Just takes one little brown jug (emphasis on the little) to ruin a forum. I feel sorry for him.

Being new to this forum, please tell me not all the preppers on this network are nut bars like littlebrownjug. Sitting in his underwear at 4am oiling his machine gun, yelling into a computer and planning his first mass shooting?

evenmorereluctantprepper

Reluctantprepper, he's the first of his kind that I've seen here. I mean, to take the effort to stick around just to say goodbye... Lol

Thanks guys for riding shotgun for me but there is no need to engage further. I was trying to ignore him from the first post but unfortunately got sucked in. This has become a distraction from the original post and lets refocus. Perhaps I can use this to get us back on track. One of the things I have predicted is that there will be alot more mass shootings. "When people lose everything and have nothing to lose they lose it". Some people will decide to go out with a bang or not and just have a panicked situation escilate into a fire fight with police. Some people will be settling scores. The issue of scapegoating will become a mager problem. There is no better way for a loser to rise to power than to tell people that they are not the problem, Its THEM and THEY have been engaged in an ancient conspiracy. Working the crowd up to coliseumHockey game like blood lust. This is not an exception in history. Its actually normal and what usualy happens.
Though not my best skill, I think a prep for this is to try and developed an almost preternatural calm. The british developed polite etticate as a survival skill. If someone was going to kill you for being rude that tendency will turn into an art form. I see that in the Ethiopians I have met. Super polite and unthreatening. I guess its how they survived such bloody history. I see that calm in vietnamese and cambodians most of all. Whats going on in their eyes does not reflect their external actions. they have a tight handle on their internal world. The russians developed it into a calm, sarcastic, dry, pessimism.
Well, thats all for today. Im off to reinforce our new solar power system. Last night was our first night of fully independent power...16 thousand dollars later.

A good discussion for the most part. One detractor but those posts did not derail the discussion. If you go back to the original post that quoted something that was written in 2005 and think about you will probably come to one conclusion. 2005 was before the stock market crash, before the housing crash in the US and Europe, before the bailouts, before massive stimulus packages, before austerity measures in most major western countries, before the Eurozone bailouts, before unrest and revolution in almost every middle eastern county and most importantly before the massive uncontrollable US deficit. There I would argue we are already in a slow crash and have been for almost five years.

A slow crash does not preclude the possibility of a sudden demise to our societies. In fact a slow crash makes a sudden SHTF end more probable. As our abilities to thrive wind down so does our resilience. Europe is struggling to keep Greece afloat although it knows it is only buying time. Portugal, Cyprus, Ireland, Spain and Italy are not far behind. Europe knows that it cannot bail out Italy's economy, it is too big. Add to that the fact that for food distribution in most western countries there is only a three days period of grace and we have the recipe for disaster.
I would conclude that we are in the midst of a slow crash and sudden societal catastrophe is more likely than any time in the last thirty years.

I think ICRCC is right. We could be in a slow crash already and most don't know it. Cheap junk from china is starting to cost premium prices, which means our dollar has devalued. We are still watching our dollar compared to the American dollar, so if we are constantly on par then shouldn't it makes sense that our money is devalued as well as the Americans. We Canadians say we are better off than most, but I don't think it means much - two times zero is still zero. Maybe this means a more prolonged slow crash here. England is stealing away Mark Carney from the Bank of Canada in hopes of saving their central bank, but really sending the best captain to a sinking ship is probably just to make sure the first class passengers get off safely. Then they'll likely knight him for his efforts too.

" Its not the end of the world. Just the world as we know it" Good points everyone. Heres my thoughts. There is nothing much new the last 5 years other than the surreal circus factor. Mel Tappan was writing about this in the late 60s and it reads like its happening today. Im not saying its not going to crash. It crashed along time ago and we're just watching the rippleing waves of crumpled steel in slow mo. (Just an after thought. Mel Tappan becomes the most respected ultimate survivalist only to propmptly die young of a heart attack as a fat guy in a wheel chair. There is a strange lesson there...or Euell Gibbons, the grapenuts guy, dieing from eating a poison mushroom. LOL) The US was servicing a unrepayable debt 20 years ago. Nothing has changed. They didnt win the cold war. They just went bankrupt second....but this is all history. We are trying to invision the future.
As federal government loses credibility ( lets just pretend it hasnt dissapeared) I suspect local governments to step into the void and if not local government, probably local buisness tycoons with visions of glory may step into the mix (let the new medieval age beggin) Imagine Russia. Guys in Rolles Roices(not the veihicles you picture in the aftermath) backed up by Unemployed Spletznas hired by the mofia right next to the grandma selling potato vodka out of a thermous at the train station... and lets seriously not forget about organised crime. Forget all about Rawles fantasy land 50s B movie wild bunches. These are well disiplined buisnessmen. Generaly more disiplend than buisnesses around them. I used to live in one of those neibourhoods and would have been able to leave my sterio on the front lawn and keys in my motor cycle safely. Historicly, they become the government(Wich is why we moved before they became the new tax collecters.) if not mager players during these periods and I hate to say it but thats not always guarenteed to be a bad thing.(The Kennedies going from rum runners to tycoons to presidents. Just a recent example. Viva Los Vagas) Sorry guys but I am crashing after the work day. Ill try to give better input latter

