Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
OK, I guess I'm talking about prepping, not survivalism. Surely there are people like me that grew up in the "Wonder Years" of the 1960's and 1970's and never had a clue that things in this country could go anywhere but UP. We were not exposed to living in the woods, farming, hunting, we were brought up in the comfortable bedroom communities of the big cities post-war, Brady Bunch kids if you will, with the family wood paneled station wagon and everything, our Daddy's making the good salary, our Mother's able to stay home in their air-conditioned new development homes with the harvest gold appliances and lunch with the neighborhood Mom's - these are the people I am asking this question of. Isn't anyone else out there a middle-class person turned prepper? What caused you to start learning these skills that are so foreign to us (farming, growing our own food, stocking supplies, taking concealed carry classes), that is what I'm asking and who I'm addressing.
I don't understand why a prepper is not the same thing as a survivalist. Isn't the goal to survive amidst adversity? Or is a "prepper" just someone who buys a lot of nice storage food, expensive gear and guns, and a "retreat" somewhere, just in case?
Your background sounds so similar to mine, but I saw such degradation where I lived that it put a fear in me even as a child. When "home invasions" were first widely reported a few years ago and no one turned a hair, when places like Chicago and Detroit are allowed to be out of control, and when morons bought into the housing bubble, I decided that the culture as a whole was hopelessly degraded and began prepping.
OP: I guess you would say my own upbringing. My parents were depression children and went through WWII as adults. They had 5 kids and struggled to put food on the table and clothes on our backs. In JR. High, I only had two pairs of pants. We ate good, but we weren't given much. I started working when I was 13 and have worked pretty much ever since. I worked my way through college, and lived in some no so nice places to afford it all. Now, as you say, I see all kinds of people living on the dole, living in huge debt, and the govt. running up huge debt. It can't go on forever, so our plan is to go back to our roots, so to speak. We're too old to start a farm and become self sufficient in growing our own food etc. So our goal is to learn to live on as little as possible. Minimalism. There's more than one way to skin a cat.
To feed to people from a large garden is not too much work, it can actually be a nice hobby and great exercise. I would not call that "farming"
Other than the obvious big major events, 9/11, Katrina, Y2K, the Economic Crash of 2008, Elections, etc., what are some of the smaller things or personal experiences or observances that drove you, an average day-to-day person living a "normal" American life, to start researching and implementing your own steps towards Survival and Preparedness? ...
Both sets of my grandparents were farmers in the 1920-1930 timeframe, when the Dust Bowl hit my parents were alive, by the time the Great Depression had cause each family to lose their farms, my parents were 6 and 8. The 'grapes of wraith' migration West was real for my parents and grandparents. My earliest photo shows me in a cloth diaper, tied to a grapevine, as a row-marker for where my siblings were picking.
The Great Depression had a huge effect on my parents, they never let me forget.
I went into the Navy, then I went to college, and I was offered a few choices of jobs that fit into the 'normal' suburban corporate career lifestyle. I could not shake the foreboding thought of what happens next time?
Our nation has gone through major troubles before. Those you listed are very minor hiccups.
Other than the obvious big major events, 9/11, Katrina, Y2K, the Economic Crash of 2008, Elections, etc., what are some of the smaller things or personal experiences or observances that drove you, an average day-to-day person living a "normal" American life, to start researching and implementing your own steps towards Survival and Preparedness? What made the "light" go on in your head that said things are just not quite right? I am doing research for something and I would really like to hear your personal testimonies.
There are those who have always loved the tactical, outdoors, survivalist lifestyle anyway, so it is not a hard stretch to adding prepping to their daily lifestyle. I'm talking about people like me who grew up in middle class America in all of it's glory, with little exposure to guns, crime, wars, poverty, etc. People like me for whom this type of lifestyle was never on the radar until recent years, far from paranoid, but seeing things that they just could no longer ignore. I appreciate any of your thoughts on this if you care to share!
You mentioned the hurricanes, and not including them, but:
I have two "bug out bags", one in each car. Filled with the BASICS One might need/want if one had to evacuate. Included is a small {camp} "stove" with fuel pellets, mess kit & silverware, cleanup stuff, all in one tool sets, etc.
