, through Zoom. Please email secrecyresearch@gmail.com for an invite link.

This paper examines the intersection of security, knowledge, power, and popular culture, focusing on how security information is concealed and disclosed. On June 25, 2021, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released the “Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena,” also known as the UFO report. It detailed 140 cases of “unexplained” unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs) and suggested they might pose a threat to US flight safety and national security. The report, based on a 2019 hearing which referenced three videos initially released by the New York Times and To The Stars Academy of Arts & Sciences (TTSAAS), led by Tom DeLonge of the pop-punk band Blink-182. DeLong celebrated his involvement with merchandise that said “Tom was f****ing right: aliens exist”. Yet in the report various explanations for the UAPs were proposed including classified US military projects or technology from foreign entities like China or Russia but excluding extraterrestrial life. This paper explores how DeLong, a known conspiracy theorist and singer of “Aliens Exist,” became part of a US military disclosure and its implications for the dissemination of information. Ultimately, it seeks to enhance our understanding the complex relationships between culture, knowledge, power, and security.

Dr. Louise Pears is an Associate Professor in Global Security and Gender in the School of Politics and International Studies at Leeds University, UK. Her research interests are in feminist security studies, popular culture and world politics, race and postcolonial international relations, critical terrorism studies, and research methods. What underlies all of these areas is an interest in the everyday practices of world politics. She also writes and works on critical feminist pedagogy.

Dr. Anna Miller was awarded her PhD in Sociology and Social Policy in 2024, from the University of Leeds. Her work sits at the intersection of gender and disability studies, exploring the clinical and educational processes that enact the category of ADHD. Drawing on post-Foucauldian scholarship, she examines the institutional power arrangements that make diagnosis possible, and the regulation and management of disruptive behaviour that this allows. An interest in the sociology of knowledge informs her current work on secrecy and popular culture. She has worked on research projects in the field of disability and health and has been published in the Sociology of Health and Illness.