[lagrange77]

Everybody knows that. You contact NASA. Then a black helicopter will pick you up, bring you to an airbase and fly you straight to the white house, where you will be introduced to the actual truth, while a team of very excited scientists with biohazard suits praise and examine the artefact. If you're still sceptical, they will take you to a large hidden hangar in the middle of the desert and show you around.

[reactordev]

You forgot the part where Brent Spiner shows up and tells you they have one and asks if you want to meet it.

[spiderfarmer]

Can’t take any US action movie seriously anymore. Not because of plotlines like this, but because they portray the team at the white house as somewhat capable.

You have to suspend your disbelief harder at the 8 o’clock news nowadays.

[lagrange77]

Watch Don't look up, if you haven't yet, it's brilliant.

[spiderfarmer]

I did. It’s depressingly realistic.

[sph]

I guess I'm not be reading the same type of science fiction.

You contact NASA because you found a meteorite with clear signs of alien life, a black helicopter will pick you up, you get put in a dark cell, interrogated, and then told to forget all about it or G-Men will disappear your family. You try to sell the news to mass media, but rumours start to spread about you. Your life work get discredited, you lose your job and family, end up wandering the streets in an alcohol daze muttering about aliens.

I guess it depends if you've drank the kool aid about the US government being the good guys, or not.