Sometimes I amuse myself by trying to categorize a polly or a doomer by their politics. In the beginning I thought doomers were all right- wing Christians. Certainly that element is well represented. But many Fundamendalist Christians seem to think it is un-Christian to overprepare. Have faith!

Non-religious Libertarian types also have a strong presence among doomies. Then there are the tree-hugger environmentalists, the Erik Utne/Paloma O'Reilly communitarians and even some anti-nuke lefties such as Dr Helen Caldicott (a contributor to NATION magazine). And, alas, there are too many conspiracy buffs with politics that bend in the breeze.

Almost as interesting as who is a doomer is who is not. Most Conservatives avoid the subject. Rush Limbaugh screens it from his talk show. Steve Forbes is not concerned. It doesn't show up in The Free Republic forum anymore. Does National Review think it is important?

I would have thought that big-government types would have glommed onto y2k years ago. Hey, let's have a cabinet level national y2k effort! Think of all the money, all the power, all the jobs.

There are just as many strange bedfellows on the Polly side. Maybe psychology is more important than politics, science or religion in determining whether one is a Polly or a Doomie. Are you an optimist or a pessimist; a worry-wort or a one-day-at-a-timer; is the glass half empty or half full?

My own view is to prepare prudently and then try not to worry about TEOTWAWKI. I can't afford to prepare for that, I am not physically able to prepare for that. Que sera sera.

-- Lars (lars@indy.net), October 23, 1999

Answers

Some days I get up on the Right side of bed, other days on the Left, and some days I'm ornery enough to slither out without making such committments.

For me, politics has NOTHING to do with it. Anyone think a Republican President would handle this differently is nuts.

I just have my Masters in computer disasters...I personally have been responsible for more Process Control disasters than you can shake a stick at. From that refinery explosion to that warped 60 million dollar Kiln at the Cement plant, it has been fun! I got out of the game pre Y2K.

-- K. Stevens (kstevens@ it's ALL going away in January.com), October 23, 1999.

Transcends all isms + ologies.

Watch The World Unravel

-- microscope (TB2K@observer.slide), October 23, 1999.

I own several internet companies, one of which primarily sells preparedness products. That business has been in existence for approximately 18 months. We have had several thousand transactions in that period of time, so I think I have a good 'feel' about the people who are concerned enough about Y2k and it's implications to purchase preparedness products.

Here is what I have found, and the order in which each theory occured to me (please pardon my placing of labels as that is the only way to communicate who they are):

1. Many of our customers are right wing Christians, Mormons, Southern Baptists and other Fudamentalists. Catholics, Jews and Protestants (mainstream, 'acceptable' religions) are less likely to prepare.

2. Most of our customers come from the Western and Southern United States. The Northeast is the least likely to prepare, however lately they have begun to get ready.

3. Political Liberals are unlikely to prepare, while those more conservative polically are more likely. True conservatives that listen to Rush Limbaugh and others like him, true to their hero(es), do not discuss it nor are they purchasing.

4. The Hollywood 'elite' are preparing.... quietly, many times through others.

5. The VERY rich are preparing.

6. Town Managers and those at the frontline of their companies remediation are preparing.

7. Those who live in rural areas are more likely to prepare than those in large cities. Suburban dwellers are split between those that can or are willing to comprehend what is going on and those that can't/aren't.(see #8 & 9)

8. After thousands of discussions with believers and non-believers - I firmly believe now that there are people (most of the population - maybe 70% or more) that cannot seem to comprehend Y2k because they cannot think in the dimension necessary to understand it. For example: as was mentioned in the previous link, people don't understand the "supply chain". Most don't understand what people will be like when under extreme stress everywhere in the country (and world) at once. Most people don't understand global economics and the dependency and connection of countries on and to one another. Most don't understand that their government leaders could actually lie to them about something as far reaching and potentially catostrophic as Y2k.

