Some People Are Taking 2012’s End-Times Prediction Way Too Seriously

Ever hear of Planet Nibiru (also known as Planet X)?  That’s because it isn’t real, at least not yet.  But it’s the planet that some people believe is going to erase humanity from the universe’s tally sheet by smashing into the Earth on December 21, 2012, the “end” of the Mayan calendar.  If it’s not Planet X, it’ll be an enormous burst of solar radiation that fries us or at least knocks out cell phone and internet service for a few days, which will have the same societal effect: rioting in the streets because we can’t access Fandango.com to find out show times for Transformers 4: The Morphinating of the Three.  And if it ain’t solar flares that does it, by golly, it’s a-gonna be the alignment of our solar system with the center of the Milky Way that somehow asplodes us all.

Most, if not all, of this stuff happens in the upcoming disaster flick 2012.  This would all be terribly funny if some people weren’t giving these apocalyptic ideas such credence.  People have actually talked about committing suicide soon because they didn’t want to be around for the end of the world.  NASA scientist David Morrison, who used to get about a question a week about the subject, has recently been getting a dozen questions a day.  This has concerned many in the science community so much that they have been setting up websites to dispel the myths surrounding 12/21/2012.  (Note: anthropologists explain that the Mayan simply rolls over, like our calendar.  While every January 1 you may feel like the world has ended, it probably isn’t due to meteorite impacts, though that would explain your crushing headache.)

Roland Emmerich, did you have all this in mind when you started making 2012?  Sony, did you have any idea your marketing campaigns like “Vote for the Leader of the Post-2012 World” would be taken to heart?  I think not, because as Sony Pictures spokesman, Steve Elzer said, “We believe consumers understand that the advertising is promoting a fictional film.”  You would think so, but just as there are people who will lay down in the middle of a busy road because they saw it in a movie, there are people who will see 2012 as a validation of their near-future apocalyptic world-view.  While Sony is no doubt taking advantage of the proximity of the date, I can’t agree with folks who say the company is contributing to the eschatological hysteria.  Very simply, if you believe the world is going to end on 12/21/2012 because Roland Emmerich said so, you are going to believe a lot of other weird shit without too much prodding from viral marketing campaigns.

Roland Emmerich is not a clairvoyant.  2012 will not be prescient.  The winner of Sony’s Post-2012 leader vote will not become a ruthless global tyrant who drives primered, weaponized SUVs scouring the blasted landscape in search of gasoline and fertile women.  I’ll make you a wager, though:  if all this does come to pass, on December 22, 2012, you can say “I told you so.”