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Ignorance and fear teach us who to trust
By Deborah Taylor-Hollis
I have always wondered just how any individual can weigh who they should trust and who they should shun. I think of this when I'm wondering about advice on banking and retirement, shopping for cars, looking at houses to buy, debating medical information/procedures/medications, etc. To trust all the information you receive is ludicrous, and to become jaded and leery of everyone is depressing and tiring.
How do we sort out the good guys from the bad? How do we decide who is smart and who is stupid but talks a good game? How can we, the ignoble middle class, weigh out the possibilities when we are trying to tell which people we should listen to and which we should laugh at? I have found at least one measurement--Y2K.
I'm talking of course about the millennial fears--built on information, superstition, historical bigotry, theological fraud and ignorance, and of course, greed. There are people who believe that the world as we know it will end on New Year's Eve of this year. There are more people that believe that the world--or parts of it--will temporarily fail, and society will go berserk on that same date. There are also people who believe that everything will be fine except for their airplanes (or elevators, or satellites, or poodles--pick one) so they are also slightly scared.
I have found it interesting that the people writing the books (which have made all the money), and the people selling all the survival supplies (and making all the money) and the people shouting all the fear from the rooftops are also the most religious members of society--including several major religious names we all know. At least one of them is so afraid that the world is coming to an end that he has written six books about how everything will fail due to computers at the end of 1999, and how turning to God is the only way. But he isn't giving these books away; he is selling them; which leads me to question just how much he wants to save us all versus how much he wants to save in a bank in Switzerland.
I had some fears about old chips in foreign countries going off at the turn of the century , but the more I thought about just how bad things are already over there, the less I worried. The Soviet Union's nuclear arsenal isn't in danger--it was all stolen by Communist leaders years ago and sold off to the middle eastern terrorists (who have already disassembled it all into easy to use bombs without technology they can't understand). The Chinese apparently stole all their technology from our most up-to-date arsenal, so they're already Y2K compliant. Any other important chips out there are probably wired up to video games, so unless you are a Game Boy addict, have no fear.
The airplane thing is also probably cured in the US, and there aren't going to be that many of us flying on January 1, 2000, so hey, why worry about that? Same thing with elevators--very few people ever find themselves in one at the stroke of midnight to begin with, so there isn't that much of a problem.
I'm going to use the survivalist/ fear monger index to decide whom to trust in the coming millennium. It's a pretty simple system. If you, your family, or your company spent money to buy homes or shelters far from the public, then you are not someone I think I need to consult for anything more complicated than nail polish colors.
If you made any money by selling products, books, manuals, clothing, or time-shares to people under the guise of helping them get ready for Y2K, then I will not only shun your advice, but will actively spit upon you for talking advantage of gullible, sheep-like airheads that can be easily led and are pitifully uneducated. If you identify with that last group I mentioned--well, you know what to do.
Yes, the end of the world is coming--and people have been warning about the end of it all at every major number change since 1 to 2. Change scares people. Any time someone gets nervous about anything there will always be someone there to take advantage.
We've had some problems--there will be some glitches. Get over it. If the world is really going to blow up, there is only one question--do you want to survive and spend the next century with the hucksters, the survivalists and the nuts? Nah--if the world really is going to end, I would rather not be around to watch, thanks anyway. And when we do survive, I will have a bone to pick with a few of you--you know who you are.
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Willow Glen, California Since 1992