9. Most important, I believe that for people to believe in Y2k they need to make serious decisions about their life. If you believe that Y2k will be catostrophic you would need to re-evaluate your finances, how you spend your money, your job, where you live, who you confide in, etc. Your entire life will have to change. You cannot believe the potential problems of Y2k and keep living your life as if nothing is going on. Important!! MOST PEOPLE ARE NOT CAPABLE OR WILLING TO MAKE THAT LIFE CHANGE, so they instead have to be in denial about it.

10. Some people are just plain ignorant, while others are not. I never realized just how many are unable to 'grasp' reality until Y2k came along.

We are now less two months away from the beginning of many years of serious changes both here in the US and abroad. We will have months, if not years of problems such as not getting gasoline and heating oil easily, and paying dearly for it when it is available. We will see disruptions in the food supply, medication availability, clean water availability and yes, probably even electricity in many areas. We will not have access to our cash. We will be losing jobs at a faster rate than at any time since the Great Depression and many people will freeze to death because of the lack of heating fuels. Business' will fail at an unprecedented rate. The worst part will be that it will seem that noone will be in control in ways we are used to seeing. We will not have the abilty to read papers and magazines, or watch our favorite news shows or log on to our favorite web sites as easily as we are used to. That will create lots of confusion and the feeling of being alone through much of this.

With the recent executive order 2 weeks ago in which Clinton put the US Military under the control of FEMA on domestic territory during critical periods such as bio-chem terrorism, nuclear attacks or other serious problems (such as Y2k?), we will witness for the first time since the Civil War, US Troops responsible for keeping order of it's citizens. Wow!

Even with the last part - US Troops on US soil keeping it's citizens in line - most people want to believe it can't happen, if they are even aware of it. The less they have to think about, the better off they will be.

And now a few words from the non-doomers....:

My company, my government, my spouse, my parents, my kids, the system - they'll take care of me. Nothing will happen beyond a few minor glitches, a bump in the road, a winter snowstorm. The Stock Market will not tank, power will work, water will stay clean and plentiful. I will keep my job because I work for a very stable company and I've been there for 15 years. I will keep my job because I work for the government and they don't lay off people. I will keep my job because I'm a teacher. Social Security will be there because it has to be - I paid into it my entire life and the money is mine. Besides, the President and the Senate promised it and if they reneg, our lobby will decimate them. The elderly are the most potent political force, you know. The FDIC guarantees my money if the bank fails. My stockbroker looks after my investments first. I can count on him to sell if the market drops too far. If I hear that things are going to get bad I will load up on food and water then. If banks start to fail I will go to the bank and withdraw my money. If things get that bad, who would want to live? I'd prefer to just die instead. We learned our lesson during the depression - it can't happen here, not now. The New Deal worked - if things get that bad, why not just hire a few million men to make roads again and spend our way out of the depression. Americans are hard workers, it will never get that bad here. Y2k may affect people overseas, but not here. Everything has already been taken care of. Y2k will be a non-event. Why can't you be positive and stop letting Y2k get you down? Let's shut down the computers before the date change, then start them up afterwards. It can't happen. I'm a positive thinker. We put men on the moon - are you saying we can't solve a computer chip problem? Why can't everyone reset their CPU's to 1974 and start all over again? Let's just turn all computers off. We can go manual if need be. We did it back before computers were around, we can do it again with no problem. My son/brother/father/mother/daughter/uncle/aunt/friend/cousin knows computers really well and he/she said Y2k won't be a problem. 9/9/99 wasn't a problem, so neither will Y2k. I heard President Clinton/Al Gore/Senator Dodd/Senator Lott/(any name) that Y2k was not going to be a problem - certainly he/she wouldn't lie about it. You guys said the world was going to come to an end when Japan's fiscal year began earlier this year and it didn't. I'm ready. I've got a week's worth of food and water; almost twice what the Red Cross and the US Senate recommends we store. We're Americans; we won two world wars - we can lick Y2k too. I'm going to get my stuff before December - probably right before Thanksgiving - to avoid the rush; I'm no fool.......

Do you recognize these people?

-- Mark Miclette (info@gasmasks.com), October 23, 1999.

? :-)

-- How About (ADiscount4@TB2000.Users), October 24, 1999.

