End of the World

Harold Camping, a name that we should all have heard of by now. Okay, maybe not, but almost everyone who is not living in a cave should have seen or heard about the May 21, 2011 end of the world prediction and Harold Camping was the guy behind that rumor. I always entertain a good end of the world idea/prediction. For starters, it breaks up the normal monotony of everyday life. I look at it  from a morbid curiosity point of view, "Really? Is this time going to be real?" Of course, they are all disappointingly wrong. All I am trying to say is, at a very minimum, whenever I hear another one of these, I'll at least look it up online to see what are the basis of said prediction. At this day and age, when everyone should at leas, if not a smart phone, why would anyone not look it up, especially those who are susceptible to such things. Evidently, most of my friends have no idea who Harold Camping is and know not much more than what's on the billboards -- May 21, 2011 will be the end of the world. Then again, most of them also paid no attention to the said date and time.

But for people who actually freaked out over the date, shouldn't they at least have Googled the prediction just once and find out what it's all about? At the very minimum, they would have realized that this person had already predicted and fail back in 1994, and take the May 21 date with a grain of salt... Originally, I only find the whole prediction thing entertaining, little do I know people will actually take it as far as quitting their jobs, giving their earthly possession away, or even commit suicides/homicides. Here's a few examples of the extreme.

A 14 year-old teen committed suicide due to Harold Camping’s May 21st Rapture Prediction

Florida man's drowning in Antioch lake related to Rapture prediction, detective says

Man Commits Suicide by Crucifixion in Anticipation of Raptur

Woman Slits Throats of Her Kids and Herself Due to Rapture Prediction

A woman donates around $300,000 estate to a failed prediction

The scariest thing about this entire rapture fiasco was not just that some people buy into his words, it's that these people were so freaked out that they were going to kill themselves, yet it never at any point occurred to them to stop and think, "Let me look up this guy and his theory and see what kind of supporting evidence he has." Don't tell me these people have never heard of the internet, or Google. Had they spend a few minutes on line, they would have learn that this person already had a faulty prediction back in 1994, so even if rapture is real, his date can be off, again. The lack of analytical thinking, heck, the lack of the ability to even realize the possibility of verifying the information independently is appalling.  Perhaps that is more of a problem than individuals like Camping.

Before I read all these crazy stories, I was going to say, This prediction thing can't be good for business.If the prediction is right, there will be nobody left to be believers. If it's wrong, it is going to lose their fans. Or, at the very minimum, why make a date so close? Don't they want to string people along for longer, and maximize the profit? Or does Campbell really believe in his own prediction? If you ask me, he just sounds like an old man who is very afraid to face his own mortality, so instead, he wants to think that he will be able to experience rapture and not face death itself and somehow he was able to convince a relatively small group of people to buy into his words.

And, as a friend of mine had casually pointed out (yes, I didn't realize till she asked), "What is the point of giving away one's earthly possession if he/she believes that the world is going to end? How will that benefit the recipients?"

At the very minimum, can we at least make Camping organization pay federal and state taxes so at least some good can come out of it??