No offence is intended here, but am I the only one who notices a correlation between 'Doomsday/Armageddon' cults and a more general propensity amongst US residents to prepare for catastrophic events? I appreciate that the US is more prone to natural disasters than the UK, but I can't help noticing that in general terms there seems to a much greater interest in the US in 'survivalist' issues.
Maybe it's a throwback to the 'pioneer' mindset (in the worldly not JW sense) enhanced by TV/movies, the existence of isolationist 'militias' ever on the keen look-out for those famous 'black helicopters' sent to enforce the 'new world order', or whatever, but I can't help wondering whether there is a partly-ingrained 'circle the wagons' or 'Remember the Alamo' mentality (real or perceived) that fueled the instigation of 'Doomsday' cults and keeps them going.
(I post as someone in the UK who wryly observes the queues in 24 hour supermarkets on Christmas Eve. One would think that the end of the world had been announced rather than just the mundane fact that some (not all) shops will be closed the next day!).