Since the previous poster's reference to gas masks...

I guess we are stuck with our area of expertise. Cory believes that it is large scale "Enterprise" systems that are the problem...Hogwash! Those are BEANCOUNTER specials...I'd much rather that those shut down than Chemical Plants do a half dozen Bhopals.

The REAL problems are associated with Large Scale Embedded Systems (LSES). The dirty little secret is that the Intel based CPU architecture has a woefully inadequate priority interrupt structure for most Process Control applications, but they were used anyway because their prices dropped to compelling levels so fast.

Van Nuys is the key. During the test, alarms were firing off at better than one every 2 seconds. Interrupt requests overwhelmed the interrupt request buffer. On a real process control machine, you would have a minimum of 256 and more likely 1024 HARDWARE prioritized levels of interrupts, and not resort to buffering at all. But remember, the Intel designs were dirt cheap due to the success of the PC, and these limitations were Programmed around. THAT is going to cost us dearly when the date rolls over!

-- K. Stevens (kstevens@ It's ALL going away in January.com), October 24, 1999.

Thank you all for this thread and posts. Helps me understand my fellow American and what to expect from them if life goes to the handbasket. We live in interesting times. I am glad to be here now and look at this Y2k as a personal challenge.

-- LongTimeLurker (12344@675438.com), October 24, 1999.

Excellent thread LARs. Based on my experiences at this forum, EUY2K, and debunkers, newsgroups, etc. my opinion is that neither religious affiliation nor religion in general is not the primary factor in whether one is pessimistic or optomistic about Y2K. Now having said that, I do believe that there ARE elements of fundamental religous organizations that have become victims of and contributed to the Y2K myths and exagerations. Conversely, there are also fundamental religious groups that dismiss the hype.

Mark Miclette: "1. Many of our customers are right wing Christians, Mormons, Southern Baptists and other Fudamentalists. Catholics, Jews and Protestants (mainstream, 'acceptable' religions) are less likely to prepare. "

Mark, no offense intended, but I do believe your own biases are showing here - "right wing Christians"? Southern Baptists and other fundamentalists make up one of the larger segments of the religious institutions in the US, yet only Catholics, Jews, and "Protestants" are "mainstream", 'acceptable'?

By the way, I thought Southern Baptists WERE protestants, lol...:)

While it may be true that some fundamental churches and members are perparing for Y2K, I would bet that some who haven't stepped inside the door of a church in years are preparing as well.

Regards,

-- FactFinder (FactFinder@bzn.com), October 24, 1999.

FactFinder,

I think that Lars' comment about certain denominations being acceptable means "politically correct." To the majority of Americans, the liberal groups, TV screenwriters, etc., have done such a good job of slamming Christians that to be a Christian is to be stupid, etc. As for me, I'm thrilled to be a "fool" for Christ, rather than being "politically correct" for anyone else.

-- Ann M. (hismckids@aol.com), October 24, 1999.

Unless I'm mistaken, the Southern Baptist Conference is the largest protestant denomination in the US.

At least that's what I was told back when I was a member of the local Southern Baptist Church.

-- Ron Schwarz (rs@clubvb.com.delete.this), October 24, 1999.

Maybe psychology is more important than politics, science or religion in determining whether one is a Polly or a Doomie. Are you an optimist or a pessimist; a worry-wort or a one-day-at-a-timer; is the glass half empty or half full?

In my experience, the overwhelming majority of people are completely unwilling to reach conclusions in opposition to the "conventional wisdom" of their era. Since the "conventional wisdom" is that Y2K is basically a hoax, that's how most people treat it. The ability to think for oneself, no matter how unpopular one's conclusions may be, is rare indeed today, as it has been throughout history. However, I think it will be much more common in the next civilization that is built from the wreckage left by Y2K, as most of the "sheeple" will die in the transition.

-- Steve Heller (stheller@koyote.com), October 24, 1999.

