If you haven’t heard the doomsday theories about 2012, you’re living under a rock. Or you’re Kent, who also didn’t know what the hell I was talking about when I pitched this article idea. Or maybe you’re living in a beautiful fantasy world, blissfully ignorant of all of the painfully stupid people that surround us. They’re everywhere, and they’re killing me.
So what is this whole 2012 thing, besides the premise to a new apocaplyptic Roland Emmerich film? Well, you’ve heard of the Mayans, right? Yeah, those people that sacrificed people in crazy ways in order to appease their gods. I know, I thought Benny Hinn was bad. Anyway, apparently these people were real legit astronomers or something. When they got bored with disemboweling people and cutting out their hearts while they were still alive, they made up this sweet calender that has a cycle that ends on December 21, 2012. No one knows how or why, except that it has something to do with the sun coming into alignment with the center of the Milky Way. My first thought was “that’s stupid, they didn’t have Milky Ways back then.” Turns out it’s even dumber than that. No one has any real justifications about why they think that the end of this Mayan cycle signals doom, death, and destruction. Seriously. It’s just when the cycle ends, and people have interpreted that as meaning Mother Earth is finally going to get fed up with us crapping on her all the time and is just going to explode or something. I feel like I remember another ominous date that spawned lots of doomsday talk. And lots of end of the world movies? Hmmm… Seems pretty recent. What was that?
Oh yeah.
Well that theory was totally true, right? I mean, we’re living in the post-apocalypse now, Mad Max style. I just went on a raid with my bros to get some diesel for our huge monster bus city that has spikes on it and is perpetually covered in dust. And we all wear leather clothes we made from animals we killed and ate, and we’ve got crazy hair cuts. And Mel Gibson is cool again. Right? Right?
Nope. The end of the world didn’t come around when our calenders danced into the 2000’s. Nothing happened, actually. Computers didn’t crash, airplanes didn’t fall out of the sky, and everyone is still pretty wary of Mel Gibson. So why is it that people are putting stock in yet another crackpot doomsday prediction? Especially if scholars – you know, dudes that read and write books on the subject – say things like “There is no serious scholar who puts any stock in the idea that the Maya said anything meaningful about 2012.”
The same reason that the Texan saying “Beware of the direction of the herd” is so pertinent. People are just awfully, awfully stupid. They get together and watch TV, hear these completely baseless fear-inducing theories and then they just poop in their pants and jump right on the poopy-pants bandwagon. And what’s the justification about it? “Well, the Mayan calendar was right about a lot of other stuff.” Like what? Anyone got any answers? Show me a Mayan scholar that talks about how the Mayan calendar predicted anything that has happened, and I’ll get right on board with you. There’s nothing I want more than an apocalyptic scenario. I want to buy a shotgun, board up my windows, and start my own community of post-apocalyptic badasses that bring justice and badassness to the new apocalyptic frontier. I really want that. I just have this thing that prevents me from buying into this crap. It’s called a brain. So please people, before you start hoarding bottled water and canned foods, check your damn sources and do a little research. It’s this kind of fear-mongering zombieism that ruins our society. Don’t be an idiot.
And you really should read this article. It’s what inspired my righteous indignation.
Image care of B. McGunigal at www.leapfrog-designs.com
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