Several things here.
1) Preppers are seen as weirdos when they’re prepping for something most of the population don’t think is a threat. I’m not saying preppers are wrong, but “regular” people don’t think it’s weird for someone to stock up before a hurricane.
2) There was a mandatory evacuation. In such a case, everyone should have been either leaving or prepping. Anyone doing neither of those is just in denial.
3) The media and liberals malign preppers because they understand “stockpiling” just like they understand the economy. They think that if someone is stockpiling a resource, there will necessarily be less of it for everyone else. This is not true until production of the resource stops. Liberals approach every situation like it’s a zero-sum game. Prepping isn’t. The economy isn’t. Liberals and stupid, lazy people will always want the fruits of other people’s labor.
4) There’s something missing from the prepping community: optimism. Everyone is Harold Camping. I’d love to meet a positive prepper. Maybe more encouragement and less doomsdayism would result in more people prepping.
Flame away.
Do you not follow the prepper threads here on FR?
I don't prep for doomsday... I prep for the normal tornados and damaging straight line winds we get here.
Mainly, I prep so that I can continue my wonderful life with minumum disruption that involves being hungry, cold, and wet. Uncle gave me lots of hungry, cold, and wet experiences. I don't like them one bit. Not at all.
So I do what it takes to make sure I'm fed (well), warm, and dry.
A disaster would really cut into my historical reading time.
Perhaps you have a stereotype in mind that doesn't match reality. ;)
/johnny
Not a spark from me, thought I will say that your flame statement shows that you expect the worse from preppers which makes me think there’s something missing from your view of preppers, that is not to judge us as a whole but one at a time. I ask you is a fireman who trains for a three alarm he many never respond to a pessimistic? Of policeman at a gun range who may never be forced to shoot someone? Or a solider training for nuclear war that never occurs?
That said I think that preppers are actually very optimist. What we say and prep for is should bad times come we or the SHTF will have the training and the tools to handle them and survive them.
We encourage others to do the same as we so that they and their families can weather storms as well, yes some storms may never come, but rare is a life that doesn’t have to to weather some type of storm. Bad things occur and many aren’t Hurricanes were you get days of warning before, but by sharing our knowledge, experiences and ideas with others shows that we are not saying we are all going to die, we are saying if you prepare you and your families might live or at least not suffer near as much when and if they do occur.
After all planning to survive SHTF takes lots of optimism and of course faith, but not planing is very pessimistic and to me is like saying why bother it will do no good any way.
I think you've got that backwards.
Preppers are optimistic and self confident enough to think they can survive a SHTF scenario.
As far as I can see, those who hate preppers (hate is the right word) are the exact opposite. They do not think they can survive, and don't want anyone else to either. Now THAT is what I call a rotten attitude!
A much more mature attitude on the part of the non-prepping majority would be to simply ignore those who prep. If you don't want to prep, fine. If you do, that's fine too.
So why the anger towards those who prep?
Some people believe SHTF never happens or never will happen to them. Well like it or not if this Nor’easter hits (which right now seem very likely) the Sandy devastation zone we will see really honest to goodness SHTF. Something that just a few days of hurricane preps that the average person stocks isn’t going to do it. And the ‘gummbermint’ is already underwater in their efforts to help. This is what I prep for and it can happen.