At 8:10 AM -0500 11/30/98, Martinus Luther wrote:
It looks like Gary North isn't really interested in the year 2000 problem. What he is interested in seems to be guns. He's latched on to this issue because it allows him to think and write more about guns. And, like so many other gunwankers he seems to get off fantasising about the total collapse of civil society because that way he gets to feel good about his guns. All this obession with death and destruction is a bit strange in someone rumoured to be a Christian.
Well... I think that dismissing someone's thoughts on the basis of psychobabble is never a good idea. Gary North's psyche may or may not be fucked up, but even fucked up people oftentimes come up with good ideas. On the other hand, the above is a good observation that I happen to agree with. If you browse misc.survivalism (a useful newsgroup) you would see a lot of gunnuts who can't have a single good idea of their own, except for inventing scenarios where their guns may become useful. I am not suggesting that all gunnuts are stupid, or that it is imprudent to own firearms to prepare for various contingencies, not at all. I am even very much pro-second amendment. But objectively, there is a large category of people who are bored with their current lifestyle and gleefully expect a "total breakdown" of the society so that they could shoot live man sized targets instead of boring paper targets. They are likely to be disappointed by Y2K, or so I expect. (again, my expectation that social breakdown is not likely to happen does not preclude me from reasonable preparations) The interesting question that arises out of all this, is trying to predict what these people's impact on the actual Y2K events would be. Would there be a big number of unprovoked shootings at groups of blacks who happen to walk down on a wrong street? How should people behave in order not to get shot by mistake? Would those people contribute to any unrest that could happen? Which areas are best avoided? igor