Party like it’s 19999
So we have reached a new decade. I find it funny that we hold so much significance in a completely manufactured date system. When you look at it from a logical point of view, we have just been following a sequence of numbers set out by a man with no particular reason other then serving his own ego. Without knowing the exact start, or even the true course of human history, calling this year 2010 isn’t any more accurate then calling it 2287, or even 15064 for that matter. The only reason we are in the “21st Century” is because the power of the Christian church was unstoppable for so long. They started marking the years from the point Christ was born. And even that is a point of speculation. They don’t have his exact birthday, or even birthyear. They just made an estimate based on a bunch of different texts. Many of which were written decades or centuries after the fact. And we have blindly followed their lead for over two thousand years. The passage of that much time has cemented this date system into almost every culture in the world because it was so widely used and strictly enforced.
I know we will never change the date system voluntarily because it would disrupt pretty much everything. I just like to remind people that it is all arbitrary and that the year 2010 is a subjective lable. It has no more significance that any other place marker. Especially people that fear massive earthshaking events on certain dates. The one on most people’s minds is the Mayan 2012 doomsday prediction. This one has been talked about for decades, but even more now that it is quickly approaching. It is a complete hoax. The Mayan calendar does exist. And technically it does end in 2012, although that is after calculate it against our calendar. But it is like any mathmatical cycle chart. It just starts over again. It’s a perpetual calendar that is desinged to follow lunar progressions and mark crop planting seasons. There is not a single piece of archeologic evidence that the ancient Mayans believed the world would end. In fact, the evidence suggests that they celebrated the end of their calendar as a rebirth, or a super new year. All the predictions associated with the 2012 doomsday are simply attempts to create fear and uncertainty, which are very powerful tools to manipulate large numbers of people. People have been doing it throughout human history. That is why we have organized religion in the first place.
I think the best thing for humanity to do is keep track of our cycles around our sun and celebrate them as achievements in human progress. We should cherish the knowledge we have created of ourselves and our surroundings, and look forward to the future as new possibilities, not possible destruction. The world as we know it could very well end before you finish reading this paragraph. There is no reason to fear it because we wouldn’t be able to do anything about it anyway. So enjoy what we have, and keep moving forward until we can’t. It is said we must learn from the past. So let’s truly do that. Fear of what might be is what prevents what can be.
