Individual Survivalism vs Collective Action?

[happychicken]

I think it's difficult to choose distinctly between going it alone as a survivalist, or being part of a community, since none of us knows how things will pan out.

Personally, I would definitely prefer the "safety" of a community of
like-minded people, but it would be foolish not to be prepared, at least mentally, for both scenarios.

Also, anyone wanting to be part of a community would have to be prepared to work since freeloading would not be an option

[DominicJ]

Bill
Your misunderstanding of Libertarianism is insulting

I help my friends, they help me.

I dont help the people the "People Department for the Herding of Sheep" orders me to help on pain of death, neither do you.

Your story of an ad hoc group working together is proof of Reaganomics, not communism.
Or am I mistaken and theres an obverser from the politburo present?

[Jakell]

.

There's a similar situation when a group bonds and develops friendship through dislike of a common 'enemy'. Is it really healthy? Or is it like the dark side - easier, more seductive, but ultimately prone to turning on itself.

So I'd be wary of 'larger aspirations'. They have their use and their time and place, but ultimately I feel they add 'conditions' to relationships and give people permission to discount others' feelings in pursuit of the 'higher' goal. If there must be a higher aspiration I'd hope it would be to make all our friendships, communities, love and support unconditional.

Sorry for the rant.

It's definately not healthy to bond together merely because of a common enemy. When the enemy disappers or becomes irrelevant, the group becomes dysfunctional, along with anything good they have built up and any resources they have used. Waste in other words.

Some climate change activists I have met see their crusade as a chance to blame the 'system', thereby exonerating themselves. Not realizing how much they themselves have been/are plugged into the 'system'.

Sorry for editing your post so much

[Jakell]

I think it's difficult to choose distinctly between going it alone as a survivalist, or being part of a community, since none of us knows how things will pan out.

This is definately a big issue, none of us really know how much or quickly things will change.
My approach is to plan for the worst possible scenario, and anything else is a bonus. Some people find this too scary however and avoid the possibilities

[DominicJ]

It's definately not healthy to bond together merely because of a common enemy. When the enemy disappers or becomes irrelevant, the group becomes dysfunctional,

I dunno, if I was on a train with 5 other gentleman and a drunked walked up and said he was going to stab us all, it would definatly be in our interests to bond together, at least in the short term.
Now, it wouldnt make sense for us to get a joint bank account over the issue.

Remmeber, your goal in forming a group is surviving peak oil, not creating a chess club.
Unless it is forming a chess club

[Adam Polczyk]

The implication behind some of the arguments on this thread has been that one is somehow tactically foolish (if not morally deficient) if one avoids intentional 'transition' style groups. I've nothing against Transition groups at all, but I much prefer to build personal relationships with local people that aren't mediated by or through an ideological group with a fixed agenda (whether or not I agree with said agenda).

I was really questioning the 'tactic' that people isolate themselves completely from any kind of group as opposed to "intentional 'transition' style groups" in particular.

Nonetheless, I take on board everything you say Tess.

Hmm. Given the magnitude of the challenge at hand I am left wondering if it is possible for any kind of effective collective response to be enacted that doesn't have some kind of 'identity' or 'formula' that people can get a handle on and reproduce easily.

Adam

[DominicJ]

But who's suggested they want to declare their home "Fort X" and independence?

When my local transistion movement accepts a lot of people arent prepared to transition, and when TSHTF they're going to die, I may consider it worth joining.
Until then, its principles simply are not sound, 20 people shopping at waitrose, eating organic lentil soup and buying "ecotricity" are not a PO prepared society
They are deluding themselves and they will pay a heavy price for it.

[RevdTess]

Hmm. Given the magnitude of the challenge at hand I am left wondering if it is possible for any kind of effective collective response to be enacted that doesn't have some kind of 'identity' or 'formula' that people can get a handle on and reproduce easily.

That's a very good question, one I've pondered myself and come to no satisfactory conclusion.

On occasion I go through the Diggers & Dreamers website and visit the websites of various intentional communities. It's a bit like window shopping. But what I've noticed is I have a preference for religious groups - even those whose beliefs I don't entirely share. I think maybe this is because I perceive such groups as more cohesive, more willing to work through differences for the sake of the higher cause. Initially at least, the sense of belonging is worth the sacrifice of submitting to someone else's dogma.

It occurred to me today actually that my favourite types of people are religious folk and practical folk. That said, I am generally not *their* favourite type of person, or I would go join an Amish community or a monastery or something.

But getting back to the point, although right now by moving to South Wales I am taking 'individual' rather than collective action, I'm also working to integrate myself with the local community. For me at this particular time, I feel it's more important than getting involved in ideological or missional groups. I need to get into a situation where I actually have something worth saving before I get involved in groups trying to save things.

The main alternative to groups with an 'identity' or 'formula' I think is simply the community of 'place' - the village if you will. On the right scale, these groups are flexible, supportive and adaptable to change. I suppose one can say that a village has an 'identity', but probably not in the sense of your question, which was more about having an identity focussed on an ideology than a place.

Anyway, I'm rambling and not really answering this as well as I'd hoped when I started. I guess what I'm trying to emphasise is that for me 'place' trumps everything when it comes to community action. So a Transition Town is fantastic if it brings neighbours together using common cause as an excuse, but not so great if it's a few disparate souls scattered across a town, or if it becomes a source of dogma or disapproval, or an intellectual talking shop like powerswitch

I've come to my own conclusion about how I want to spend my life, and I figure everyone else has to make their own decisions. I love having powerswitch as a source of information and encouragement, but imagine what we could do if a whole bunch of us lived in the same village!

