Disaster for all humanity, with one exception

In his global disaster movie 2012, which is premiering next week, director Roland Emmerich portrays the destruction of many secular and religious monuments—with one exception, the Kaaba. He was afraid that if his movie showed Los Angeles being destroyed, and showed Rome and St. Peters being destroyed, but also showed the Kaaba being destroyed, Muslims would be so outraged they would put out a fatwa on his head.

The squeaky wheel gets greased—and Islam is the squeakiest wheel that ever was.

Also, the page has a clip from the movie, and it looks very stupid, a family trying to escape Los.Angeles in their car while tall buildings and elevated highways are collapsing all around it and the pavement beneath it is disintegrating. Somehow the car is not affected and keep going.

- end of initial entry -

Gintas writes:

“He was afraid that if his movie showed Los Angeles being destroyed, and showed Rome and St. Peters being destroyed, but also showed the Kaaba being destroyed, Muslims would be so outraged they would put out a fatwa on his head.”

We can take heart, liberals are cowards despite all their bluster about “speaking truth to power”.

A. Zarkov writes:

Roland Emmerich like so many in the West are choosing to avoid trouble now by not antagonizing the Muslims, but the monster is not to be satiated until the whole world is converted or subdued. He might not be interested in Islam, but Islam is interested in him.

The movie 2012 looks absolutely terrible from the trailers, and I will look forward to missing it. My consumption of the Hollywood product over the last ten years is nearly zero. I average less than one of their movies per year.

On a related note, a large earthquake in California is certainly in the future. The Hayward, San Andres, and Calaveras faults are all due for a rupture—see the United States Geological Survey earthquake probabilities here. There is a theory that a swarm of small earthquakes generally precedes major quake. We are in a swarm period now. To see this go to the Wolfram Alpha website here. In the wide short rectangular box at the top of the page type: “earthquakes near San Francisco” without the quotes. In a few seconds you will get a map, a graph and some text box material. Look at the graph. It displays all earthquake events with a magnitude greater than 4 in the Bay Area over the last 30 years. Now change the vertical scale by using the pull down menu right above the map. Select “Magnitude 3” instead of the default “Magnitude 4.” Behold the swarm in 2009 which you can see better by going to the pull down menu to the left of the magnitude menu and selecting “last 5 years.” Now notice how 2009 has lots of magnitude 3 and above earthquake events. Try the same thing with Los Angeles, and note the similar result. Try it for anywhere you like. For example New York City. Only this time select” magnitude < 2.” Note the swarm in 2009. Kind of spooky.

By the way, New York City is in earthquake country too. Brooklyn had a huge earthquake in 1884, and there is a fault at the 125 Street valley. The subway becomes overhead at 125 Street because of this valley. If you look carefully a the bridgework that holds up the subway station, you will see hinges. The designers were aware of the earthquake danger and put in the hinge to allow for movement during a quake. Go here and click on the audio sideshow. The sub-surface rock in New York City is not fractured like the rock in California. This un-fractured rock transmits energy with much less attenuation, so a magnitude 6 earthquake in NYC would be far more destructive than one in California. California has lots of small quakes compared to New York and that’s why the rock has much more fracture.

The return period for earthquakes is about 100 years in New York, so one is comping up, but not necessarily next year. Nevertheless less look on the bright side. The 125th fault runs through the UN building, so at least we will be rid of that.

A. Zarkov continues:

I have tried various cities, and I think the Wolfram Alpha must not show small magnitudes earthquakes for years before 2009. I can’t believe every place is now in a swarm period. So I suspect if it had all the small quakes we would see a steady stream for every year. Otherwise I would start to believe in the 2012 prophesy, and I most certainly don’t.

Stewart W. writes:

Although by all accounts this is a terrible movie with which I won’t waste my time, I prefer to think of it this way. By 2012, the Kaaba has for several years already been destroyed, undermining the faith of the Muslims and rendering Islam a spent and impotent historical footnote. Why waste the CGI to show the destruction of empty and worthless desert?

Well, I can dream, can’t I?

Posted by Lawrence Auster at November 05, 2009 12:11 PM | Send