Prepper

[pErvinalia]

Do you have a network of spider holes spanning several hundred kilometers? What kind of depth charges is your boat packing in the event of a submarine attack? You didn't think of that one did you?

Come, let us talk preparedness...

[Hermit]

The best laid plans...

No matter how well you think you are prepared, there's likely to be something you overlooked or some mistake you made - one solitary one of either will do - for all your preparations to do you no good at all. Take the Vl'hurgs and the G'Gugvuntt, for example. After warring each other for thousands of years over some perceived insult they realised that said insult emanated from an entirely different galaxy, which they managed to pinpoint. They despatched a fleet consisting of millions of state of the art battle spacecraft. The noted historian, Douglas Adams, briefly commented on how this panned out: the "mighty ships tore across the empty wastes of space and finally dived screaming on to the first planet they came across—which happened to be earth—where due to a terrible miscalculation of scale the entire battle fleet was accidentally swallowed by a small dog."

If some catastrophic event is set to wipe out, say, 50 or 90% of a population lone preppers will not improve their chances of survival by a noticeable factor with their bugout kits, their stashes of ammo and food, their armour plated hidey holes and whatnots. Survival has always been, and will always remain contingent on being a member of a community. Post-apocalyptic survivors will be those who have rebooted civilisation within some of those.

[pErvinalia]

In rural areas, cooperation already flourishes, so a disaster would just see a continuation of what is normal. As much as possible. The cities, though, are another matter. In Australia we do see people in cities get together and cooperate in disasters, but these are things that last like a week or so. Push that out to 6 months, and I image the gloves would be off.

[laklak]

You don't want to be around mullions of other ground apes when it all goes tits up. The fuckers are stupid, violent, and dangerous at the best of times, add a bit of apocalypse and they're positively lethal.

[Forty Two]

In rural areas, cooperation already flourishes, so a disaster would just see a continuation of what is normal. As much as possible. The cities, though, are another matter. In Australia we do see people in cities get together and cooperate in disasters, but these are things that last like a week or so. Push that out to 6 months, and I image the gloves would be off.

Oh, indeed, yes. In rural areas, the people tend to be more self-sufficient, and there is more distance between a catastrophe and starvation, and there are fewer people around to make demands.

Indeed - people are basically good and they don't want to hurt each other. We saw here in the US during the 2003 blackout in the northeast or on 9/11/01 where New York City was blacked out and absolutely peaceful. Extend that to where garbage is piling up for weeks, clean water stops, and the power is gone, stores are closed and transportation impossible....it's not evil that takes over, it's necessity.

[Forty Two]

Having enough food for a month at home doesn't require much effort. Spending an hour once every year to renew the stash.

Certainly not, because one can ration certain foods for quite a long time. But is a month's worth of food enough for a month? I have about 100 families within a short walk from my front door. What happens when they don't have enough for their kids?

[Rum]

I’ve seen a few disasters. Several major typhoons in Hong Kong and two lots of serious flooding here in Carlisle. Not quite in the collapse of everything as we know it league but totally disruptive. My experience for what it’s worth is that people come together and work for the common good. The community spirit here during the floods which left a good few hundred people homeless was something special.

Of course if it’s you versus another survivor fighting over the last radioactive potatoe in town it might be another matter.

[Sean Hayden]

I think there is a lot of opportunity between local flooding and the last radioactive potato for a breakdown of "community" to happen.

[Forty Two]

I’ve seen a few disasters. Several major typhoons in Hong Kong and two lots of serious flooding here in Carlisle. Not quite in the collapse of everything as we know it league but totally disruptive. My experience for what it’s worth is that people come together and work for the common good. The community spirit here during the floods which left a good few hundred people homeless was something special.

Of course if it’s you versus another survivor fighting over the last radioactive potatoe in town it might be another matter.

Agreed, and people will come together to help each other.

It all depends on the disaster. Did the flooding in Carlisle mean people were fending for themselves without power, food or water, and no outside assistance, for a month?

When the overall community is still functioning, but small area of a few hundred people get homeless, the outside folks come in. Like when tornado in the US rips through a town. Sure, bunches of people have their lives devastated, but there is support for them, public and private, when that happens. They don't have forage for food.

What I'm talking about is the true catastrophe the preppers are waiting for.

[Rum]

I think there is a lot of opportunity between local flooding and the last radioactive potato for a breakdown of "community" to happen.

Yeah - I think the red line is when the broadband drops.

[Forty Two]

[Sean Hayden]

[Rum]

I’ve seen a few disasters. Several major typhoons in Hong Kong and two lots of serious flooding here in Carlisle. Not quite in the collapse of everything as we know it league but totally disruptive. My experience for what it’s worth is that people come together and work for the common good. The community spirit here during the floods which left a good few hundred people homeless was something special.

Of course if it’s you versus another survivor fighting over the last radioactive potatoe in town it might be another matter.

Agreed, and people will come together to help each other.

It all depends on the disaster. Did the flooding in Carlisle mean people were fending for themselves without power, food or water, and no outside assistance, for a month?

When the overall community is still functioning, but small area of a few hundred people get homeless, the outside folks come in. Like when tornado in the US rips through a town. Sure, bunches of people have their lives devastated, but there is support for them, public and private, when that happens. They don't have forage for food.

What I'm talking about is the true catastrophe the preppers are waiting for.

Yes I know. There's a great deal of difference. Perhaps the Blitz in London is a better example. There was a real existential threat in those circumstances. A bit of a myth has grown up around the 'Blitz spirit' and there was some of that. But there was also a thriving black market and people looking out for themselves.

The utter collapse of things isn't something I personally think about. In a small highly interlinked and interconnected country like this, with a massive spider web of interconnected dependencies there would be little room for small independent and isolated groups to set up on their own - or to survive the initial collapse - whatever that might consist of. Chaos would ensue fairly quickly here. Far less so in developing countries with less modern supply chains and large countries where there is space to be isolated.

On the other hand if there was some remaining governance of a military type, that might be to our advantage is getting some sort of infrastructure back up and running.

[JimC]

A few crates of gin will suffice for me.

Oh, and some vitamin pills - good health is important...

[pErvinalia]

I think there is a lot of opportunity between local flooding and the last radioactive potato for a breakdown of "community" to happen.

Yeah - I think the red line is when the broadband drops.