"second, you have the rich fulfilling prophecy the way people expect it to for the purposes of manipulation, fraud, etc."
Exactly. "Prophesy" is a double-edged sword and anyone (in my most humble opinion) who touts themselves as a prophet or is presented as one for the sake of viewership, money, or simple attention is no prophet, at all. These hokums and snake oil salesmen are 100% diversions. Anything that takes my focus away from the work that I need to do for myself, every day, and for others is dangerous. I don't need to know what it all means because I have the attention span of a flea. So, delving into something that I have a difficult time understanding is only frustrating and distracting for me.
I don't think anything is "exciting" about the collapse of mankind.