I am a polly but not one who is here to ridicule. I took my chances by choosing not to prepare. I found the arguments about what could happen completely plausible to a degree. If computers all over the country ceased to work, then we could have mass chaos. I looked at the alarmist and their backgrounds and motivations and found them to be extremists in every aspect of their life. Why were these the people leading the battle cry and no one else? Did they have another agenda? Money, ego gratification, desired political power? After researching, I found these doomers to have suspicious reasons other than semaritanism as their reason for playing Paul Revere. I wont re-hash Gary North and his Chritian Reconstructionist Motivations. Anyone who has a web browser can find out about his fanatical ideas he was spouting 25 years before y2k. They can also see that he was trying to use this as an acension to religous power over politics, as implausible as that sounds. Do some reading on the man and you can hardly disagree. His motivations are pretty clearly defined. North is a smart man and knows as well as anyone, computer failure or not, that a prophecy can easily become self-fulfilling if enough people believe it.

In short, I came to beleive that the messengers in this whole mess were so extreme, so "out there" and so motivated by self-serving factors, that I chose to become a Polly. This of course was not my only reason, I spoke with several programmer friends who chortled at the extremist doomsday scenarios being laid out by the radical Y2K types.

For those of you that believe you have been duped, don't sit around stewing; research how you think this came about, what made you vulnerable. Who did you listen to and why did you beleive them?

Then, after you you have done some reflection, try and decide what you will do the next time you are presented with someone who says to follow them blindly.

Then, if you really want to exercise your brain and maybe blow off some steam, research these gurus, decide for yourself what there motivations were and post a web page or give talks on con artists. Tell your story! Expose the scam! Don't let them get away with it!

For those of you that prepared and are glad,I say you did not waste your time. It is a good idea to prepare for any disaster. If you did however quit jobs, spend all you had on Spam and duct tape and a bomb shelter on the advice of the "The End of the World as We Know It Gurus" and now have a life to re-build, than get to it! You were better safe than sorry but come out and re-join society. Go get another job, hang on to the Spam and keep enough gas in the car to get to that bomb shelter if that makes you feel better. Be proud of what you have done and live in the satisfaction that you did not need it but if you had, you would have been safe. I for one do not think you were crazy for preparing. But I do think when it comes to gurus who lead people to extreme measures of any kind, you may want to question their motives before making extreme life changing decisions. You are to look out for yourself because Gary North et. al., were not looking out for you. It could be that the biggest benefit you get from Y2K is to NEVER follow anyone blindly again.

-- DAVID (tdavidc@arn.net), January 04, 2000

Answers

Just so no one else will have to respond to this inanity, I will do it for you.

-- Kyle (polly@lemmingnot.com), January 04, 2000.

David:

Just a couple of questions? How many of Dr. Gary North's books do you have or have you read. It would be quite nice to know how much you really know about him and what he believes.You seem to be an expert on what he has written in his books,because you say you have researched it, so please for my educations and to show to others on the list your qualifications for such , I would like you to list them and the ones you have read?

Second question is that it seems you know a lot about Christian Reconstruction, so enlighten us as to what is that Christian Reconstructionsists beleive will bring about changes in the way the world works? You imply that it is manipulation of circumstances. You say that you have done this after "researching." Please tell us your research from the books with quotes.

I anxiously await your reply.

-- jetod (jetod@hotmail.com), January 04, 2000.

Too bad this isn't the Gary North forum.

Listen David, I've been a professional programmer for 31+ years. I didn't need Gary North, or Ed Yourdon, or anyone else to tell me that Y2K could result in serious problems. I have seen the guts of countless computers over the past 3 decades, and many of those are very date sensative.

Sure, I visit North's site quite often. But I read very little of his commentary. I use his site for his links.

But if you want to bitch about Gary, ask yourself one question. What would have happened if people like Gary and Ed didn't sound the alarm years ago? What would have happened if the trillion dollars worldwide (by some estimates) was not spent?

This problem was, and is, very real. Don't blame the messenger. <:)=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), January 04, 2000.

Thank you for not acting as jerky as most "pollies" I am sorry to blow your analysis but I cannot blame anyone for my decisions. I did not follow anyone blindly. I did my own research and interpretations. No one made me do anything. I read opinions and knew all along that they were only opinions. I did much research. If I have misjudged anything it was my own responsibility. I never thought things would happen at the stroke of midnite (although I was also surprised at the outcome) I never read Ed Yourdons book, I didn't read much of GN. I don't blame anyone for my decisions. I make my own decisions. Just for the record, I feel that y2k has only just begun. I pray that no one gets hurt.

-- a mom (my@own.decisions), January 04, 2000.

BS, Sysman.

North's purpose was never to "sound the alarm". He wanted the system to crash, and said so openly.

And Yourdon's many essays were not exhortations to get the work done. His message was clear, and stated many times: the effort was doomed from the start, because software projects are always late.

-- Hoffmeister (hoff_meister@my-deja.com), January 04, 2000.

