# Betty and Barney: It's weirder than you think **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 5, 2012, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792 "2012-03-05T06:16:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/1 "2012-03-05T06:16:18Z")
Ever since I learned about Betty and Barney [Hill](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barney_Hill), I’ve vaguely assumed, without really thinking about it, that the creators of _The Flintstones_ named Betty and Barney Rubble after them, as some sort of obscure pop-culture homage. Today, while puttering around the internet, it finally occurred to me to check out whether my assumption had ever been confirmed. What I found, though, blew my mind: Betty and Barney Rubble came first. _The Flintstones_ [premiered](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flintstones) in 1960, while the Hills reported that they were abducted in 1961. Do you all understand what this means? The aliens were working in Hollywood, and they already had their eyes (their big featureless gray eyes) on the Hills by 1960! This puts the introduction of the Great Gazoo into a whole different perspective. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/2 "2012-03-05T06:19:21Z")
I’m the reverse: I didn’t realize until just now that Betty and Barney Hill were their real names. I’d assumed they were pseudonyms to protect the real people’s privacy and they took the names from the cartoon characters. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/3 "2012-03-05T17:02:56Z")
Apparently her given name was Eunice, and she went by Betty. Just a weird coincidence. ---
**Author:** ![Enderw24](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba9def/32.png) [@Enderw24](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enderw24)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/4 "2012-03-05T17:37:41Z")
I’m the reverse reverse. I’d never heard of Betty and Barney Hill. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/5 "2012-03-05T17:47:40Z")
I’m the reverse reverse reverse. Who’re Betty and Barney Rubble? ---
**Author:** ![Sister\_Vigilante](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@Sister\_Vigilante](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sister_Vigilante)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/6 "2012-03-05T17:55:32Z")
In the interest of fighting ignorance (unless I’m being whooshed), Betty and Barney Hill claimed to have been abducted by a UFO. Betty and Barney Rubble are characters from The Flintstones, and old cartoon show. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/7 "2012-03-05T18:05:51Z")
[QUOTE=Inner Stickler] Who’re Betty and Barney Rubble? [/QUOTE] Betty was not a who’re. I don’t care what Rush Limbaugh says. Did anybody see the movie with Estelle Parsons and James Earl Jones? From what I’ve read it was a fairly accurate depiction of their claims. Of course it was a made for TV movie in the '70s when von Danichen was getting book so it does little to show the skeptical side. My cousin lives near Portsmouth and knows quite a few people who knew Betty (Barney died a long time ago) and none of them doubt her intelligence or her honesty; even if they don’t believe her story they believe she believed it. The notion that people only tell the truth under hypnosis is a strangely prevalent one. It happens all the time- even if they really are hypnotized it’s a dreamlike state and it’s easy to confuse memories and imagination. I have no way of knowing obviously if this happened with the Hills, but does anybody remember the past life regression craze where people routinely _knew_ they were Elizabeth I and or Ramses II in their past lives because they remembered it under hypnosis? ---
**Author:** ![well\_he\_s\_back](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/3ab097/32.png) [@well\_he\_s\_back](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/well_he_s_back)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/8 "2012-03-05T18:13:31Z")
Sampiro - those crazes/fads will live forever in Shirley MacLaine’s autobiographies. I think she believed she experienced all that crap. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/9 "2012-03-05T18:21:52Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > The notion that people only tell the truth under hypnosis is a strangely prevalent one. It happens all the time- even if they really are hypnotized it’s a dreamlike state and it’s easy to confuse memories and imagination. I have no way of knowing obviously if this happened with the Hills, but does anybody remember the past life regression craze where people routinely _knew_ they were Elizabeth I and or Ramses II in their past lives because they remembered it under hypnosis? In addition, the Hills’s psychologist, who did the hypnotizing, never believed they were reporting actual events. There were some psychological issues involved (they were a mixed-race couple at a time when that was even illegal in some states) and he figured the alien contact story was a way of them working out their issues. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/10 "2012-03-05T23:02:14Z")
I saw the movie when I was around eight years old, and it Freaked. Me. Out. I mean, what the hell; a black person was married to a white one? Kidding. The reenactment (so to speak) of the abduction scared the bejeezus out of me. As far as the hypnosis goes, apparently Barney changed his story several times under hypnosis, presumably from Betty pressing him to remember things the way she did. Investigators have correlated some of the details he added later, such as the aliens having “wraparound” eyes, to TV and movies that he’d recently seen. ---
**Author:** ![furryman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/furryman/32/99_2.png) [@furryman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furryman)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/11 "2012-03-06T01:51:48Z")
I’m totally clueless. I always thought Betty and Barney Rubble had been abducted by aliens. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-and-barney-its-weirder-than-you-think/614792/12 "2012-03-06T02:02:33Z")
It would be much weirder if their names were Hank and Peggy. (the UFO people, not the Rubbles)