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I am thinking aloud right now more than anything, if I am thinking wrong can someone set me straight please. Can we really prepare for life when TSHTF?

Those who prepare will be very few and hence they will be the ones who have the neccesities of life such as basic food, hot water, the knowhow etc. But the vast majority won't and will most likely become marauding hordes. They will attack those that were prepared and I don't see how the prepared can fend of 1000's of desperate psychos. So what is the use of preparing if the worst happens and we get marauding hordes, becasue you will be forced to move out with you small group to a safer location or risk getting killed. So all those solar panels, insulation etc in your hose is just wasted for when TSHTF.

And the only possible way we will NOT get desperate hordes is if society keeps functioning more or less as normal albeit with less luxury spending and taking care more of the neccasseties of life. In this case we can just go along with the rest of society and change when the rest of society changes.

So the way I see it there is no point in preparing with things like solar panels, large stoves, house insulation etc at this point, but if you want to prepare i think hiking stuff will be more appropraite, having the skills of a travelling survivalist will be more appropriate becasue if the worst happens you will most likely be forced to move whether you like it or not, and if the worst doesn't happen we can go along with the rest of society and change as and when needed?

I agree that if UK society decends into anarchy, any preparations would be useless.

However if society keeps it together but just gets poorer (a lot poorer) , then those that had prepared with micro generation, insulation , gardens, tools etc etc will have the means to make things a little more bareable?

We may face a slow slide into reccesion and then a great deppresion, preps such as insulation, solid fuel stoves, solar, stocks of clothing and linen etc. could be very valuable in such cases.

Alternativly in the event of a sudden crash or disaster, then despite the risk of theft, being prepared is better than not.

Large PV installations or vegetable gardens cant realy be kept secret, but some other preps certainly can.
Stocks of food, fuel, blankets, warm cloths,batteries, boots, tools and so on can be built up discreetly, and could save your life if things turn bad quickly.
I would advise that if you disscuss such matters on the internet, that you should keep your physical address private.
Keeping supplies at more than one location is prudent, workplaces and the homes of friends and relatives are useful.

To paraphrase Phoney Bliar:

"Ask me my three main priorities for survivors, and I tell you: flexibility, flexibility, flexibility."

We don't know exactly what is going to come so we need to be adaptable enough to adjust to whatever does. Pensions, houses, certain careers - all limit you to what you can do to adapt.

Budgie wrote:
Those who prepare will be very few

Not if we prepare as communities rather than individuals. Tougher to do, but more resilient in the long-run.

Budgie wrote:But the vast majority won't and will most likely become marauding hordes. They will attack those that were prepared and I don't see how the prepared can fend of 1000's of desperate psychos. So what is the use of preparing if the worst happens and we get marauding hordes, becasue you will be forced to move out with you small group to a safer location or risk getting killed. So all those solar panels, insulation etc in your hose is just wasted for when TSHTF.

What makes you think that the majority of starving people will become maruding hoards? People who haven't eaten for days don't usually have the energy for too much activity. In the countries where people really don't have enough to eat there is still some level of law and order. Whilst I accept that there will probably be an increase in the level of violence and criminal behavior, I think the mad max scenarios are just hollywood inventions.

careful_eugene wrote:

Budgie wrote:But the vast majority won't and will most likely become marauding hordes. They will attack those that were prepared and I don't see how the prepared can fend of 1000's of desperate psychos. So what is the use of preparing if the worst happens and we get marauding hordes, becasue you will be forced to move out with you small group to a safer location or risk getting killed. So all those solar panels, insulation etc in your hose is just wasted for when TSHTF.

What makes you think that the majority of starving people will become maruding hoards? People who haven't eaten for days don't usually have the energy for too much activity. In the countries where people really don't have enough to eat there is still some level of law and order. Whilst I accept that there will probably be an increase in the level of violence and criminal behavior, I think the mad max scenarios are just hollywood inventions.

It seems that chaotic situations indeed happen from time to time, but for very brief periods only. When societies break down, they soon run out of energy and can't feed much destruction. A couple of weeks at a maximum. Rwanda was a bit extreme, but I don't think we are fully comparable to Rwanda.

if things get really bad knowing escape and evasion techniques and having hidden caches of food and weapons might be the way to go , or if you have time sailing somewhere quiet and hiding for a while may be a option .
we really dont know whats going to happen people in yugoslavia didnt expect the civil war or becoming refugees .

