The World Isn't Ending, Now What?

In a old post on the seduction of apocalyptic thinking, my emphasis was on fundamentalist Christians and others who feel enticed by the notion that the world will soon come to an end. But the tendency reaches deeper than that. Apocalyptic thinking is motivated, in large part, by an inability to come to grips with life's challenges, and one turns to metaphysics as an escape from lurking feelings of guilt, anxiety, and despair.
Without being religious, many liberals and progressives act as if their world has come to an end. That is, they see no solutions to a world sunk into chaos, reactionary religious backlash, and overwhelming difficulties.

There is an alternative to this sort of gloom and doom. We need to reshape our expectations by holding them higher, not lower. Certain points come to mind.

--In the past, people accepted disease, poverty, political corruption, war, and even urban pollution on a vaster scale than we do now. They were still able to conquer disease and find a way out of the other problems, if not perfectly, then progressively. That same impulse is alive today.

--What blocks a solution to such things as poverty and pandemic disease in the Third World isn't lack of knowledge but lack of will. We have the money and know-how to solve almost every challenge we face. Reactionaries may stand in the way, but if one looks deeper, even the most liberal thinkers are clinging to nationalism, post-colonial values, and other outmoded ideas, such as the inevitability of a world divided into haves and have-nots.

--The way to be optimistic again is to help foster the future. The best future would be one based on globalism and peace. Hundreds of organizations already work on behalf of both. There's no need for anyone to feel that isolationism, war, and nationalism are irreversible. They may not end in our time, but there's much value in helping the future to be born at any stage.

--Since the world isn't coming to an end, the realistic alternative is a personal choice--reactionary isolation or progressive cooperation. Once each of us sees this clearly, we can make a choice. To do nothing is the same as allowing apocalyptic thinking and right-wing interests to prevail, since both are aggressively active. the good news is that one doesn't have to think in terms of success or failure. Just to align yourself with the progressive impulse in life brings its own reward. And there is huge hope of success, because the dominant trend in the world is progressive, despite how things look in the U.S. right now. Technology is capable of solving the fuel crisis and global warming, or at least these two huge challenges can be met positively. There is no need to give in to passive resignation. What we are experiencing now is far form the end of the world. It's a transition time, full of ferment and conflict but just as full of promise.

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