PowerSwitch

Inspired by SherryMayos post here I was wondering if any of you could help me convince my folks to take some action.
I've lent my dad The Long Emergency (James Howard Kunstler) and I've sent him copies of The Ecologist and the New Statesman when they did their energy issues, plus I'm always forwarding him links, but it doesn't seem to be getting through. He knows we'll have energy problems in the future but he doesn't seem to think it'll happen in his lifetime (he's 55).
I'm going to send him The End of Suburbia and Peak Oil: Imposed by Nature, but do any of you have any advice/tips/tricks or some failsafe links or articles? I'm not trying to get him to buy a farm in the middle of nowhere (though it'd be nice!) I just want him to take things seriously and maybe even take some precautions, especially with regards to the coming winter.

I've just realised I've mostly talked about my dad and not my mum, although they're still very much together. My mum would be a different case entirely. It would be a real case of the softly softly approach as I think too much too soon may scare her into 'turning off' and just dismissing it all. Plus she's heavily into her luxuries so talk about lack of running water and composting shit would be a no-no! (well, for now anyway)

My partner's dad made me laugh the other day when he said "Middle age: it's when your broad mind and narrow waist do a swap."

I have found that appealing to the wallet is always a good way .

If you can somehow show that implimenting certain things could save money for them in the long term.

I've managed to have a small breakthrough on the solar hot-water front with my parents, as they don't want to be fleeced by the gas supplier and are currently looking into the cost of it for the house.

I'm lucky, I gave my mum The Long Emergency and she caught on immediately, and is willing to move to NZ. The same for my dad, although he didn't read the book. They're 57/58. I think they were quick to accept the reality of it all because they've made sure they don't let changes to their lifestyles affect their view of the world. For a couple of years my dad had a job with an insane salary, but was always aware it could easily go.
But as for advising you, I'd suggest that you show you're serious by taking some action in preparation. I don't know what kind of situation you're in, you might've already done this, but it's an idea. Some people don't fully believe me because I haven't taken enough action. I'm on a graphic design degree, and I've said to lots of students and colleagues that graphic design is going to have to downscale unimaginably, we should change career, etc., but since I'm still studying (I need some skilled employment before emigration you see), I'm not taken as seriously as I should be. It's understandable in a way.

Can't help too much there, I'm afraid... My parents actually understand the problem now (after a long, concetrated effort on my behalf), and they've gone into the: "if it happens so be it and why did you have to tell us?" mentality

I actually focussed more on the nearer term issues like being prepared for the possibility of gas shortages/power cuts as well as high prices, and I think the mainstream press articles about these helped (eg from bog standard newspapers that they read - not the alternative press). I have told them about peak oil etc but I think the short term issues provided more of a motivation to get prepared. It helps that my Dad is a bit of a technophile so I think things like photovoltaics and domestic turbines appeal to him on this level. Do either of you parents have any enthusiasm for DIY projects and technology that you could appeal to?

Actions speak louder than words. Maybe if you did something to show that you are serious (like start an allotment) and asked for a bit help from your parents?

Actions speak louder than words. Maybe if you did something to show that you are serious (like start an allotment) and asked for a bit help from your parents?

An excellent suggestion, I started an allotment early this year, not only does it give me some exercise, I have met some great people.

My folks told me that I shouldn't focus so much on world events and should concentrate on 'you and yours'.

Thats exactly what I was doing.

I told my parents about this, they didn't seem interested.

Now, how do I tell people on my radiography course that it's a profession that's unlikely to last more than 10 or 15 years due to energy shortages? Those x-ray machines consume an awful lot of energy

I'll just keep quiet. Probably best to. Although people now know that I'm off to Inverness once I've finished, its in the middle of nowhereness might be useful

Going off the deep end talking about post-peak worst case scenarios is likely to meet with a wall of denial. I think the key thing to communicate is initially just how complacent we've been over energy for so long, and how in the near future there's likely to be real economic pain, whether there's is a long term solution or not.
For most people energy is one of those issues which is just somebody else's problem. The world is full of such problems, and most people get pretty good at ignoring them and just getting on with their lives. You've got to communicate is that energy issues are soon going to be everybody's problem; impacting everything from the value of your pension and your house to holidays in the Caribbean.
A lot depends on just how much your audience respects your opinion. It's easy to sound hysterical about these issues, so it's usually best to deal with facts as far as possible, and try not to overdo the apocalyptic speculative visions that get your opinion filed under 'crank'.

I've engaged in a kind of mental war of attrition with my own father on this issue over the last year or so, which I can claim partial victory in, mostly thanks to the way events have largely backed up my views.
Of course since energy issues have crept on to the business pages of The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Times I now have to occasionally pour scorn on the tripe contained therein. Unfortunately there's a limit to how much pessimism he can take. He refuses to sell the buy-to-let property that's nearly doubled in value in a couple of years, and doesn't accept the possibility of a house price crash in the near future as a consequence of 'peak panic'.
Once you get into the nitty gritty of consequences and actually taking action then it's a different ball game.
The trouble with peak oil is that the implications undermine a lot of core assumptions about life as we know it in the western world. Getting people to wake up and accept realities that run counter to these assumptions depends a lot upon how skeptical they are of these assumptions in the first place.

After getting my father to sit through The End of Suburbia he was a lot less dismissive than he had been, but it didn't take long for the denial to begin creepting back. C'est la vie. At least I tried

A further thought, people tend to pay more attention to things they find out for themselves than things they are told. Maybe rather than tell someone directly energy should be spent on creating an environment that allows them to question things? Easier said than done but maybe things like dropping something or mentioning something in passing into a conversation without explanation or maybe a book or leaflet lying around the place so that people accidentally find it.

Well, the strategy worked well in WWII.