1 post tagged “calston”
For those who believe that your survival probabilities and living standards during and after our
Societal Collapse will be optimized through some type of preparation, you might consider one of
the following strategies.
target.
- Educate Yourself: learn where and how to secure, produce, obtain, and/or create sufficient
life sustaining necessities—clean water, food, energy, shelter, and clothing—to last for the
remainder of your life, in the complete absence of any output from our industrial mosaic. The
upside to survival awareness is that you will be self-sufficient; the downside is that you will be
competing for dwindling supplies of remaining resources with 300+ million desperate and
hungry Americans—at least for the short term.
-Store Provisions: stock sufficient life sustaining necessities to enable your survival for at
least several months. The upside to a resource storehouse is that it will provide a buffer
during the onset of difficult times; the downside is that some of the 300+ million desperate
and hungry Americans will almost certainly find you and your storehouse, and attempt to
remove its contents by force.
-Arm Yourself: stockpile guns and other weapons in order to protect yourself from the 300+
million desperate and hungry Americans. The upside to armaments is that you will be able to
defend yourself; the downside is that you will eventually run out of bullets, encounter
somebody with a bigger gun, or sleep.
- “Relocalize” into a Self-sufficient Community: this is the group living strategy employed
by those who expect a “fizz” type collapse and post-collapse scenario. The upside is that you
and your self-sufficient companions will be capable of obtaining and producing your life
sustaining necessities for an indefinite period of time; the downside is that those lacking such
capabilities will find you, and your community will be an easy.
- Erect a Compound: this is the group living strategy employed by those who expect a “pop” type collapse and post-collapse scenario. The upside is that you and your trustworthy companions will be temporarily self-sufficient; the downside is that you will be subject to attack both from the outside, by the 300+ million desperate and hungry Americans, and from the inside, by your trustworthy companions. -Stay Mobile: travel, scavenge, and maintain a low profile during the collapse until the initial major die-off from thirst and starvation, which should occur within the first month or so in a “pop” collapse scenario. The upside is that you will be a moving target, more difficult to hit than a stationary target; the downside is that you may still succumb to the initial die-off, due to a lack of sufficient remaining resources, or to the second major die-off resulting from disease epidemics spread by initial die-off victims. You would do well, in any event, to keep your survival strategy and its particulars to yourself— and remember that “human decency” is directly proportional to resource availability.
Cris Calston in On American Sustainability, Anatomy of a Societal Collapse, 2009
