On December 21, 2012, a while ago, we woke for the last time.
The sky will be shadowed with gray clouds tinged a blood-red on a day the sun will not rise. A large celestial body, be it a comet or planet Nibiru, will come hurtling down as we watch helplessly. Conquest, War, Famine, and Death, shall ride their steeds in the sky, harbingers of the last judgment. This is the end — or so our sadistic minds have fantasized.
The day of the Mayan Apocalypse has come without a substantial contribution of actual Mayan thought in the so-called prophecy. Truth is, sadly, that this is the creation ofthe 21st Century Western world, and the hapless Mayan civilization has been used for the effect of mysticism in this propaganda.
What have the Mayans done? Nothing, other than making a Mayan Calendar that lasts 1,872,000 days, just as ours lasts 365 days.
Imagine, as you already have, that our civilization be wiped out tomorrow, and a hundred years from now aliens come to discover our planet and find a warehouse that has stocked calendars up to the year 2200. The aliens would then proceed to make cults, documentaries, and films dedicated to the year 2200, claiming it to be the end of the world. Absurd? Yet that is exactly what we have done.
Perhaps it begs the question, does anyone really believe in these prophecies? NASA scientist David Morrison is the man tasked with debunking these apocalypse rumors and affirms the ludicrousness of it all; he also receives messages from people who have considered killing themselves and their children just because the world will be ending, in a euthanasiac sort of manner.
This year has already borne two predictions proven wrong. One is from the leader of the Growing Grace Ministry, a supposed antichrist; he predicted the end of days to be on June 30, 2012. The leader of another religious sect, The Church of God, preparing For the Kingdom of God, claimed it to be on May 27, 2012. A few years ago, a certain Bible code also touted the year 2012 as the end of days, before it was rescheduled.
Of equal fame to the current Mayan scenario was the Y2K prophecy phenomenon back in the year 2000. Other than a few malfunctioning computers caused by faulty programming, civilization went through the turn-of-the-century without a hitch.
Despite the common recurrence of false prophecies, we embrace the fear of new prophecies on a relatively frequent basis. It also warrants the question, why are we so quick to jump on the apocalypse wagon?
Apocalypse theories are a staple of pop culture as they are both pop, and integrate weird elements of culture together. This is evident in the multitude of zombie-themed television shows, alien invadsion sci-fi literature, and all other nihilistic psuedo-dystopian projections of how humanity can in truth destroy itself, or be destroyed. These themes sell and are a reflection of our interests. So perhaps the thought of the world ending might actually appeal to us, as masochistic as that may sound, as it could mean a flight from the problems of this world.
Literature professor Erika Carreon conjectures that the appeal to dystopian worlds or settings may be cathartic; take, for instance, the case of a zombie apocalypse. Most versions “involve you just hacking and slashing without conscience at the undead. As opposed to, say, a war, or any other calamity, that makes you question your moral compass.” It might be deduced that we enjoy the thought of a breakdown in a system that we secretly loathe, and an apocalypse could be the escape we need.
She cites Frank Kermode’s concept of the Middest, to describe our lives. “We’re cut off from the past and present, so we make up ‘plots’ for our lives. It’s what Kermode called a ‘recti-linear’ way of looking at time and the end. Knowing that the world will end, say, on December 21, 2012 beats not knowing the particulars. No matter how gruesome, people look to prophecies because we don’t like being blindsided or we’d like to think there’s some sort of ‘plan’ or path.”
Regardless of the reason why we might think of ourselves as suffering in the near future, a prominent part of society will continue to follow these prophecies of a world ending, or of humanity giving a last push for survival. It’s too soon to say that another batch of apocalypses has been debunked this 2012.
The night, after all, has yet to pass.
