10 Biggest Movie Myths About The Apocalypse

#9 - Religion

Another notion of the fractured, post-futuristic human society is that we will inevitably turn to religion en masse for our emotional well being. And not the hot chocolate & Christmas Carols type of religion, but that olde tyme religion of brimstone, hell, damnation, and Dick Cheney. Overnight, we'll all become Salem witch hunters again.

Sounds fun! Well, historical events actually might lead us in another direction all together. During WWI, when man's insatiable blood thirst encountered for the first time modern weaponry (i.e. machine guns, mustard gas, Gary Busey, etc), and then during WWII, which displayed the very worst of leaders and their foot soldiers with the collision of the -ism's, there was a profound sociological effect on Europe as it struggled to come to some type of understanding as to what just the Hell happened. It was a complete rewrite of the religious demographic across all of the countries that saw the very worst of the war. Go read some of the poetry from that era - a stark contrast to the eternal optimism in man's future from the Age of Enlightenment. Okay, then, don't read the poetry - but take my word for it. In 1900, the percentage of Atheists in Europe was only 0.4%. After the wars, that same number jumped up to 21.3%. Look at areas where the fighting was among the worst: Currently in Germany, only 47% of people believe in a God (Rammstein?). In France, a mere 34% believe in God (and France was a country so desperate to be more religious at one time, they actually invented their own pope). Damn Frenchies. Jesus is gonna be so pissed when he hears about this ... The idea that people will flock to religion as a means of hope in the post-modernist world is perhaps naive. Yeah, the crazies will worship re-discovered DVDs of Carrot Top, but the rest of mankind is just as likely to not believe in anything. I know what you're thinking ... Carrot Top has DVDs?