So I touched up that previous message now my brain is working better. Todays job will be reinforcing the new gas ,mc and engien shed before heavy snow and wind. Ive wanted all gas products away fron the house and barn incase of a fire.
So last time I talked about the possible "Privatisation" of local goverment. Think pre renaissance, medieval europe "Families" and city states and the intrigues with goverment to give them legitimacy. If you think about it, Its not much different than today. As time creaps along, there will just be more of it. Privatised totalitarianism.
Time, fast or slow is pretty reletive. Historians may look back at the 200 years it took for western civilisation to collapse and go "Wow, That was fast. What a shock"
Me, Im pretty sure the local vollonteer fire department will become the next local government, police and tax enforcer. They are pretty inbred and clannish so its actualy one thing Im concerned about and keeping an eye on. Ahrrr there matees. Pirate firemen

Hey hold on a minute I am a volunteer fireman (among other things). I don't think I am inbred but I know I am definitely not clannish. What you said is funnier than you could ever know. I'll start looking for a used eye patch at the next fireman's yard sale. 😆

I think I know the type Cern5 is talking about, I think it is just here in Nova Scotia (Alabama of Canada). If you're a guy and move to small town Nova Scotia, you're usually invited to join the volunteer brigade. Which is the locals way of finding out if yer a good ole boy. The brigades here are alot of really short guys driving really big trucks. And they would likely be the first to join a mob or posse during a shtf scenerio. There are usually a few sensible fellows in the crowd, but in a bad situation their voices would likely be drown out by the crowd. They're a lot of good volunteer work, a drinking club and definitely something to be mindful of. A slower crash might see some of the more sensible ones rise up in leadership positions but that would depend on each locality.

Yes. They remind me of hobbits...but hobbits with muli generational blood feudes. Luckily my immediate neibours are great. If you moved here from 15 miles away in the next town, yould be considered CFA (come from away) and not to be trusted.LOL. The rest of the world sort of left them behind. The thing I like about them is that they have known real poverty for multiple generations so they are not spoiled and are resilient. They totaly missed what happened in 2008. Each area will have its own unique survival problem. In BC you have to worry, going into the bush, about stepping on land mines or bear traps protecting someones crop

HOBBIT PIRATE FIREMEN! Run for you lives 😆

My post apocalyptic slow crash world is getting weirder and weirder. 😎

"All the guns/ammo/food in the world won't save you if society is simply getting poorer and the banks are foreclosing on your house while you don't have a job. This is something to prepare for, too.

" Quote from RabbitTeeth

We've gotten off topic again so lets stear this back to looking for helpfull advice. Great thing to be thinking RT. Ive been pushing people for years to start thinking about what to do, if say, the ecconomy collapse by only by 23. Society is still around. Its only that YOU are not part of it. You've been fired and wont have another job for the rest of your life? If you rent or your house is now forclosed on or your land taxes are high? Do you have a place you can move into to not freeze to death on a minus 15 degree night like tonight and keep some of your stuff....like food. Heck, it only takes a messy divorce for this to happen, ...especialy if she freeks because you no longer have a job.
Even if there is a BANK HOLLIDAY....you lose most of your savings, There are local riots, protests outside of goverment buildings, ......then the bank opens again with a greatly devalued dollar or , what has happened before, a new monitary script.... And lets say this happens 3 or 4 more times because it worked so well at distracting everyone the first time. Each time people get used to the new reality. We'll throw in the possibility of ration books and the government "Billeting" urban families at your farm property, like what happened in England during WW2

This is where I bring up one of the other articles I put on the front page. http://www.silverbearcafe.com/private/10.08/tshtf1.html . Its ferFAL befor he got famous writing Surviving the Ecconomic Collapse & Surviving In Argentina. You may know him as ModernSurvival on youtube. I prefer this article because it was fresh in his mind wile going through it, Even having to stop wile someone was screaming outside his house. You can feel his stress and trama. Argentina has an ecconomic crash, the banks close wile the peso is being adjusted. Riots, Crime , Kidnapping......But he still has to go to work. There are still cops, theyre just easier to bribe now or hire buy buisness strong men. Children starve to death. Farmers get tortured. There are nervous security gaurds hired for every block....but he still has to fill out government forms and it helps if he shows up to the beurocrat teller with hard to find cosmetics as gifts...etc. Getting a new generator became a priority perchase for me after reading this article...even though I had used one living off grid before but never felt it was that important thinking it an eccess.
And still, Argentina remains...Its just far more unplesant...and you get used to speeding up when someone steps in front of your car

