I am sure that all of you out there were breathing a huge sigh of relief on Sunday, May 22nd (SIGH!!!), given that the world once again narrowly avoided yet another doomsday. If you were not basking in a new second chance at existence you were probably nursing the mother of all pre-apocalypse party hangovers. I mean sure, every ounce of common sense and every expert said the chance of Harold Camping being right were nil, but why would I trust a bunch of hyper-educated, elitist hippies, when I have the word of a simple man of God, who happened to take in $18 million in donations since his announcement. Please, why continue to live everyday as it is my last when I can lock myself away and spend months/years worrying about some arbitrary date based on questionable interpretations of ancient texts.
Now back to reality. Everyone had their fair share of fun with the latest Doomsday prophecy. Without a doubt most of us were ambivalent about the day, but the day itself and the creator of the prediction served as the perfect straight men for a host of witty Facebook and Twitter posts. My fellow coaches and I had a good five minutes of witty banter as we were waiting to load up the bus for our County Open track meet. Most of us were disappointed, we figured Rapture would be a good for at lest an extra few days off. Of course, true to the American capitalism-at-all-costs spirit, many establishments and individuals capitalized on Rapture furor. Between people going to bars to attend Rapture themed events, people selling everything they owned in preparation of the End of Days, and the millions donated to Camping's radio station, never has the quote from 16th century British poet Thomas Tusser rang more true - "A fool and his money are soon parted"*.
(*This is a modern English translation of the original quote)
All the laughs and witty repertoire aside, this incident brings up a growing trend in modern America; complete blind adherence to the most absurd theories regardless of the gargantuan mountains of evidence to the contrary. I have had students in my class that constantly talk about the Illuminati, the their involvement in everything from faking the moon landing, to 9/11, to murdering Tupac Shakur. Of course when I ask about their evidence the response is always the same, "some website". Since research is a focus of my classes I want them to look logically at their sources, so the questions begin: "Who created the site?" "What ideology do they subscribe to?" "What sources do they site?". Needless to say I have yet to meet the student who is able to locate the answer to any of these questions. I completely understand and accept this from teenagers, especially with the sheer mountains of information they have just at their fingertips. They are still learning how to sort the "garbage" from the "gold" online. The real issue is when adults, especially the so-called educated ones, buy into irrational ideas with little or no evidence for support.
The reason this phenomena is occurring far too often is twofold:
1) The Internet and easy access to computers has made it easy for the most mentally disturbed and most gullible denizens of our planet to connect. Like Hershey perfected the marriage of chocolate and peanut butter in that wonderful morsel known as the Reese's Cup, the Internet has brought forth the greatest union of our day, "crazy and gullible". Oh how con men worldwide have rejoiced at their great fortune.
2) There is an anti-intellectual fever sweeping the country. After all if I insist that dinosaurs did not exist, how dare some snot-nosed fancy talking intellectual, whom spent over a decade studying everything they can about palaeontology in order to devote the majority of their life to it, tell me that they have so called "evidence" (i.e. hundreds of thousands of fossils) that proves me wrong.
Combine these two phenomena and you have thousands of stubborn, easily frightened individuals willing to throw in their time and money in order to combat the serious issues facing us in contemporary society, you know, like stopping the evil free masons from controlling our government or discovering what secret island the Illuminati are using to hide Elvis, Biggie Smalls, Tupac, and Michael Jackson.
Many ask, "What harm are they doing?" "Who cares what the views of a few weirdos are?", but here is the real question, "What good could they be doing with their time, energy and money?" Instead of printing thousands of pamphlets and spending absurd amounts of money on billboards, imagine what else Harold Camping could have done with the nearly $75 million dollars he has raised since his last epic fail at predicting Armageddon (in 1994). How many malnourished children could have been given a months worth of food? How many college dreams could he have made come true for financially struggling students? How many inner city rec centers could have been refurbished and fully stocked with everything they need to help the children in their community? Imagine what the people of Joplin, Missouri could do with an additional $18 million dollars right now.
If I have taken anything away from the numerous "end of the world" scares that I have endured in my life, it is this - there are enough real threats to mankind, climate change, natural disasters, over population, dwindling resources, etc.. We do not need to make up imaginary threats - but the Mayan calendar ends on December 21st, 2012, and they predicted the end of the world (just like every other ancient religion or culture), so it must mean that the world will end on that exact date.
The message is simple be thankful for the physical and mental gifts you have and use the time you have on this world to make it a little better. I started Sunday morning at 4:45 am with a 13 mile run (as I prepare for the Marine Corp Marathon) and then spent the afternoon with friends from work kayaking in the NJ Pine Barrens. I then spent the evening in the company of my two favorite ladies, my wife Lisa and our always entertaing cat, Chloe. I always remind myself while doing these activities how lucky I am and remember to just enjoy those moment. There was a moment on the kayak trip where our group was spread out and nobody was really talking much; I remember looking and listening to the serene surrounding and realizing how many people go through life so focused on the unknowable and uncontrollable, only to miss out on moments like this.
Instead of spending every minute worrying about when our world is going to end, and even looking forward to it, and which nefarious secret organization is planning world domination (some of these groups have apparently been working toward that goal for over 200 years - making them the most patient and worst organized arch villians in the history of the world), try making the world you live in a better place and enjoying the little corner of the world that you are lucky enough to call your own.
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