Preppers: What should we be worried about?

[BStrong]

I live in earthquake country, and having been through a lesser example in '89 and seeing the effects, and hearing stories from friends about Managua in '72, That scenario is what concerns me most.

When I see the show Peppers I always think of my buddy who observed "Tier 1 gear, 4 F bodies."

 

[sackett]

Hey, lay off the preppers and their practices! We no longer condemn masturbation!

I think you should be good and ashamed of yourselves.

 

[Toontown]

Bug-out plans to avoid local disasters make sense. But bug-out plans to avoid the effects of an insane society collapsing are futile. As soon as the insane society collapses, millions of bugger-outers will go running off in all directions, and you will find yourself in a wilderness crawling with bugger-outers. Don't expect the game, the wood, or your life to last long in such an insane scenario.

If people can't even keep a society functioning - something they've been doing for thousands of years - then how in monkey hell (literally) are they going to make it in the wilderness?

Bottom line: in case of total societal collapse, all you need is a handgun and a bullet. Unless you have a plan for bugging out into an environment so hostile to typical bugger-outers that they won't even think about trying it. Such a plan would require highly specialized gear. Not the same stuff all the other buggers have.

 

[The_Fire]

Bug out? As in evacuating Copenhagen?

This reminds me of a scenario we ran in science class once (physics). IT was in the mid-80'es and television had just shown a live "roleplay" about what would happen if Barsebäck (swedish nuclear plant 80 or so km from Copenhagen) blew.
The televised RPG was pretty much a show in planned vs. reality. The politicians were stumped that civilians (and most non-civilians) in charge or operating critical equipment wouldn't stay and let themselves be irradiated to death while everyone else bugged out (imagine that).

Anyways: In that particular science class we were told to pretend we were in charge of the evac of Copenhagen. As part of it, we were told that we didn't have resources to evac the entire city before it was covered in entirely in a cloud of radiation.

Now, I'm sure that there were some other suggestions, but I clearly remember the bug-eyed look I got from my teacher when I suggested that the parts already in jeopardy (read: already irradiated) would be told that they were perfectly safe and should simply stay inside while telling the rest of the city to get the **** out of Dodge since they were in danger from the closing cloud.
When asked for clarification, I answered that those already irradiated, or close to being irradiated, were a lost cause and that leaving them behind would free up resources to evac the ones that could still be saved. That teacher never looked at me the same again and the rest of the class were sort-of horrified......

 

[DrDave]

How do you prepare for that?!

Anti-aircraft guns

 

[Unabogie]

Or when the deer run out.


I don't know of any survivalists in Denmark. (society is supposed to keep working?)
The US one on that tread were not in favour of gardening, perhaps it ran counter to his gun obsession?

If you learned to garden instead of prepping to hunt wild game, then you'd be a vegetarian. And that's the same as being a communist. Why would you want to survive the Apocalypse, only to live in an even worse hellhole?

Come on, people!

It's this kind of damned fool thinking that will get us all killed!

 

[Checkmite]

Bug-out plans to avoid local disasters make sense. But bug-out plans to avoid the effects of an insane society collapsing are futile. As soon as the insane society collapses, millions of bugger-outers will go running off in all directions, and you will find yourself in a wilderness crawling with bugger-outers. Don't expect the game, the wood, or your life to last long in such an insane scenario.

If people can't even keep a society functioning - something they've been doing for thousands of years - then how in monkey hell (literally) are they going to make it in the wilderness?

Bottom line: in case of total societal collapse, all you need is a handgun and a bullet. Unless you have a plan for bugging out into an environment so hostile to typical bugger-outers that they won't even think about trying it. Such a plan would require highly specialized gear. Not the same stuff all the other buggers have.

"Total societal collapse" - you mean that thing that doesn't seem to have ever happened in the history of mankind? Societal "collapse" when it occurs, occurs in isolated pockets at best. In a nation the size of the United States, with hundreds of cities of all sizes, it's pretty much impossible for a single condition or even a coinciding set of specific conditions to collapse society across the entire map. Last year a hurricane completely redrew the New Jersey shoreline, and people as geographically close as Philadelphia weren't even bothered.

You ask the question "if people can't even keep a society functioning", but this question is begging itself. People can quite handily keep a society functioning; they've been doing it for millennia without issue.

 

[Toke]

"Total societal collapse" - you mean that thing that doesn't seem to have ever happened in the history of mankind?......

I wonder how good the records are for the black death in Europe, it did cause some serious changes in society?

