If the bloke who stood, with sandwich boards proclaiming “the end of the world is nigh” in my childhood town had had access to social media, who knows, he may have become the Greta Thunberg of his day, with millions hanging on his every word.
Greta always puts me in mind of two characters: one fictional, Violet Elizabeth Bott of Just William fame, the spoilt brat from next-door who would yell, “I’ll thcream and thcream till I’m thick!” (translation: I’ll scream and scream until I’m sick); and, Elizabeth Barton, the Holy Maid of Kent, who almost brought down Henry VIII, so popular were her visions and prophecies.
While Greta chucked in school when she was about 12, Barton never went. Despite this, and again, like Greta, Barton met repeatedly with Henry’s senior ministers, though her meetings ended rather less well for her than did Greta’s. It was Thomas Cromwell who, worried that the Barton cult was getting out of hand, had her executed on trumped up charges and a number of her followers hung, drawn and quartered.
Perhaps humans are pre-programmed to adopt apocalyptic cults. After all, the Abrahamic religions all anticipate the end of the world as we know it. Christian breakaway sects, such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses and Christadelphians, appear to expect Judgement Day any time soon, but perhaps no sooner than those ‘green’ zealots who set up a trestle table each Saturday in our town square, cover it with baize and pamphlets and, literally, try and frighten the children. Ironically, their pitch is immediately opposite the Jehovah’s Kingdom Hall! Take your pick, they’re all selling the same thing....<<<Read More>>>...
