Posted on 03/24/2013 6:28:49 AM PDT by dennisw
Imagine if suddenly, and completely without warning, the world experienced a total blackout – no electricity, no mobile phones, no banks, no internet, no TV, no emergency services.
As it becomes apparent that the lights are never coming back on, nations are plunged into chaos, mass riots break out in major cities and, without electricity, governments are toppled. Into the vacuum step ad-hoc militias, armed and ready to enforce their own rule of law.
This is the apocalyptic premise of the hit American TV series Revolution, which begins on Sky 1 this week. In the first episode, viewers are pulled through this nightmarish chain of events.
So, what would you do? It’s a question that members of a burgeoning subculture known as ‘Preppers’ – people who are prepared for any kind of disaster – have been asking themselves for years.
Preppers look at the world around them and see all kinds of potential threats – economic collapse, global warming, terrorism, nuclear war, dwindling energy supplies, asteroid strikes and, yes, a prolonged blackout.
They’ve largely reached the same conclusion: the end of the world as we know it is just around the corner, and time is running out to gear up for the total collapse of society.
Furthermore, the recession has seen ‘Prepping’ become a multibillion-dollar industry, with many American Preppers spending thousands every year stocking up on supplies
Ron Douglas has seen business boom in the past 12 months. A founder of the Red Shed Media Group in the States, he’s enjoying what might be described as the ‘profits of doom’.
Last year, Red Shed organised five Self Reliance Expos, which pulled in 40,000 punters at $10 a head, while its radio network has notched up over two million podcast downloads.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
“The little one on the end looks kind of shifty and she might mark the deck...”
Agreed....can’t trust the gingers!
Obviously they’ve got a good supply, but what concerns me the most as a modest prepper is security. My question is, yes, you can have weapons and ammo, but in a long-term crisis, aren’t you going to have to band together with other family members and trusted friends/neighbors for real protection - especially in the cities? Remember the adage, “there is safety in numbers”. Wouldn’t that especially apply in a real long term “shtf” situation?
When food and water run out, the bad guys are also going to go hunting in large groups and they are going to take what you’ve got dead or alive. Fighting against a couple of individuals is one thing, but when you are going up against 50 to 100 individuals there is no way you, by yourself, are going to be able to stop them.
I’ve heard other preppers say that if things get bad, they will leave the city and go to a “safe” place - but how do you travel safely to get there? Again, just like in the wagon train days - is there not more safety in numbers?
I still think the two most important things to have for a *particular* disaster, is a timetable and a manifest *unique* to that kind of disaster.
The timetable has two parts: how much time do you have to prepare?, and how long do you expect the situation to last?
For example, you wake up in the middle of the night and you home is on fire. Your timetable is simple, get your family out of the house and grab your “grab bag” before you run out the door or window. Get a vehicle if you can. Estimated recovery time: a minimum of six months to a year.
The manifest is trickier. If possible much of it, like rarely accessed but critical documents, is stored offsite, as in a bank deposit box, or in a buried cache in your yard. Everything else is likely a loss.
Granted, a different disaster will have entirely different parameters. The worst disasters tend to take years to even build up, which gives you years to mitigate it, but recovery may be a decade or more. Very different timetable and manifest.
Also posted last night, with 141 replies so far:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3000129/posts
OPSEC is everything - just read Selco's blogs to see how it really mattered when SHTF.
This guy is also quite interested in cashing in on the prepper popularity, as the article itself states clearly. Book rights, $400 in revenue - follow the money.
To say nothing of how the Brits look on preppers, as from the article:
While there’s no evidence to prove that Nancy (Lanza)’s lifestyle directly contributed to the tragedy of Sandy Hook, it has prompted some commentators to suggest that Preppers are gun-toting, conspiracy-theorising, right-wing militia. Much like the Australian punters who last year bet on the world ending after our planet is ‘consumed by the Sun’ (in which case, how would they claim their winnings?), there are radical elements within the Prepper community.
Not very OPSEC bright, are they?
It’s probably part of a marketing campaign for their website that sells supplies like this.
After reading all of these doomsday posts I am going to spend the rest of my life worrying and gathering supplies so that I can hunker down in some filthy hovel and protect my stash. This sounds like a wonderful way to to spend the few years we have on this earth. I for one will spend the rest of my days
worrying and fretting about tomorrow and all the horrible things awaiting me down the road: I better close now and get
on with my worrying and what iffing, there’s not much time.
Half the society is nuts and the other half is crazy.
re: “I for one will spend the rest of my days
worrying and fretting about tomorrow and all the horrible things awaiting me down the road: I better close now and get
on with my worrying and what iffing, there’s not much time.”
Ah, gregfox, remember the story of the Ant and the Grasshopper? Remember the Boy Scout motto, “Be Prepared”. Planning for the future is not necessarily “fretting” and “worrying”.
Remember how Jesus once told his disciples, “When evening comes, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red,’ and in the morning, ‘Today it will be stormy, for the sky is red and overcast.’ You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.”
“Red Shed Media Group”...
Good catch; I missed that reference completely.
If they don’t know how to/aren’t currently gardening, they are going to be very disappointed and hungry.
This should be posted on every one of these threads. The seeds are the easy part of gardening and that assumes that seeds are selected for the growing zone you live in. I have looked at the advertisements and researched a few of these companies and noted lots of problems. First and foremost, seeds gathered in the south may not grow well in Northern states and vice versa.
Gardening takes practice, soil preparation, irrigation, protection (pests/blight), fertilization, knowledge of plants (can’t plant some near each other), pollination, and the list continues. Even assuming a novice was able to grow a crop there is an equally daunting list of items/skills required to preserve the harvest if you plan on eating it year round.
Anyone thinking they are going to bug out to live off the land with a pack of “survival seeds” on their back and some rudimentary hunting skills like some kind of “Prambo” (prepping Rambo) are setting themselves up for failure.
If you are reading this and live in a suburb and plan to head for the hills you should be practicing now in your backyard to understand what you really face. I would concentrate on learning to grow staple crops (like potatoes) to get started and practice storing them as well. If you are not currently gardening and learning about gardening don’t count on it as part of your preparation!
Thank God I’m a country boy!
Are you serious?
And run a trot line according to Hank Williams Jr
Don’t try to confuse me Rusty, I’m a Scientologist.
Thanks for the tip rusty but I must go now, I’m late for my
weekly tupperware party.
Your the guy that was bitching because you had to stand in line waiting for someone to give you food and water after hurricane Ike.
They just set themselves up for a raid by HS.
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