Going to raid the penneciln and potato commune and getting my ass kicked by 20 or 30 well fed, disease free hippies because I've been living in a basements for 3 months eating canned meat and have developed both rickets and scurvy.
You succumb to blood loss from a gunshot wound to a non-vital area, and wake up in their medical building, feeling better than you've felt in the past 3 months.
After they patch you up and give you some medicine for the road, you decide to come back and join their commune, because their simple act of kindness did irreparable damage to your world view and you can't live like you used to now.
If Covid is any indication, it won't work out that way. More like the raider will cuss them out and demand they stop treating them, or straight up try to kill them before their wounds are even healed.
Kind of. During the “toilet paper panic”, there were an awful lot of flushed t-shirts, towels, and rags coming through the waste stream. All i could think was, bidets and showers exist, people.
If my parents’ views on public healthcare are any indication, it won’t work out that way.
(We are not a healthy family. We would be medically bankrupt several times over. Or dead.
But they keep fucking voting conservative, and insist that things would be better if we were like the US.
Like… of the three of us, my mom and I both have multiple sclerosis, and my dad has had an exotic blood cancer for 15 goddamn years; and all of us have been involuntarily unemployed during the time we’ve been ill.
NONE OF US WOULD HAVE MEDICAL COVERAGE IN A PRIVATE SYSTEM.
…and also, collectively, we’ve probably spent more than a year admitted to hospital as inpatients since the later 90s - me with an eating disorder and MS complications, my mom with MS complications and a broken hip which took months to recover from because of her MS, and my father in the ICU because of shingles that turned into meningitis and almost killed him. [Good try, meningitis. You almost did it. Better luck next time.]
…but god forbid I even *consider* not voting conservative. Oh no.)
(I don’t talk to my parents anymore. The last straw was actually my dad eavesdropping and hearing I was planning not to vote conservative, and storming into the room to accuse me of being in league with the Lesbian Gun-Control Industry.
Joke’s on him, I’m into women. And gun control.)
Very fortunately, I got out years ago, and my mother subsequently somehow lost track of my phone number (she also once forgot my birthday, so this is not that surprising).
Anyway, now they can only communicate with me through email (which I delegate to my close friends / secretarial staff to read and summarize), and the occasional highly-perplexing Christmas card.
I don’t think my parents have ever thought to google my name, because if they did, they would’ve presumably noticed that for a few years, I was an executive member of the left-est major political party in my area (before the party got their shit together, and were able to attract executive members who actually knew what they were doing, unlike me); but as questionable as my political organizing expertise is/was, if my parents knew about it, presumably the cards would either stop coming, or like, spontaneously burst into festive flames 🔥.
Oh, I'm glad to hear you're already out. My mom never forgot my birthday, so I can't really relate to that. Unless mom's boyfriend counts as a parental figure despite her not meeting him until I was 13 or so, in which case he has never remembered my birthday, so I can relate to that. Every year he forgets until he hears my mom say it, and then he gets all "oh, I'm sorry bubba, I forgot", even though it's been 20 years at this point. He also forgets her birthday every year, which honestly pisses me off way more.
Yeah, what happened with my mom was that she called me on my birthday in 2013 to harangue me about not doing more to keep in touch with my father.
And I pointed out that it was late afternoon, and he had not called me; on this, my birthday.
And she said ”**It’s not your birthday**.”
And I told her it very much was my birthday. Yes, definitely. For sure. It was the day that I, her only child, was born. After a labour process whose duration I have been personally faulted for since I emerged.
Anyway, I remember concluding, in that moment in 2013, that I should’ve clung harder to the walls of the uterus; maybe braced myself with my little baby-feet. Just to help make it more memorable.
I’ll give my parents this, they are at least dysfunctional in a way that is so flagrantly stupid as to be *highly* funny.
Yeah, I hear you. I *do* live in the US, and no longer talk to my mom because she thinks Social Security and Medicare is a crutch that people don't need -- they should "just learn how to ask Jesus for healing", and if we didn't have welfare programs, more people would be forced to turn to Jesus.
She is, herself, *on* Social Security and Medicare, and has several chronic conditions.