Far out! An anachronism from the "everybody's gonna die" days. Ah, weren't those exciting times? I have such fond memories of the days when nobody knew squat and our imaginations ruled. Good to see not everyone has abandoned the "massive dieback" vision in favor of the "grinding inefficiency" version. These new days are so much duller!

Uh, Steve, you need to distinguish very carefully between independent thinking and accurate thinking. They aren't necessarily the same thing.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 24, 1999.

Flint, how about screwed-up thinking? Like yours. I've been reading your posts for over a year and you are one messed-up dude.

-- Ohio Bob (ohiobob@buckeyestate.com), October 25, 1999.

I sometimes wonder how many 'identities' here, either long term participant or the occasional passer-by, are actually the creation of a professional PR team. I have no idea. Perhaps none. But what do we know? We know that PR teams are more than capable of posting to Internet forums and they don't need notes from their mommies allowing them to do so. We also know that lots of large companies have addressed Y2K with their agencies. Ergo, it seems reasonable to specualte that at least a few campaigns would involve the use 'avatars' in forums such as this one.

Don't get me wrong. Even if I could, I would certainly not ban such posts. Nor would I 'out' them for deceptive identities alone. Please don't ask me to put names to my suspicions because first, I don't know anything for sure, and more importantly, it really doesn't matter.

Communication is curious thing. It can be formal or informal. Official or unofficial. It can be informative while simultaneously being manipulative. For better or worse, when Ed Yourdon created this forum, he did not establish any rules that would prohibit such posts. In an open forum, everyone gets a voice. How they use it is entirely up to them. But I suspect Ed never envisioned the strange assemblage of characters who would eventually appear here.

No, wondering about the PR 'avatars' who might be here doesn't keep me up at nights or fill my waking hours. But I am curious. I've chuckled at the thought that just perhaps, on some rare occassion, an argument may have ensued here in which our two protagonists were really two PR teams, going 'head-to-head', each oblivious to the fact that the other team existed.

Perish the thought :)

-- Arnie Rimmer (Arnie_Rimmer@usa.net), October 25, 1999.

I am an optimist by nature. I'm the one you hate, who says, "Oh, come ON--with a bit more effort we can do it!" Sometimes it's, "Oh, you give up too easily!" However, I am pessimistic about Y2K, although not as pessimistic as some and not as pessimistic as some would have you believe. I have done serious volunteer work since I was 15 years old. I have worked in the War in Poverty, United Way nonprofits, politics, conservative law firms, and th meddia, among others. I am not a religious person. I have been told I look like an aging preppie hippie. I was diagnosed as diabetic six months after I Got It. I have some difficulty walking and tend to sleep more than most--CFS runs in the family. The pharmaceutical supply line has become a major concern.

Sweetie is more pessimistic than I, but he's always been a half-empty glass type. That said, he's a happy person, not dour or morose (nmostly!). He fits in more with Libertarian philosophy than any other. He has served his country well (including combat situations) and now does computer software stuff. He's worked on dinosaur mainframes, minis and PCs, federal, state and private. He is not a religious person. He looks like an eccentric preppie. Apart from the occasional attack of gout, he's in good health. He worries about most of Y2K's aspects.

Very few people know we have any interest at all in Y2K. We are perceived by most of the locals as "odd"--Jim because he makes and flies free-flight scale model airplanes ("A grown man!"); myself because I dug up the front yard and turned it into a sprawling English cottage garden ("She dug up the front LAWN!"); and because we have a number of indoor cats ("Whoever heard of cats NEVER going outside!").

We live in the midst of what might be termed "conservative Christians," none of whom has made any Y2K preps and who, if asked, will reply, "It's all hype," "They've fixed it," or "God will provide." The only two liberal families we know within several blocks are completely oblivious to Y2K. The city has told everyone there are no Y2K problems and nothing has been said during any of the campaigns for mayor or city council in November.

If we're right aout Y2K, we'll make it through more comfortably than most; if we're wrong, we'll make it through more comfortably than most. And if we have one of those occasional ice storms this winter and the power goes out in the midst of brutal weather, we'll make it through more comfortably than most.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), October 25, 1999.