A rational person could conclude the world has gone mad. And not just a little loony, a little off kilter or slightly eccentric either. We live in a certifiably crazy world. A world where violence and hatred, neurosis and psychological disorders are normal; in other words, a world where normalcy is really an abnormal state. It is now normal to be abnormal.

Ponder the Y2k implications of living in a world where what was once considered abnormal and deviant is now either accepted or tolerated as normal reality. The new global reality is this. It is not that violent or crazy acts happen everywhere all the time in our pre Y2k world. The truth is that violent or crazy acts can happen anywhere at anytime. Anytime and anyplace, remember that well. It is the Rosetta Stone for understanding the global psychosis deepening around us.

One of the major needs, besides toilet paper, of human beings is to feel secure and to have a place where they feel unthreatened. This is why random acts of mindless violence lead to a sense of general unease among people. The background level of stress is increased after each such incident. Particularly in technological, impersonal western cultures-where people are already at Def-Con 3 over the chaos of modern life. Def-Con is a U.S.A. military nuclear alert status that starts at 5, which is peace, and goes to 1, which is global radioactive toast. With 7 months and counting till Y2k, the global populace is edgy, paranoid and has a short fuse in American slang. This being their state of mind prior to Y2k, one has to ponder their state of mind post Y2k.

In certain environments, say a ghetto or a war zone, paranoia is a rational response. In certain cases, being uneasy and alert helps to survive and even thrive. In certain situations, like Y2k for instance, the gloves come off, the thin veneer of society peels off and people go into combat mode. All of the preceding being terribly politically incorrect in our modern world. One wonders why anyone would expect a stressed out populace, deprived of basic technology to behave rationally. Has anyone else besides me noticed that people aren't behaving too rationally now? Yet widespread rational behavior is exactly what the powers to be expect, aside from a "little rioting" among the ghetto dwellers. So much blindness and arrogance; so little time left to prepare.

Y2k is devastating to modern technological society for two reasons. The first is that Y2k scrambles the technological infrastructure of our global society. Y2k threatens to decouple both the boxcars and luxury cars from the technological train engine; sending us hurtling backwards into the abyss. Does anyone contemplate what living in 1900 exactly means? And even if we go back only to 1972 or 1980, this will cause a "mere" global depression. All of which we could deal with except for number two. Y2k is the single most unnerving prospect to modern technological man, with the possible exception of global nuclear, biological or chemical war, planetary ecological disaster or an asteroid strike. I'd include the prospect of Al Gore being elected United States president, but that would be too terrifying to think about.

The Second reason Y2k strikes terror is that it questions the technology cult underlying our modern societies. It is not necessary for Y2k to actually do anything disastrous to fulfill its role as technological heretic. Y2k strikes so much terror into the deepest recess of modern man that he responds by denial. A denial that is so complete and through it simply cannot accept Y2k's implications. And so with a mere 240 days to go, most people aren't even thinking about Y2k, much less actively preparing for it. The reason for this astounding turn of events is simple. I shall label it "uncertainty overload". People simply cannot get a handle on what Y2k will mean for them personally. They have probably heard the term Y2k by now. They may even have some understanding of its potential is for global chaos. But they cannot zero in on what will really happen. They are like an antiaircraft crew which has picked up a plane on radar, begins the process of tracking it, to determine if it is friend or foe, and then decide whether to shoot it down. All of this being done during a howling rainstorm, in the stress of combat, physical fatigue, fear and under the command of a "cruit" officer just out of ROTC. With these conditions the antiaircraft crew might very well shoot their feet off, or at least not make the right decision in time.

The official disinformation campaign on Y2k has made things worse, delaying vital awareness among the global populace. There is always a conflict between the urgent and the important. The urgent is the phone ringing. The important is the report the boss wants in a week. In modern life, the urgent will always win out over the important unless a conscious decision is made to ignore the urgent and deal with the important. Y2k is a classic example of this. The urgent problems, crisis, and just the physics of modern day to day life have all conspired to keep Y2k in the background as next years problem. 240 days isn't a long time, but when today is filled with High School Gothic Terrorists, Kosovo genocide, Yugoslavian Air Strikes, global economic, political and military instability, and a President who has renamed the Oval office the Oral office -Y2k gets not just pushed to the back burner but off the stove altogether.

A person hearing about Y2k from official sources might conclude that while there wasn't a problem a year ago, there is now. Fortunately, the same official sources that told you Y2k wasn't a problem-but now is-have confidently asserted that they have it under control and issue deadlines to meet. Like the September 30, 1998 deadline; the December 31st 1998 one; the March 30th 1999 one and now rapidly approaching June 30th one. Lost in the clutter of modern life is the obvious fact that these are all missed deadlines, including the approaching June 30th one. For instance, 11 of the 24 federal government agencies missed the March 30th one, with the ones that made it showcasing the following maxim: "If at first you don't succeed, redefine success". Y2k has evidenced the largest failure to meet a deadline in computer history and it has happened three times in a row. Remember 12-31-98 with a year for testing? Now it is June 30th, 1999 with six months for testing. Soon it will be September 30th with three months for testing and then 12-31-1999 with three minutes for testing and a full year for spin control.

The term TEOTWAWKI (the end of the world as we know it) is often used In use-net discussion groups to describe survivalist visions of a coming societal meltdown. I personally prefer this essay's title as I think it is a more accurate description of Y2k's likely effects. The world will go on. As Mark Twain put it "All I learned about life can be summed up in three words "It goes on". And so life will go on after Y2k hits, but it will not be life as we now know it. The global economy will be reduced to the status of a badly run state Department of Motor Vehicles. Life will be chaotic, unstable and the basics of our technological superstate will be frayed. We will have electricity, but only for 6 hours a day, just like a third world country. Social tensions, class inequalities and economic poverty will result in a surge of political envy. Just how popular do you think Bill Gates, with his $100 billion, will be next year? If things get bad enough, and the system holds together long enough, Y2k's political upheaval may surpass its economic one. I doubt the elite's will be done away with completely, but I can foresee Y2k tribunals and the trial, conviction, and possibly summary execution, of many current political, economic and social leaders. Read what happened to the economic leaders of 1929 after the Stock Market crash. Interesting reading, since they all were thrown in jail and universally despised.

Admiral Chester Nimitz, given command at Pearl Harbor after the Japanese attack commented that he waited until the disaster before actually accepting the previously offered command. He felt that anyone in command on December 7th, 1941 would be destroyed utterly regardless of technical competence. Likewise, Y2k will sweep away anyone in a position of authority now. The only real questions are how bad will Y2k be; how bad do the current political, economic, media, social and educational elite's want to hang onto power. We have a liberal veneer to a predatory, corporate banking oligarchy attempting to rule the world. Life as we now know it is ending almost on a daily basis. Over the next few months, and well in the next millennium the process of decay will increase until we see either freedom or slavery. Y2k will either awaken the world's people to the truths of sound money backed by gold and silver, a sound society backed by personal morality and a truly peaceful, prosperous global system. Or, the global banking oligarchy will use the chaos to cement its control and finish off the only remaining bastion of freedom remaining; namely, the United States. In so doing, the global bankers will usher in a new medieval feudal system with themselves and their cronies as its nobility and the rest of us as serfs.