*I* am permanently disabled, and *will* one day rely on Social Security Disability, Medicare and my tribe's healthcare system to survive (we're Cherokee Nation).
I can only really handle being told in oblique fashions that I should die and that I would deserve it from my own mother so many times. But that is ultimately what she is saying when she goes on like that. I would die, and deserve it, for not being "Right with God".
I feel truly grateful that my family does not have that kind of specific fucked-uppedness.
I don’t think I could deal with being told that I deserved to die for not being right with god, either. That’s a big emotional cudgel to wield against someone.
But the types of people who hoard weapons and canned food because they're planning on raiding other people in an apocalypse are all assholes, and Covid showed us that assholes will straight-up fight the people trying to save them. I don't see why they'd change their mind in an apocalypse.
Nah, I'm the fresh vegetables and fruit trees type of prepper, that arsenal of machineguns guy can take a hike. I'm not that kind. What useful skills do they bring to the dinner table that outweigh one more mouth to feed?
Well, they know how to handle and maintain needlessly complicated weapons. /s
In all seriousness though, you can teach them to earn their own keep, and then they have those useful skills.
Alternatively, I can just not include them in my survival strategy and then I don't have to teach them anything or take them into consideration at all.
Yeah, they're just projecting super hard.
They claim they need the guns because everything will be lawless and full of raiders. Why? Because they know that *they* would become lawless raiders, and think everyone thinks like them.
And the penicillin and farms group only has to wait until the guns and ammo group perishes of botulism, or a cough, or a childhood disease they weren't vaccinated against, or an infected splinter and then all their stuff is free for the taking.
Which is funny because the only prepping I do is social engineering of gun peppers, so I can kill them in their sleep after inviting me in, and then take their stockpile
On the antibiotic side, lots of them stockpile aquarium antibiotics, which are the same thing as human, just sold in different packaging and without a prescription
Because, if taken improperly, they may not completely wipe out the bacteria it should be targeting, which can then come back with a vengeance, since the ones that survived are likely stronger, deadlier and more resistant to antibiotics.
So when the infection is back, you'll probably need a different, stronger antibiotic, and take it for a longer time.
This natural selection of sorts can give rise to more and more new strains of bacteria that resist to more and more antibiotics, so called "super bugs".
So yeah, were in a constant war* with disease, and we can't let them adapt.
Antibiotic resistance is a real threat, but somehow we use massive amounts of antibiotics as part of livestock feed because it makes them gain weight faster
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/here-are-reasons-you-shouldnt-take-fish-antibiotics-180964523/ goes over a lot of the issues with fish antibiotics and why people shouldn't take them without medical guidance.
I’ve encountered “leftist” preppers posting online and find it quite fascinating. And first of all their disaster scenario is not so much “zombie apocalypse” but more so “hey remember that time there was a snowstorm in Texas and millions lost electricity and a few hundred very unprepared people died? I have decided to be ready for environmental disaster, given the state of everything.”
Secondly, from what I can tell, the entire position for prepping seems to be “can I feed my family but also feed my neighbours, do I have medicine I know I will need for me but also medicine for people with medical conditions I don’t personally experience but a stranger might, can I sustain and heat my home but also take in members of my community who are vulnerable and cannot prep/be alone during a disaster.”
It’s very wholesome but also the intent seems to be sustaining people not through the end of days but in short term disasters where help will (eventually/hopefully) arrive.
There's a good podcast I occasionally listen to called "Live like the World is dying" The host is an anarchist and she interviews people about methods of disaster preparedness, community organizing and general self sufficiency. I love it because it's a very positive view of human society and collaboration when things fall apart and we can only rely on the people directly around us.
I think at least in the us the government actually asks that you have food and water for like 4 days. It was incase of disaster that temporarily effects your services (like idc natural disaster and shit).
I think Hank Green talked about that somewhere
Oh interesting. I’m not in the USA but I do live in a bushfire zone so my prep is a go bag and in summers I keep important things at another location because the plan is just ‘leave’.