[JohnB]

I love having powerswitch as a source of information and encouragement, but imagine what we could do if a whole bunch of us lived in the same village!

Spend all day arguing

[PaulS]

How did I managed to miss this excellent thread. So many good points, hard to see where to start.

I have always taken it for granted that my first priority is to do whatever I can to improve my and my family's chances, regardless of what anybody else might think or do. And that for me meant
- getting into necessary profession (farming in my case)
- getting away from the most dangerous places (inner cities and overpopulated areas)
- cutting out unnecessary expenditure, such as all utilities by investing in our own substitutes (bore hole, PV/ wind turbines, solar hot water, bio-diesel from own crops), own wood for heating and other stuff, like baking own bread, buying only the simplest/ secondhand/ repairable machinery
- learning new skills: growing food, bee keeping, whatever ...

And all that and more is great and interesting and important, but also NOT ENOUGH

And that's why I got involved in the Transition movement (Transition North Cornwall, www.TransitionNC.org, but also Transition within our own village)

Whether Transition is just a talking shop or a life changing movement is largely down to you. You can get involved in funding applications to set up office systems to put up a few lectures or courses - some of which is necessary, or you can act together with a few friend and neighbours to achieve practical goals, such as
- forcing the Parish council to provide allotments
- helping local food and other business sell directly to their own neighbours (example, we started by selling our fresh meat boxes on eBay and now most are sold locally. Same goes for a local vegetable box scheme, next may be a local milk round, perhaps a local village cheese maker.
- hopefully, in a few months, our local area may be reasonable self-sufficient in some of the basics of life.

But more than that, with a project like that you tend to meet many more neighbours, you work with them on various scheme, we get to know each other well and all that helps to build a self-supporting community, where we are happy to help each other. I hope so, anyway.

Even if our efforts were to fail, what had we lost? My family will be better off simply because we now know many more of our neighbours than we would have otherwise, we have found/ encouraged/ even started local little services that we will all benefit from as things get tougher and our own products now sell well locally, helping us all to greater resilience.

In fact, I believe this is the way forward so much, that I have setup the TransitionNC website with a view to encourage every one of the 65 Parishes in North Cornwall to set up their own Transition group and even use the website for info sharing and communication within their own groups as well as the whole of North Cornwall.

I would recommend this approach to everyone of you guys. I think it is probably the best way to improve not just your own position, but also that of the whole village/ Parish/ Region.

[Jakell]

Anyway, I'm rambling and not really answering this as well as I'd hoped when I started. I guess what I'm trying to emphasise is that for me 'place' trumps everything when it comes to community action. So a Transition Town is fantastic if it brings neighbours together using common cause as an excuse, but not so great if it's a few disparate souls scattered across a town, or if it becomes a source of dogma or disapproval, or an intellectual talking shop like powerswitch

Maybe the hot air generated could be used to power some kind of turbine

[Prono 007]

I don't think there is anything to be gained by "spreading the word", either.

I think 'spreading the word' is probably the single most worthwhile thing to do. In the past few months I've bumped into 2 old friends and neither had any clue as to what peak oil is.

In Naomi Klein's short video promoting her book "The Shock Doctrine" she says people are much more able to withstand shocks if they can understand what is happening to them and why. Dimitri Orlov says something similar. So if people understand why crises are occurring they'll be much more able to deal with them. Do you want to live in a society where people are cracking up because they don't know what is happening to them or one where people understand it and are empowered to make good decisions about their and their community's future?

Firstly, in my experience no one wants to listen.

Well since it's a pretty incredible and compelling subject I'd be inclined to think that you're probably not going about it in the best way. I think a lot has to do with who you talk to. The most receptive people are likely to be those who are: open minded, already pretty critical of our current society, reasonably intelligent etc. I think it's a waste of time expecting everyone to come on board right away. For many people if it's not on the BBC news then it's not true. You have to start with the most receptive people first. (Perhaps the BBC might be a good target.)

Secondly, the reaction of most people when they're finally confronted with the truth will not be to find a way of building a future co-operatively, but to find someone to blame, which will be governments and maybe foreigners. That's just human nature.

Well it's not human nature but rather a typical response of someone living in a very hierarchical and individualistic society who has virtually no say in the way things are run. And after all the governments ARE to blame. Not for peak oil per se, but failing to see it coming and failing to prepare society, for presiding over a system based on growth that obviously has no future. But events like this could easily end up with a revolution and then people will have to take responsibility since there won't be anyone left to blame.

It's hard to see how people will respond but despite our current cultural and political heritage I think we're pretty much hard wired as social animals and it's 'human nature' is to work together - even if it doesn't seem like it at this point in time.

Those who have lived through wars say there is a much greater spirit of cooperation than in peace time so it seems likely that as the collapse progresses so will cooperation.

Finally it seems like this debate assumes that people will go on exactly as they are now. Personally I think as the consequences begin to be felt people will change accordingly. But so far for the vast majority of people even the current crisis is just a news item that's not really affecting their lives yet. It's when their lives are affected that they'll be really looking for answers as to what's happening and it's then that 'spreading the word' will have most impact.

[RevdTess]

Well it's not human nature but rather a typical response of someone living in a very hierarchical and individualistic society who has virtually no say in the way things are run.

Nicely put.

[RenewableCandy]

I love having powerswitch as a source of information and encouragement, but imagine what we could do if a whole bunch of us lived in the same village!

Spend all day arguing

No we wouldn't

[JohnB]

I love having powerswitch as a source of information and encouragement, but imagine what we could do if a whole bunch of us lived in the same village!

Spend all day arguing

No we wouldn't

Oh yes we would.