I think most people on this board prepare for a slow rather light decline not a hard fast crash they may be right although I think they may not be , its one of the areas where I disagree with the whole transition movement and I find myself agreeing more with latoc .

As I wrote on my blog recently:


A common fear amongst those studying the effects of peak oil is thought of mobs of people fleeing towns and cities and invading rural areas. In so many science fiction movies, we see motorways clogged with thousands of cars as people panic and run from impending danger. But the difference between these scenarios and peak oil is that they were fleeing from a known and immediate danger ? a flood or a nuclear bomb ? whereas peak oil is a slow and gradual breakdown with an unknown set of problems and an unknown timescale.

People are notoriously reluctant to move even when things are bad ? consider the inhabitants of cities like London and Plymouth who stayed even when they were being bombed during the War, or the people of Naples or San Francisco who live in the shadow of a constant natural threat that will one day destroy them. People prefer the known to the unknown, familiar surroundings to the unfamiliar, friends to strangers, especially when the place they are fleeing to is alien or, in some cases, if they don?t even know where they are going.

There is also, especially in Britain, the infatuation with owning your own home. If you have spent 20 or 30 years to buy your house, and maybe spent thousand of pounds on improving it, you will be very reluctant to leave it without somewhere definite to go to. The house is recognisable and it?s yours. In a time of fear and uncertainty, the four walls and the garden are something to hold onto. It will almost certainly be the bulk of your assets. If you leave it, who knows what will happen to it, who will invade it.

I believe that the vast majority will stay put, hoping that ?things will recover? or ?the government will sort things out?. If and when they do flee, it will probably be for places they know (relatives and friends) or areas relatively close to home. I can?t see thousands jumping in their cars and using whatever petrol they have left to head off into the country. And those that do will probably be the adventurous, motivated people who would be useful in a survival situation.

In a good location, a house is a blessing; in a bad location, it is a curse.

WolfattheDoor wrote: In a good location, a house is a blessing; in a bad location, it is a curse.

hmmm, and that's a stickler, mind you withg prices expectedc to plumet soon, then maybe we can reclaim some of the land that incomers have bought up, our smalll farms, and put a couple of acres to lawn, and the rest to horses!!!

yes, I am across the border, and no this is not zenophobia, merely incomprehensible behaviour that insences me.

in really bad times a house is a sign saying come and kill me , remember all the houses burned in the ethnic cleansing in bosnia .

jonny2mad wrote:in really bad times a house is a sign saying come and kill me , remember all the houses burned in the ethnic cleansing in bosnia .

ALL? 100%?

jonny2mad wrote:in really bad times a house is a sign saying come and kill me , remember all the houses burned in the ethnic cleansing in bosnia .

In Belfast they used to keep the bath full of water, always, with some blankets thrown in. Then if anyone tried to torch your gaff in the night, you ran to your bath, grabbed blankets and threw them over the flames.

They also had extra-long net-curtains with fishing-weights sewn into the seams, the extra length fitting into a sort of tray like an internal window-box. That way, if your window was stoved in by object or explosion, all the glass would ball up into the cloth, and there weren't flying shards of glass all over the place.

not all houses were burned but a hell of a lot were , if people are doing a round up they generally look for people in houses if your doing escape and evasion they advise you to avoid houses or barns .

and you can do the sort of things that were done in belfast but not against a well armed gang

http://nz.youtube.com/watch?v=WFjt0qmoNSA

einsatzgruppen destroys russian village

Budgie wrote: Can we really prepare for life when TSHTF?

Nope, but I think it is worth taking obvious anticipated effects into account when making plans for the future. For me that includes:

a) An 'emergency' box with some long shelf life food, Katadyn water filter, small camping gas stove, wind up torch, wind up radio, first aid, etc. etc. suitable for a few weeks disruption. Most people in California have one of these for obvious earthquake reasons, and I bet many UK residents wished they'd had one during the floods last year.

b)Live frugally and get out of debt. Recession, as currently seems on the cards, is an obvious early effect of peak oil. If you are in debt and lose income - you're varked.

c) Invest in personal skills, tools, and minimising your own energy consumption rather than shares and other 'paper' investments. Spending money now, for example, to get your house insulated to a very high standard will, I think, pay off better in the long run than topping up your pension fund.

... apart from that, I'm off for a quick dip and I'll catch you in the bar later. Mine's a large gin tonica.