It would work in a shelter situation, OR in a "roughing it" situation, or a 'camping' situation. Food bags {as described below} a couple of those too.
We also have some H2O bottles always on hand, and the "Life straw" straw, and the Life Straw bottles {filters creepy bugs and filthy water to clean}.We have H2O treatment tablets too.
We have quite a few bags of "add 2 cups of boiling water" to to make 2 servings of various foods {for survival or camping}. we could eat for a while on that alone.
A change of clothing is in there too {one for colder weather, one for warmer}.Compact soaps, travel bath stuff, And a BIG roll of "personal TP"....hee hee.
The compact 'space age' reflective mylar blankets and a 2-man tent of same material may come in handy. A 2 pk nylon rope {100'} to string up the tent between two trees, or hang up belongings in a tree.
Everything is in zip-loc bags, which will keep dry OR the bags may come in handy too for things, too.
WHy?
Because in 2005, 2006, 2011 we had MAJOR flooding. We were high 'N dry, But We are automatically without power for at least 5 days, as the sub station floods, and needs to unload water and dry out.
In 2011, the local grocery had SUPER sales on beef as there was a national surplus of beef, so I filled the top freezer on the fridge and the separate small freezer FULL of $500+ worth of beef and broke my heart to throw it away!
In our county's seat {next town over some few miles away}, there are officially 1600{+/-} homes in the {small} town, and in 2011, the flooding flooded out 1300{+/-} of those homes!!!
I have the bug-out bags in the cars so that IF we have to mandatory evacuate, we have them already loaded to go to a shelter, etc. They are separate IN CASE we are separated when evac comes in or we get separated while out and about.
Location: When you take flak it means you are on target
7,646 posts, read 9,944,809 times
Reputation: 16466
"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."— Robert Heinlein, Time Enough for Love[1][2]"
To this nowdays I would add you need to be able to fly a plane, program a glass cockpit and a handheld gps, sight a red dot, and properly use night vision, and navigate with a sextant. You need to be a Glock armorer and know how to build an AR from an 80% lower, an AK from sheet metal, and polish a 1911 without destroying it.
You also need to know how to unclog a toilet and build a house.
Location: When you take flak it means you are on target
7,646 posts, read 9,944,809 times
Reputation: 16466
Oh, and why am I prepared? Well, ever head of the Boy Scout motto? Girls can use it too.
Basically I'm lazy and like my comforts. So I have a generator for when the elect goes out. And a portable AC for when the main air fails. And two guns in case one breaks. I stash some extra food in case the road washes out.
I know where some tanks are stashed by the Army in case I need one if the world ends.
I'm not a survivalist - I'm a survivor. That starts in the mind. And knowing I can survive no matter how hard times get is security enough for me. I would still like to make my car over so I have a place to stay comfortably when I camp out, but I also want it to be a place I can call home in an emergency. Always supposing the car isn't destroyed. LOL
I don't think it's going back to basics that's going to save us. Rather, we need to be inventive and be able to survive on what's already here. That means being creative and having flexibility is really going to matter.
As to why, well, after having gone through numerous power outages, two large earthquakes, mudslides, flooding, and having to live in my truck, among other things, I think I became efficient at being resourceful. Figuring out what I need (and don't need) to survive is one result of that.
Last edited by rodentraiser; 07-08-2015 at 11:31 PM..
Reason: pun,c;tua!tio"n?
"Most people, as soon as they earned some amount of money deemed successful and rich, stopped doing manual labor themselves. It is just normal progression of things. If you are well to do, you sweat for exercise and pleasure, not because you are dying to break your back digging ditches or laying fences"
Not so fast Hoss...
At least one household of relative means does their own manual labor and even when hiring help, we work along side them digging those ditches, laying fences, clearing pasture and whatever else needs to be done. I'd sooner have my teeth drilled without sedative than go to a gym to do pointless biking to nowhere or whatever the trendy new exercise might be. No, my sweat all has a point found in manual labor or natural recreation. And proletariat? Seriously, that tired old terminology describes a worker without property which clearly does not include MT or myself. BTW, with very few exceptions, between DH and I, we have done most things on that "renaissance man" list.
