Issue date: Dce 5, 1999

In this article:
Y2K is mostly about ignorance and stupidity
Y2K gives us an opportunity to evaluate ourselves

Why we love disaster
As Y2K looms, noted psychologist and USA WEEKEND contributing editor Mary Pipher explains our fascination with worst-case scenarios.

hen I was a girl, my favorite stories were disaster stories. Over and over, I pestered my mother for the same tales -- Scott and Shackleton in Antarctica, the Donner party, the beheading of Marie Antoinette. Even now, years later, I'm still fascinated by worst-case scenarios. Like many other Americans, I read The Perfect Storm, Endurance and Into Thin Air, and watched Titanic and Saving Private Ryan. Disaster stories have it all: passion, adventure, heroism, depravity, loss and redemption.

Why are disaster stories so fascinating?

They touch our most basic instincts. As primates, we're hard-wired to pay attention to danger. No doubt our earliest ancestors watched, riveted, as saber-toothed tigers attacked their prey and avalanches wiped out tribes one mountain away. We humans can't not look at a train wreck. Our heartbeats accelerate and our eyes widen.

They teach us how humans behave when pushed to the edge, then over the edge. Under such adverse conditions, the gamut of human character emerges -- from craven ignominy (the man in the Donner party who enjoyed human flesh) to incredible self-sacrifice (the man who swam in the icy Potomac after the 1982 plane crash in Washington, D.C., helping passengers to safety until he went under from hypothermia). There are surprises -- the weak may become strong, curmudgeons become heroes, generals become demoralized and helpless. As we envision a disaster story, we imagine how the participants feel. We think, "Could I behave with the dignity of Marie Antoinette thrown in her silk gown into a dungeon filled with rats? What would I have done as the Titanic sank beneath me?"

They comfort us, because they are not our stories -- at least not yet. They make us feel lucky we weren't there. The earthquakes, the hurricanes and plane crashes, divert us from our long-term sorrows and keep our small miseries in perspective. After hearing a worst-case-scenario story, we say to ourselves, "It could be worse. My life isn't so bad."

The Y2K computer bug scare is the perfect worst-case-scenario story for the millennium. It's an old story -- humans always have been superstitious and vulnerable to apocalyptic fever -- but it's a new story, too, about our fears of technology and our vulnerability in the complex modern world.

Y2K is mostly about ignorance and stupidity. Unlike many disasters, with this one we can make preparations. Yet, even as we prepare, we sense that our fate is really in the hands of people we don't know: the administrators in governments and businesses who either are or aren't taking care of their computers. We can make a few small plans, but we cannot save ourselves. Other people will determine the outcome. Our anticipation of the event, our panic or complacency, is really a matter of trust. Our government officials, our bankers and our airline executives assure us things will be OK. Do we believe them?

I'm surprised to admit my answer is yes. I came of age in the late 1960s, and, like most of my contemporaries, I am distrustful of authority and skeptical of institutions. But I haven't lost one night's sleep over Y2K. I'll buy some water and Power Bars, fill my car with gas and save my bank statements. I'm planning a big party with family and friends and my husband's band. I don't expect any trouble. If there is some, I can't control it, so why worry? I am not the type to hole up in a bunker and shoot anyone who wants my food and water.

The way people anticipate Y2K says something about their characters and psyches. Are they optimistic or pessimistic, calm or panicky? Do they trust others or do they feel vulnerable when they aren't in total control? Y2K gives us an opportunity to evaluate ourselves and our fellow humans and ponder once again a doomsday scenario. Will we cope with events with the wisdom of a Shackleton or the shortsightedness of the Donner party?

I wonder if my grandchildren, yet unborn, will ask me to tell them Y2K stories. I hope to tell them I was dancing with my children and friends while the Fabtones played Moondance.

Mary Pipher, of Lincoln, Neb., is the best-selling author of Reviving Ophelia and Another Country: Navigating the Emotional Terrain of Our Elders