My A to Z of scare stories, from Anthrax to Zion (Protocols of the Elders of)

Otepoti

You missed Global Warming and Peak Oil!

caliban

And then ther's terrism. Which we in the States call terrism. Get over it. Live lives.

The Laughing Carbon Footprint

How could you miss ebola? That was going to be far more devastating than Ecstasy.

You also missed,from 25 years ago, global cooling. Africa was going to turn into Siberia and wouldn't be able to grow food! They would starve!

And you missed, from the Eighties, that we would run out of petroleum by the end of the decade. We wouldn't be able to transport food to market! We would die!

AndyX

Not to mention global warming, the Second Ice Age, obesity in the young, Sat Navs, 4x4s etc. etc.

John Cranham

Seems a mite Panglossian to me.

There could indeed be a global discontinuity coming combining peak oil, Western decline, EU disintegration (Hoorah), credit crunch and societal breakdown -already happening in the UK and please don't bring up Teddy Boys and skinheads, or that the current rash of fashion stabbings is nothing compared to the 19th century footpads who bordered the Tottenham Court Road and St. Giles - it doesn't help the families of the murdered does it? Bringing back capital punishment might deter future knife and gun crime, unless that's another panic measure we all suspect would work.

As for anthropogenic global warming, or is it cooling right now? We forget, so maybe you're right, perhaps we indeed shouldn't care about he-who-pays-the-piper-calls-the-tune scientific research and claim back Green taxes in favour of a smaller State where we keep a gun in the cupboard under the stairs and are able to use it when the burglar or the taxman's bailiffs call.

Comforting Mr. Parris as 20:20 hindsight always is. But let's not forget that World Wars I and II did happen, as people before those events feared, as did Iraq I and II and every war along the way. The Cold War WAS a cuban missile crisis/technical glitch away from global nuclear war.

So let's hope WW III remains a chimera and we can keep both neo-cons and jihadists in check by building bridges, but probably it'll end in blood being spilled. It often does it seems.

What you don't mention is that the struggle to counter these threats may have deterred and ameliorated the situation by pushing financial resources in that direction. Scare stories do produce actions which can neutralise the original fear, materially or psychologically.

Forewarned is forearmed to quote some panicker or other.

Back to Mahler and Radio 3 in the cottage garden Mr. Parris, and keep the heat pump working to heat the house just in case peak oil was right after all.

Now I feel a silent calm. Panic over, just another journalist talking b*ll*cks. G' us a job, I can do tha'.

The Happy Carbon Footprint

John Cranham -

I don't see your weakening the point for private ownership of guns by suggesting we might shoot tax bailiffs as amusing. This is a critical issue for containing the lawlessness in our society.

Your point about wars that people were fearing actually happening is a good one. I'm sure the English knew the Normans were planning to come over with all their fancy French ways to try to conquer their country. And for weeks or months, people centuries later were talking and writing about nothing but Napoleon and the Iron Duke.

So you're right on that point.

However, people acknowledge the possibility a jihadi inspired violent clash, partly because we're in the middle of it. Viz the takeover of the American Embassy in Teheran in the late 70s, the bombing of the US Marine barracks in Lebanon three years later with the death of over 200 marines as they slept. The bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires. The first attempt on the WTC. The nightclub in Bali. The central Railway station in Madrid. Nine eleven. Then 7/7. Then Glasgow Airport. Then the plan to blow up 10 transatlantic liners simultaneously over 10 major American cities. The railway station in Madrid. After all, they've been at it since the 12th Century, so we know they mean it. Yet you opin that you hope "we can keep both neo-cons and jihadists in check by building bridges,".

You think it's a matter of building bridges, eh? All we have to do is try a little harder to understand their feelings? Clearly, the meaning of jihad has sailed right over your head. Religious fanatics don't want bridges. They're not open to bridges. They're on a holy war. Chatting about it over a nice dish of humus and pita and a lovely glass of mint tea means diddley.

"G' us a job". Uh, no.

TDK

Interesting that you acknowledge Zion as a scare story. We know belief in the protocols and similar stories, led to thousands of deaths in Russia and millions elsewhere. It certainly seems to be the case that ideologies that believe in the power of Zion are a real worry. I wonder if there are any groups in the world today who buy completely into the Zion myth? Perhaps the the ones you dismiss in C, J, Q and fleetingly M.

Jimmock

The flaw exposed by TDK above, and the fact that the mother of all bogeymen, climate change, has been left out (because it's 'real' presumably and no joking matter), makes this a bizarre treatment of a promising topic.