As for the original question: I'd say living in AK for 35 years did it for us. Being prepared, not hard core survivalism. A wide spread 5-10 day power outage (7 days where we lived) in the heart of winter in the early 90s was one of the first real eye openers. It's possible in AK to be blind to how fragile and tenuous the system of civilization as we know it is but it's a willing blindness. It's much easier in warmer climates, in less isolated locations to be much more asleep at the wheel.
Then for me it's the failure of corporations and governments to provide safe food, quality products or solid lasting workmanship that drove us to first become informed consumers, then to begin to produce food and shelter for ourselves. It for us has been a natural progression, wanting to know how things work, finding better and less impactful ways of doing things or reverting to old school because it makes more sense to do so.
Like several others here I am the product of parents raised at the end of the Great Depression and WWII. I clearly recall their stories. Unlike Submariner, our family farms are still intact but my DH's family left west Texas and OK for California around 1910 perhaps seeing the handwriting on the wall. Something to be said for early flight. Survival (and thriving) not only depends on resourcefulness but situational awareness as exemplified in these comments on this thread.
"Most people, as soon as they earned some amount of money deemed successful and rich, stopped doing manual labor themselves. It is just normal progression of things. If you are well to do, you sweat for exercise and pleasure, not because you are dying to break your back digging ditches or laying fences"
Not so fast Hoss...
At least one household of relative means does their own manual labor and even when hiring help, we work along side them digging those ditches, laying fences, clearing pasture and whatever else needs to be done. I'd sooner have my teeth drilled without sedative than go to a gym to do pointless biking to nowhere or whatever the trendy new exercise might be. No, my sweat all has a point found in manual labor or natural recreation. And proletariat? Seriously, that tired old terminology describes a worker without property which clearly does not include MT or myself. BTW, with very few exceptions, between DH and I, we have done most things on that "renaissance man" list.
You are doing it for fun though, not because you have to. There is a difference. There is also no need to spit on anyone (not saying you are doing it but someone else did it) who has the means but subcontracts it out. My wife and I have done it all, built storage sheds, put in fencing into hard rock, grown (and still grow) most of our food, chickens, horses, whole house renovation from scratch, installing solar, installing water collection systems, so on and so on. Would I do it again? Hell no! Once was enough.
"Trendy new exercise". See that's what I find funny, you guys have to deride it all. Why assume someone goes to a gym to do "trendy" stuff. Maybe I go and do martial arts. Maybe I do some weight lifting. Maybe I do some boxing. Maybe I go out into nature to run for 10 miles and just unwind. Maybe I have a high tech profession I find extremely satisfying but I also like to get the best of the "other side" - by living a bit remote, growing my own food, being energy independent, riding my horse into the wilderness when I feel like it. Why is it always an "all or nothing" thing with you "prepper types"?
I used the word proletariat because the whole post MTSilverTip wrote was pretty derogatory and bashing anyone who doesn't sweat in the ditch. It is OK to do what you want but don't look down on people who think otherwise as stupid and lazy. As I said, I have done most of the stuff that people subcontract out. Why? 'Cause I wanted to see if I can do it and 'cause it looked like it saved tons of money. But did it? Nope. Instead of spending $10/hr I could have paid someone to get it done and making $60/hr I could have made at that time in my career, I chose to forego the $50/hr for months on end just to see what it is all about. Assuming there is no big SHTF, I just threw away tens of thousands of dollars in the wind for no apparent reason
I also used the word proletariat because at the end of the day, you have the means but you are forcing yourself to still break your back outside - you are making yourself be a manual laborer when instead you should be the boss.
Quote:
Originally Posted by AK-Cathy
Then for me it's the failure of corporations and governments to provide safe food
Lost a job in the 80's with a wife and four kids,so I started food storage and savings immediately when I was employed again. The wife has always been sort of an herbalist, and an avid gardener.
About 8 years ago when it looked like gun control was gaining significant momentum, we bought guns - before it would be difficult to get them IMO (although things seem to have slowed significantly with public backlashes about gun control).
We live within our means, have food stuffs, garden, have guns to augment food supplies and defend ourselves, and back up power and water systems. I consider myself a prepper though, not a survivalist.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I stash some extra food in case the road washes out.