 

[Joey McGee]

They should spend more time worrying about their receding hairlines, sagging tissues and increasingly muddled thoughts, things actually guaranteed to happen with time.

Adam Lanza's mom was a prepper, not a healthy mindset to begin with and just adds to paranoid and insecurity with everyone in my opinion.

 

[Lukraak_Sisser]

I wonder how good the records are for the black death in Europe, it did cause some serious changes in society?

Changes yes, but nowhere near collapse. The existing nations kept right on going.

 

[BenBurch]

I see nothing wrong with having a few day's food, some emergency heat and light, and water set aside. Out in the countryside where blizzards can cut you off for days it is foolish not to have that.

 

[Checkmite]

I see nothing wrong with having a few day's food, some emergency heat and light, and water set aside. Out in the countryside where blizzards can cut you off for days it is foolish not to have that.

That's also not quite what "prepping" (preppage?) encompasses.

Emergency preparedness is keeping a full code-compliant container of gasoline in your trunk in case you run out. Prepping is installing a 1000-gallon gasoline tank in your back yard.

Emergency preparedness is keeping a few cases of bottled water stacked in the closet. Prepping is keeping a dozen 5-gallon jerry cans of water in the garage, along with several ceramic filters, chemical treatments, multiple rain-barrels and well-digging equipment.

Emergency preparedness is making sure there's never less than, say, a week and a half of canned food in the pantry. Prepping is keeping several sealed and airtight large plastic tubs full of dehydrated or vacuum-bagged food in foil pouches with shelf lives of five years and carefully marked with instructions as to person/day rationing.

Emergency preparedness is keeping a medicine cabinet stocked with different-sized Band-Aids, various pain relievers, burn cream, and an ace bandage or two, plus or minus a couple of items. Prepping is keeping a surplus army field surgery kit, trauma dressings, clotting agent, cervical collars, oropharyngeal airways, an entubation kit, and other similar equipment in a clearly-marked "go-bag" (unless you keep this go-bag in the trunk of your car rather than your home, in which case you're a Whacker, not a Prepper).

Emergency preparedness is keeping a small portable gas generator for small electrical needs in the event of a power failure. Prepping is keeping a large gas generator hardwired into your home's electrical grid with an automatic tripswitch.

Emergency preparedness is keeping a little one-burner camping stove with a couple of little disposable propane cylinders, the kind you buy in a set of two at the sporting goods store. Prepping is keeping a four-burner self-standing "portable kitchen" with several large cylinders of propane for backup.

I think that ought to give the general idea.

 

[Charlie Wilkes]

"Total societal collapse" - you mean that thing that doesn't seem to have ever happened in the history of mankind? Societal "collapse" when it occurs, occurs in isolated pockets at best. In a nation the size of the United States, with hundreds of cities of all sizes, it's pretty much impossible for a single condition or even a coinciding set of specific conditions to collapse society across the entire map. Last year a hurricane completely redrew the New Jersey shoreline, and people as geographically close as Philadelphia weren't even bothered.

You ask the question "if people can't even keep a society functioning", but this question is begging itself. People can quite handily keep a society functioning; they've been doing it for millennia without issue.

Monday, April 6, 2015. At 9:15 am, a 10-kiloton nuclear weapon explodes in the US capital, killing the president, most of his cabinet, and about half the US Congress. At almost the same time, a similar explosion occurs in Midtown Manhattan. Two hours later, a third bomb explodes in Los Angeles.

How well will society function?

 

[Sam.I.Am]

Monday, April 6, 2015. At 9:15 am, a 10-kiloton nuclear weapon explodes in the US capital, killing the president, most of his cabinet, and about half the US Congress. At almost the same time, a similar explosion occurs in Midtown Manhattan. Two hours later, a third bomb explodes in Los Angeles.

How well will society function?

Why 2 hours later? Is it someone who just happened to have a spare nuke lying around that decided to join the party after hearing about the other two?

As far as preparedness goes I would think that it would depend upon your location and what resources you can expect to have available if there was a huge interruption of society (meaning your local society and not society in the grand scale).

If you live in a geologically active location then you might be without water, power and a reliable supply chain for up to a month (or more in some cases).

If you live in a place where wildfires are anything more than a remote possibility (remember that "Wildfires" don't have to mean forest fires it can also include suburban areas like the outskirts of Oakland or LA as we have seen in the recent past).

If storms are a major concern (involving large amounts of wind, water or snow).

In some large cities there can be rioting which is hard to predict (as we saw in LA a few years ago) and may accompany the above possible emergency situation.