Thoughts anyone

Been AFK for a bit i checked up on this thread sometimes but didnt have enough time to type out a response, so here goes.....
IMHO,
We've been going through a slow crash for quite some time, why do i think this? Probably because in a little more than 10 years everythings pretty much doubled in cost, recession or not ! I remember as a teen getting groceries for my mother while my father was away working and getting 75 dollars and a long list that would feed 4 of us for two weeks. Now....for a family of three is 165 dollars (roughly). Thats including hygene as well as it did back then. Now lets look at gasoline i remember when gas was stable around 40 cents a litre, mind you it bounced down and up but it was roughly 40 cents. Now look at it! Its terriffying when you talk to someone in there 70s-80s-90s and they tell you how much they used to get for a dollar when they were in their younger days, and you think back to when you were younger and realize holy $%&T the same thing is still happening everything is getting more and more expensive! Do you think todays wages reflect these high costs?? I dont! Min wage is a joke and so are most other wages, you have people that barely run this government that make over 100k a year! while Police, Emt, firefighters, people that actually risk their lives, that dont fit in the same tax bracket! I believe theyre all around the 50 -65 mark correct me if im wrong. I guess what im trying to say is think about 10-20-30 years in the future, How many days of work do you think youll have to do to get two weeks worth of groceries? Meanwhile you still have to pay the rest of your bills which have all probably doubled or tripled while your wage has probably only gone up 5-15%
In the grand scheme of things i think its only a matter of time before the rusty bucket bottom gives out and all hell brakes loose. People can only take so much and when you put such large burdens on large groups of people, well i dont have to tell you what the outcome would be, you probably already know as much 😀

Been AFK for a bit i checked up on this thread sometimes but didnt have enough time to type out a response, so here goes.....
IMHO,
We've been going through a slow crash for quite some time, why do i think this? Probably because in a little more than 10 years everythings pretty much doubled in cost, recession or not ! I remember as a teen getting groceries for my mother while my father was away working and getting 75 dollars and a long list that would feed 4 of us for two weeks. Now....for a family of three is 165 dollars (roughly). Thats including hygene as well as it did back then. Now lets look at gasoline i remember when gas was stable around 40 cents a litre, mind you it bounced down and up but it was roughly 40 cents. Now look at it! Its terriffying when you talk to someone in there 70s-80s-90s and they tell you how much they used to get for a dollar when they were in their younger days, and you think back to when you were younger and realize holy $%&T the same thing is still happening everything is getting more and more expensive! Do you think todays wages reflect these high costs?? I dont! Min wage is a joke and so are most other wages, you have people that barely run this government that make over 100k a year! while Police, Emt, firefighters, people that actually risk their lives, that dont fit in the same tax bracket! I believe theyre all around the 50 -65 mark correct me if im wrong. I guess what im trying to say is think about 10-20-30 years in the future, How many days of work do you think youll have to do to get two weeks worth of groceries? Meanwhile you still have to pay the rest of your bills which have all probably doubled or tripled while your wage has probably only gone up 5-15%
In the grand scheme of things i think its only a matter of time before the rusty bucket bottom gives out and all hell brakes loose. People can only take so much and when you put such large burdens on large groups of people, well i dont have to tell you what the outcome would be, you probably already know as much 😀

Yup. Inflation is a bitch. Its sort of where this survivalist adventure began with me. Between age 10 and 12 I watched gold rise from 150 to 300 an ounce. The canadian debt was less than 20 billion but it was clear the direction it was headed. The US debt was still under a trillion but it was also clear they were heading for a train wreck because it was an amount that would never be able to be paid back. A trillion was basicly a new word we had to add to our vocabulary because no body talks about a trillion of anything(I seem to recall that Ragan popped it over a trillion and almost trippled the debt befor he left)
On a personal note, It was watching the price of candy rise before my child hood eyes and remembering what my grand dad said he used to be able to buy with a nickel. I supose it was also seeing the way my parents lived and that it was all wrong. We were destroying the world simply to keep up with the jones for lives we didn't even want.
And perhaps this runes my previos argument because at that age I understood the Exponential Function, a mathimatical equasion that shows how any increasing system will begin to increas exponentialy real fast right near the end. There is a fantastic video on that. Ill go search for it.... http://www.peakprosperity.com/video/217/playlist/153/chapter-4-compounding-problem

😛 😛 ❗ The cure of economic ills WAR. Interesting viewpoint and probably closer to the truth than most realise