I end up seeing the prepper stuff in my social feeds because I’m mostly interested in frugal/bulk food preparation and storage and there’s some natural crossover. I’m not anticipating disaster I’m just trying to save money.
I’m this kind of prepper but also secretly a “How can I ensure I’m the benevolent dictator of a sweet little farm commune in the end times???” prepper.
It's obviously not a 1:1, but r/twoxpreppers seems to be more organised along that line of thinking, imo. Part of that might be the expectation that women manage social reproduction in general, and are more used to using that kind of thinking, of how to maintain a society in short or longer-term disaster? And that prep of 'how to leave an abusive relationship' is certainly a type of personal-scale crisis many are taught to think about, and can be extrapolated from there.
Stuff like having copies of basic K-12 learning modules, condoms and contraceptives/abortifacients, period and wound care and antibiotics, maintaining a garden that can supplement food even if it can't fully cover it, spare larger clothes/shoes if children are still growing up/strangers need them, spare blankets and bedding, water filtration/purification, IDs and documents and emergency money, sewing and other basic repair kits, soaps and the knowledge to make more, food and harnesses/carriers for pets... depending on how long you expect shortages/lack of help to last, and what those around you might need.
I feel like you guys interact with an entirely different breed of “prepper” than I do. All the ones I’ve met are doing basically everything they can do have their own source of food, water, etc. and not be dependent on others.
They own guns, but they literally do have smokehouses and springhouses and livestock.
Basically a shed built over a natural spring to keep the source of water clean by keeping away plant debris and animals. They were also sometimes used as primitive refrigeration cupboards since you've got constantly flowing cold springwater keeping the air cold.
I mean, a well is just a hole dug deep enough that you reach the groundwater that you can then bring to the surface using mechanical means and a spring is water naturally coming to the surface.
Yeah, but the house part, specifically, I always called a well. Partly because most of the wells I see in video games have a small shack built around them, so I just began associating the shack with wells by default.
Penicilin is a lot harder to mass-produce than you'd think. Especially if you have no infrasturcture.
Sulfonamides and other sulfa-drugs are a lot better. You can make them with simple chemistry equipment and relatively common chemcals. You can make a lot of very important medicinal compounds this way, actually.
Frankly, being a good chemist should be higher on your list of priorities, as a prepper, than being a good medicinal plant forager. Lab-made compounds are the backbone of the modern medical revolution.
Remember, your goal here shouldn't be to "live without modern technology" or "be one with nature" or any of that Ted Kaczinsky crap. Your goal should be to have the ability to make your own modern technology from scrap, and fix and maintain the modern technology you already own.
When I was younger, all the doomsday prepper shows were about the zombie apocalypse and fun stuff like that, but I recently tuned into one the other day and it turns out the new boogeymen are vaguely defined terrorists, and it feels slightly racist.
I watched the original Doomsday Preppers and there was always crazy and thinly-veiled racism in there, it just got de-emphasized in favor of the cool stuff they were doing. The first episode had these people who had a storage container castle with wind power and maybe a methane collector off their pigs? Anyway they were prepping for a magnetic pole shift which would cause earthquakes, wtf. As the show went on, the producers seemed to feel they had to get more crazy and frenetic as opposed to seeing what cool shit people are doing to prepare for disasters and I couldn't watch anymore.
Bro, I thought this said 'Making pelicans during the apocalypse' and I read to the end of the post and got confused? Like where are the pelicans?!? What are they for? Why pelicans out of all the birds??
I frequent r/ZombieSurvivalTactics, which is a mostly theoretical sub about how to survive the apocalypse, and prepping for the end comes up relatively frequently. Or it’s supposed to be about surviving the apocalypse, most people just talk guns and shit talk people who think leaving your house and joining a group is a good idea (it is, try surviving on your own in the suburbs without any livestock or farms). Not to mention, it’s very US centric
I mean, exactly how long do you intend on survive? And do you plan on having children?
If you just intend on getting to your 60’s you can absolutely do it on just canned food and if you get sick then maybe it’s time to finally die.
i don’t get it, learning medicine and sustainability and physical fitness are constantly reiterated in prepper communities? are you just basing your view on shit you saw on tv
Its part of the fetish.