If any of those or any combination of them are a known hazard for your particular area then preparing (or even over preparing in comparison to your neighbors) for those specific types of situations isn't unreasonable in my opinion. However preparing for a tornado by building a tornado shelter into your house in an area where there is a extremely remote possibility of one occurring (for example) is where you are getting into Prepper territory.

For example the major concern for my area is earthquakes however, even though I live less than a mile inland from the ocean, I'm not concerned about tsunamis wiping me and my stuff into the ocean as I'm several hundred feet above sea level and a bugout bag is almost useless as there would be no prior warning. Major fires may be an issue (mostly post earthquake) so I have a portable fireproof safe for important documents. I have some food and water stored (about a weeks worth is kept out of the kitchen and in a place that I assume will be accessible if the building collapses) as well as gas and portable charcoal grills with a small camp stove and some small gas cannisters. I don't have a generator because I can get by for up to a month on no electrical power if I needed to (no water well, and a temperate climate). I also have a tent and sleeping bags just in case I need them if my home is either destroyed or unstable (at least until the aftershocks subside). I also like to go camping so that's kinda just a bonus side effect. I don't own any firearms however I know someone who live close by that does (and he knows that I know how to use them safely) and he has said that in an emergency that I could borrow one if the situation warranted it so I have about a hundred rounds of the proper ammo for that.

Outside of that there's not much more that I can reasonably do.

 

[crescent]

Monday, April 6, 2015. At 9:15 am, a 10-kiloton nuclear weapon explodes in the US capital, killing the president, most of his cabinet, and about half the US Congress. At almost the same time, a similar explosion occurs in Midtown Manhattan. Two hours later, a third bomb explodes in Los Angeles.

How well will society function?

Pretty well, actually. DC, Manhattan and LA would be a mess, and other areas would be without power. The state governments in Albany and Sacramento would continue to function, and federal continuity of government contingency plans would go into effect.

Disasters in the U.S., for the most part, tend to bring people together, not push them apart.

 

[Lukraak_Sisser]

Monday, April 6, 2015. At 9:15 am, a 10-kiloton nuclear weapon explodes in the US capital, killing the president, most of his cabinet, and about half the US Congress. At almost the same time, a similar explosion occurs in Midtown Manhattan. Two hours later, a third bomb explodes in Los Angeles.

How well will society function?

English, German and Japanese societies kept running remarkably normal during the Blitz and allied bombing campaigns at the end of WW2. Especially in the latter cases by the end most, if not all, infrastructure of the countries had been bombed into rubble.

While your scenario would be tragic to the people involved, to the US it's barely a scratch. It doesn't affect local government structure at all and there'd be a new and functioning government within a day or so. Given what US citizens are like when attacked in such a way the country would, as crescent already noted, be far more likely to come together to punish the perpetrator than fall apart.

 

[Safe-Keeper]

The Vice President would take office, the government would be "rebuilt", and America would lick its wounds and move on.

 

[Jim_MDP]

English, German and Japanese societies kept running remarkably normal during the Blitz and allied bombing campaigns at the end of WW2. Especially in the latter cases by the end most, if not all, infrastructure of the countries had been bombed into rubble.

While your scenario would be tragic to the people involved, to the US it's barely a scratch. It doesn't affect local government structure at all and there'd be a new and functioning government within a day or so. Given what US citizens are like when attacked in such a way the country would, as crescent already noted, be far more likely to come together to punish the perpetrator than fall apart.

We can do both, thank you very much.

 

[12AX7]

Wanna peek inside the mind of a gunnutter survivalist prepper?

For the LULz.

 

[Charlie Wilkes]

English, German and Japanese societies kept running remarkably normal during the Blitz and allied bombing campaigns at the end of WW2. Especially in the latter cases by the end most, if not all, infrastructure of the countries had been bombed into rubble.

While your scenario would be tragic to the people involved, to the US it's barely a scratch. It doesn't affect local government structure at all and there'd be a new and functioning government within a day or so. Given what US citizens are like when attacked in such a way the country would, as crescent already noted, be far more likely to come together to punish the perpetrator than fall apart.

I'm not so sure. No country has ever lost a sizable percentage of its political and economic command structure in one day. Think of the knowledge that would evaporate in an instant. What would happen to the monetary and banking system? Would workers and retirees continue to get their checks? Would essential goods continue to reach their destinations? Would people who live in cities stay there and do their jobs, or would there be a mass exodus to the countryside?

I see the potential for massive disruption lasting years, and a short-term situation in which people with bunkers, guns and canned goods would be glad they had them.