Posted on 12/05/2012 7:58:13 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
A few days ago, I posted this blog: Doomsday Preppers are Socially Selfish. The role of a blogger is to foment discussion an it certainly appears that’s what I did. I very much appreciated most of the 150+ comments – except perhaps the ones that called me ‘stupid’, ‘nuts, ‘arrogant’, ‘ignorant’ – and a few personal emails that were much more graphic.
I wrote this for the emergency management community, who pretty much misunderstood what I was saying. Social media is certainly powerful and I had no idea this would be so controversial.
FIRST .. let me offer a heartfelt apology. The title of that blog was misleading because there is a difference between DOOMSDAY Preppers and DISASTER Preppers. My sister, Marilyn, is a great example of a Disaster Prepper – although she calls it stocking up while working with her community. I asked her what the difference was and she said Disaster Preppers want to prepare for a prolonged power outage (all to common these days), while Doomsday Preppers are preparing for half the world to be destroyed.
For the record, I was a practicing emergency manager for over 20 years before I retired last year. The words 'All Disasters Are Local' are permanently inscribed on my brain. I would NEVER discourage or disparage work being done in communities as part of CERT or any other volunteer group. Those are the folks who are going to save the world. I can also unequivocally state (and I don’t know an emergency manager who would disagree with me) that NOBODY should expect help from their government during the first few weeks of any major disaster. The issues we saw in Katrina and Sandy (among others) only confirm it. The people who needed help right away were the ones who didn’t prepare...
(Excerpt) Read more at emergencymgmt.com ...
/johnny
It is against the law to be the little red hen or the hard working ant...
We are living in the animal farm of the lazy grasshoppers...
How is it selfish to be storing food and medicine for an emergency? I have to be storing it for my entire community, otherwise not at all?
This author seems more like a liberal do-gooder to me. And makes no sense.
Whether I prep because there might be an earthquake or financial collapse, the end result is the same. I’m ready, no matter what scenario plays out.
This is PURE CYA
She probably will never actually tell us what is selfish about preparing for troubled times.
/johnny
survival of the human race doesn’t mean saving the entire membership of the species. Just enough to carry on.
She’s right on target.
Yea, just like there's a difference between a storm and a tempest. *rollseyes*
This woman is insane. This is a CYA to another article she wrote.
Preppers are selfish? -BOGUS
Preppers hurt others?? That is insane.
Second Civil War File.
Hahahha, this woman is a commie/thug/thief If I’ve ever read/heard one.
I read the entire thing, all comments, etc.
She wouldn’t bat an eye to jack your well planned supplies to give to thugs and idiots.
Also, she even admits in one post that “of course I’ll be taken care of, I have a government post to help other losers” (paraphrased).
I mean, these people really do think we are stupid like their followers.
I think the real mind blow for people like her is that there are so many people not so stupid as to buy into her commie crap hook line and sinker.
Phsaw!
And I hate this “old-white-angry man” meme (tangent). I’m white and 30 (hardly old), and not really “Angry” so much as terribly disappointed in my fellow countrymen.
This country simply can’t survive united, it gets clearer every day.
WHY does everyone insist on sticking together? What is in it for each group?
We can be separate and still engage in trade and resource mixing, just like we do with China, now.
bleh.
Bring on the calamity!
The selfishness of the doomsday preppers is real but is harmless because the scenarios in which they get to play out their selfishness will never come to pass. They’re harmless in the same way that the rapture crowd is harmless. The rapturists fantasize about airliners full of unbelieving doubters getting their just comeuppance when the Christian pilot is raptured out the cockpit. But it ain’t never gonna happen. Likewise the doomsday preppers look forward to the day when the doubters are either herded into FEMA stadiums or are forced to beg at the doorstep of the doomsdayers’ hidey holes for a few C-ration crumbs. But again, it’s never going to happen. What will happen is what the lady who wrote this piece describes: the local community will rally to meet needs. The doomsday crowd is correct only to the extent that the more people have stocked away some supplies, the less difficult will be the work of the community.
/johnny
Hmmm...
Preparations for a social collapse or disaster: non-perishable foodstuffs, water (and water purification equipment), medications and bandages, firearms and ammunition, firewood and facilities to use it for heating and cooking, . . .
Preparations for doomsday: rightly confessing faith in Our Lord Jesus Christ, baptism and chrismation, repentance and confession of sins, prayer, fasting, vigils, frequent reception of the Holy Mysteries, . . .
Yeah, we’ve been through this before, twinkletoes.
Actually, I suspect that the community will confiscate “excess food” for the “community good”. Which is why advertising that you’re a prepper is incredibly stupid. . .
Right. That’s why doomsdayers need to practice good “OpSec”. You don’t want the zombies to know about your stash.
I prepare to live. Regardless of the circumstances.
Just like great grandma did.
You want to make out that preppers on FR are evil.
Guess what?
I don't have fantasies about disasters.
You might have fantasies about people you imagine might dream about disaster.... but that's several removes from reality.
/johnny
You know I’m right about the prepper community’s nutty doomsday tendencies.
Last time you even admitted it was silly — I think you used the word “idiotic” — to prep for some improbable SHTF fantasy. I’m with you 100% that it makes sense to stock up a few weeks worth of supplies so you’re not screwed when the next flood or tornadoe or regional power outage comes. But that’s as far as I’ll go with it.
