My tinfoil hat and I can prove it: The end is NIGH

House Bill 85 was struck down in the Wyoming State legislature by a vote of 30-27. It was nicknamed the Doomsday Bill, and for good reason. The bill called for a community task force to be assembled in the event that the Federal government collapses. The bill was a bit of a joke created by Rep. David Miller, who put in a provision that included the purchase of an aircraft carrier to defend landlocked Wyoming. It got me thinking though, 30-27 means the nays won only by a five percent margin. Maybe the yays know something we don’t. Perhaps the end is…NIGH! Okay, that’s a joke. To my knowledge the end isn’t at hand or even on tap. What are always close are reasons and predictions as to why this is the age in which the world will end. For example, Levi having visions of Judgment day or this guy. I thought it would be fun to make up some reasons of our own why next Wednesday will be the end of days and maybe uncover why we have this obsession with our own demise .

And the seventh angel sounded

Clearly, this being here and me being me, any reasons I come up will be video game based. Here we go:

Fallout 3has taught me that I’ll know the end has arrived when giant insects roam the land. If that’s true then it’s already begun. Recently, the Dryococelus australis, also known as the tree lobster, has been rediscovered after it was believed to be extinct for 80 years. It’s 12 centimeters long, as big as a human hand. What’s worse is that humans are trying to facilitate the gigantism of these spineless, flying demons.

In Half-Life 2 the end comes with a whimper. Aliens known as the Combine surround Earth with a field that makes people sterile. Well, a report released by the National Center for Health Statistics have shown that fertility rates in the US have fallen by 10 percent since 2007. The number one reason cited was the high cost of raising a child. Indeed, the USDA estimates that the cost of raising a child for 18 years is about 226,920 dollars, and that’s no including college. So it seems that the Combine are not using a suppression field as much as they are using the rising cost of goods!

Do you hear that? Tick, tick, tick. That’s the sound of our lives running out. Big bugs plus no babies equals the end of the world. And don’t mock me, there have been less creditable arguments why the end is nigh. I mean David Icke thinks that lizard people are manipulating governments into ending the world.

Why?

It isn’t a new thing. In 1844, William Miller predicted the end of the world would happen on March 21st. When the 21st passed without incident, Miller recalculated and re-proclaimed the end of the world would happen on October 22nd. One of his followers was so sure in his faith that he jumped off the roof of his barn, believing that he would be raptured away to Heaven. One way or the other, he made it to God. This whole incident of the not so end of the world was known as the Great Disappointment. But Miller did have a great impact on the religious American landscape. His followers became the Seventh Day Adventists, the Jehovah’s Witness and many others. And our obsession continues today. There are last a dozens of games that coming out this year that have to do with the end of the world. The Last of Us, Metro: Last Night, and Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City are just a few upcoming video games that have humanity’s days numbered.

Where all these people just silly to buy into Miller’s story? Is our obsession with this statistically unlikely scenario just as stupid. I wouldn’t say so. There is something deeply spiritual about the end of the world. Indeed, the word apocalypse itself comes from the Greek meaning, the lifting of the veil or revelation of truth. On the one hand, the end comes with a will of a deity. The truth is revealed, God is real and the faithful will be rewarded. On the other hand, there is no God, mankind is humbled by the reality that the strong inherit the Earth.

All those post-apocalyptic games have something in common. You play the hero that makes the difference. That’s true in a lot of games, but there still plenty that make you feel like you’re part of something bigger than yourself. In post apocalyptic games, you’re a cut above the rest of the golden boys and chosen ones. They seem to be taking the place of cowboys who rode in world of dangerous bandits and against the backdrop of an unforgiving Mother Nature. For both these heroes redemption is always around the corner. That is where our lusting for the end is from, the belief that right now is special – that we are special. All the so called prophets are claims that the signs point to the end. The conflict in our souls is spilling out and burning the world. I think the intro to Fallout 3 says it all, War never changes. The end was always nigh. So perhaps, to those 27 state senators, we know something you don’t.  That thinking about the Apocalypse is like thinking about tomorrow; something that is always coming but will never get here.