Amazing how 5 days ago we were foolish because the world was going to end and now were still foolish because we don't have a ten year supply of tuna and rice.

-- me (pollyy@home.now), January 04, 2000.

OK, as requested, here are several quotes from North with references where they can be found in print. I have read approximatley 5 years worth of his Newsletter. I have North Devotee accros the hall from my office who shares them with me. I have also done a great deal of research on the web. I don't claim to be an expert but I do know enough to make a decision to stay away!

Here are several ramblings of North:

The battle for the mind, some fundamentalists believe, is between fundamentalism and the institutions of the Left. This conception of the battle is fundamentally incorrect. The battle for the mind is between the Christian reconstruction movement, which alone among Protestant groups takes seriously the law of God, and everyone else.

Gary North, Backward Christian Soldiers? An Action Manual For Christian Reconstruction (Tyler, TX: Institute for Christian Economics, 1984), pp. 65-66 .

The long-term goal of Christians in politics should be to gain exclusive control over the franchise. Those who refuse to submit publicly to the eternal sanctions of God by submitting to His Church's public marks of the covenant--baptism and holy communion-- must be denied citizenship, just as they were in ancient Israel.

Gary North, Political Polytheism: The Myth of Pluralism (Tyler, TX: Institute for Christian Economics, 1989), p. 87.

So let us be blunt about it: we must use the doctrine of religious liberty to gain independence for Christian schools until we train up a generation of people who know that there is no religious neutrality, no neutral law, no neutral education, and no neutral civil government. Then they will get busy in constructing a Bible- based social, political and religious order which finally denies the religious liberty of the enemies of God.

Gary North, "The Intellectual Schizophrenia of the New Christian Right" in Christianity and Civilization: The Failure of the American Baptist Culture, No. 1 (Spring, 1982), p. 25.

The question eventually must be raised: Is it a criminal offense to take the name of the Lord in vain? When people curse their parents, it unquestionably is a capital crime (Ex. 21:17). The son or daughter is under the lawful jurisdiction of the family. The integrity of the family must be maintained by the threat of death. Clearly, cursing God (blasphemy) is a comparable crime, and is therefore a capital crime (Lev. 24:16).

Gary North, The Sinai Strategy: Economics and the Ten Commandments (Tyler, TX: Institute for Christian Economics, 1986), pp. 59-60

Furthermore, there is that other great, intolerable evil of the New England Puritans: the Puritans took land away from the "native Americans." You know, the Indians. (Liberals have adopted the phrase "native Americans" in recent years. They never, ever say "American natives," since this is only one step away from "American savages," which is precisely what most of those demon-worshipping, Negro slave- holding, frequently land-polluting people were.... This was one of the great sins in American life, they say: "the stealing of Indian lands".... That a million savages had a legitimate legal claim on the whole of North America north of Mexico is the unstated assumption of such critics. They never ask the question: From whom did the Indians of early colonial America get the land? They also never ask the even more pertinent question: Was the advent of the European in North America a righteous historical judgment of God against the Indians? On the contrary, our three authors [Noll, Hatch, Marsden] ridicule the Puritans for having suggested that the Indians were the moral and covenantal equivalent of the Canaanites (p. 33). In fact, if ever a continent of covenant-breakers deserved this attribution, the "native Americans" did.

Gary North, Political Polytheism: The Myth of Pluralism (Tyler, TX: Institute for Christian Economics, 1989), pp. 257-258.

"The y2k crisis is systemic. It cannot possibly be fixed. I think it will wipe out every national government in the West. Not just modify them -- destroy them. I honestly think the Federal government will go under. I think the U.S.A. will break up the way the U.S.S.R. did. Call me a dreamer. Call me an optimist. That's what I think. This will decentralize the social order. That is what I have wanted all of my adult life. In my view, y2k is our deliverance. "

Sorry, admittedly I couldn't find the reference on this but I will!. Not enough time at the moment. This has been attributed to North over and over however and I have never heard him deny it.

-- DAVID (tdavidc@arn.net), January 04, 2000.

Mom: I am not saying everyone followed North et a; blindly. As I said, preperations for any disaster are prudent. Many did it with little regard to these folks. Some simply put back some supplies to last a while. Prudent, common sense.

There are those here however that took all these folks said at face value and followed their advice to the letter and are now living in a shack in Arkansas surrounded by $20,000.00 worth of Spam and beans and have no job because they quit to "bunker in". Those are the victims!

-- DAVID (tdavidc@arn.net), January 04, 2000.

OK Jetod: There are some nuggets from North I have read. Please let me know if you knew about these attitudes of his.

-- DAVID (tdavidc@arn.net), January 04, 2000.

David, reference:

http://users.erols.com /steve451/doom.htm

-- Hoffmeister (hoff_meister@my-deja.com), January 04, 2000.

Thanks for a great link Hoff Meister! Those of you who don't want to read my rants, please go the link Hoff Mesiter mentioned. The facts are clearly available there. Please continue to comment here though if you would like.

-- DAVID (tdavidc@arn.net), January 04, 2000.