2012 News

Something must be wrong when you find information related to your professorial duties posted on News of the Weird (Professional Edition, no less!). But that's where I found a reference to a guy who was in jail for making bombs because he believed the world was ending in 2012. The full story is at the Louisville Journal-Courier.

This should serve as a reminder that the apparently silly bunk about 2012 can be deeply pernicious. However ridiculous, inane, or childish they seems to us, these outrageous fabrications can trouble people and might even push troubled people over the edge.

This is not a unique incident. I seem to remember reading somewhere about a Mayanist who took a call from a credulous person who wanted to know if he or she should kill himself before the world ended.

I want to collect stories like these. Please send me any you find.

Thanks!