To say the prepper community isn’t caught up with fantasy BS is to ignore all the SHTF junk they write about day in and day out.
You seem as obsessed with it as most anyone else, I’m sure glad that I do long term prepping, it has sure helped my the last couple of years.
“Valerie Lucus-McEwen”
I live by the rule “Never trust a woman with a hyphenated name”. It’s never steered me wrong either.
/johnny
There is no bright line but that doesn’t mean there isn’t such a thing as too far. You know this. That’s why you acklowledged a distinction last time.
/johnny
What Stash ??? We’re Extreme Couponers, not Preppers. . .
Here's your post (my comment in italics):
What I don't believe in is prepping for an extremely low probably SHTF type scenario.Anyone that does that is an idiot.
In my area, most likely threats are tornados, damaging straight line winds, wildfires, and personal financial events.
Those preps also work for someone in an earthquake zone, or a hurricane, or a blizzard.
I'm not prepping for earthquakes, I'm prepping for tornados, but if the New Madrid goes off (unlikely, in my lifetime), the tornado preps cover me.
/johnny
The book may be a work of fiction, but the premise is not that far fetched. Today, astronomers are aware of a Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (PHA) labeled 2012 DA14 which will miss the earth by less than 25,000 miles or approximately one tenth of the distance between the earth and the moon. Granted, this PHA is not a comet and is a rather small asteroid measuring about 60 yards wide. If it were to hit the earth the impact would be equivalent to a 2.4 megaton nuclear bomb. The resulting crater could be about a mile wide and 500 feet deep. The date of the upcoming close encounter is February 15, 2013. Hypothetically speaking, what is the possibility that if it were to hit the earth, scientists would have the faintest idea exactly where or when the impact would occur? Even if they knew (or guessed) the location of ground zero, what are the odds the local or federal governments would have any ability to prepare for the event or react to the devastation after the fact? I'm not confident.
Prepping for WWIII? Or CWII? Maybe not so much.
/johnny
Your unwillingness to entertain the idea that one more domino could fall.... Well, to me that sounds like believing in the Easter Bunny while denying the existence of Santa. But what do I know? :p
Okay, and now I want to see you say that prepping for a SHTF scenario, as generally understood by the prepper community, is crazy.
Not hypothecially speaking... the last time a large enough object was detected early enough, it was filmed from aircraft as it fell, and picked up after it fell.
Them math guys... They know when and where stuff meets atmosphere.
/johnny
You got some serious control issues going on...
First. Get the prepper community to define SHTF. I've said mine. Oct 2008 market crash.
/johnny
Uh huh. You dodged it. Speaks volumes.
Have a good evening.
“Pretty much misunderstood what I was saying”
Anymore when I read those words, whether from Zero, Costas or whomever, my first thought is, now there’s some great rhetoric: “You were too stupid to comprehend my meaning.”
Word to that. As soon as I see one using a hyphenated name, they go on my 'do not communicate with' list.
I said my personal SHTF mark is the market crash of 2008.
You are the one that had the 'generally understood' thing going on.
You have a great evening.
And remember, out here, somewhere, somone is doing something you don't like.
/johnny
Every communist nation that ever existed has built walls to keep their people from escaping. The need for these walls is because the people who are more productive know that they will be better off outside the walls rather than inside.
For the same reason, those who support socialism realize that no productive person who could, say, leave Kalifornia and move to Texas if the nation split up, would stay in Kalifornia. The socialists cannot afford to have the nation split up.
Many posters on this thread seem to be blind to what is happening in Greece and, more importantly, what is yet to happen.
There is simply not enough wealth in the world to do that which the socialists among us have promised to do. This reality is slowly being recognized.
Another poster on this thread points out that there is a limit to just how long productive people are going to be willing to be "fair" to those who expect themselves to be supported. I predict an UNCIVIL WAR.
I would say she isn't CYA-ing at all. It sounds more like she is doubling down on her own stupidity:
Selfish is defined as concerned excessively or exclusively with oneself, seeking or concentrating on one’s own advantage or well being without regard for others. By that definition, Doomsday Preppers are socially selfish – Disaster Preppers are not.
/johnny
Yep, and Ms. Hyphenated-Name is just doling out the standard patter to soften up anyone who would strenuously object. Only, things don't seem to be working according to plan right now. Preparedness takes many forms :)
But, of course, the patter would work once amplified by demagogy if the S really hits the F. Sadly, the demagogy will largely broadcast what already lurks in the heart of many men.
what the hell is it her concern why people plan for whatever level of problem they think could occur?
not everyone preps for the same reasons, and not everyone plans as long or as detailed as’others. you do what you can, you plan for what you feel you need to, and if you want to keep going, you do.
Well one event you haven’t considered is a solar-orbit asteroid or low-magnitude comet impact approaching from the sun, ala the Tanguska impact. No one saw that coming since it approached from the sun.
SOHO might pick it up but radar systems eventually would.
All of a suddent lots of people are leaving Washington and the news networks reporters are all low-level subs or go to taped programming. That’s how you’ll know. And you won’t have time to make a trip to the stores you’re completely dependent upon.
I know from comet Lee in 1999 that if there’s any reason to be concerned Americans will be the absolute last to be informed.
“The selfishness of the doomsday preppers is real”
Define ‘selfish’. You talk too stupid to know the meaning of the word without distoring the definition like a liberal. So, go ahead. Give your best liberal try.
Dan, is that you?
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