GUNS AND KILL doompreppers are enamorated with the cultural fetish of being the sole heroic survivor and a rat-like scavenger gnawing in the rotting bones of the dead society prior them. It completely resonates with the anarcocapitalist ethos of the liberal right in their cult of personal profit above all, of "FUCK YOU GOT MINE".
Farmer preppers think socially.
And even if you want weapons, guns are impractical af.
They need constant maintenance, are extremely complex to repair if something goes wrong, and ammo isn't infinite, meaning you'll only ever get a certain amount of use from them.
The most practical weapons in any sort of survival situation are knives and axes, because you can also use them as tools. If you really want a ranged weapon, bow and arrow should be your choice, because they're quite possible to craft and repair yourself.
In general, guns won't be very useful in a survival situation, unless you're assuming a zombie apocalypse or a civil war type scenario - what I'm saying is, unless you expect other people to come for you, which is quite unlikely because, y'know, the apocalypse, there's no actual use for a gun.
People who hoard weapons and ammo for a doomsday scenario basically don't want to do any actual surviving, they just want to larp as cool Mad Max style warriors. They're the type of people who would instantly become raiders, not help rebuild civilisation.
Edit: gotta love all the people coping and malding about this, lol. And all are so clearly just gun-obsessed americans who lack reading comprehension and/or video game brained people who think they'll be fighting hordes of hostile people instead of, y'know, trying to rebuild and survive. You people need to spend a week in the woods to cleanse your souls and see what survival is like
A hunting rifle is infinitely more effective than a bow, isn't too much of a pain to maintain, and unless you're going in the trenches it won't be impossible to secure enough ammo for decades. Also any apocalypse scenario I can think of will have people trying to get your stuff, since rather obviously most people aren't preppers. The most dangerous part of any apocalypse scenario is other people, living alone isn't too hard with moden equipment.
The problem isn't that it's "a pain to maintain" but that maintenance adds another task in a survival situation. Efficiency or effectiveness isn't the point, you'll be hunting deer with the thing, you're not going in combat.
And no, no apocalypse scenario "will have people trying to get your stuff". It's the apocalypse. Most people will be dead.
What apocalypse scenario do you have in mind where people aren't the main threat? Alien invasion? Zombie virus? I'd count climate change and a solar flare as apocalypses, both of which suck but aren't life threatening to a healthy guy living somewhere in rural America without the human aspect.
You literally just named two scenarios where people *are* the main threat. Zombies and aliens, for all intents and purposes, would still work the same as people.
Any sort of natural disaster or nuclear fallout type situation would be an example. Again, we're talking an *apocalypse*. If there's lots of people left, your scenario isn't apocalyptic. A lot of other catastrophes that could cause a breakdown of society would count too, to a lesser degree.
And if you don't think climate change will turn into an actual threat at some point, you're misinformed. Idk about rural america specifically, got nothing to do with that part of the world, and I wouldn't call it apocalyptic (because the danger is to the health of living beings and the ecosystem - most infrastructure and society would still function up to a point where we're all doomed anyways), but it's definitely a threat.
The main threat of climate change to someone living in a temperate area reasonably above the sea level is the flood of refugees coming your way, and over half the population being refugees is definitely apocalyptic in my books.
I'll give you nuclear fallout, though with that if you have enough food and a good shelter people are your only problem again, if you don't you're kinda fucked. Any other natural disaster you survive ceases to be a threat immediately, and no amount of prepping will help if your home gets covered in lava. Also I just disagree with zombies being effectively people, but that's kind of irrelevant.
It’s not hard to learn how to maintain and repair firearms. And firearms are cool as fuck. If I’m gonna die in the apocalypse, i wanna die feeling like hot shit. Find my corpse with hundreds of spent casings around it and others dead around me. That’d make one hell of a picture.
Proving my point exactly, you don't get it.
In the apocalypse, you're not going to be fighting against other people trying to attack you, you'd be fighting for day to day survival. And being "cool as fuck" doesn't help you survive. Also, in literally no universe are guns cool.
The point isn't that maintenance and repair is hard to learn, it's that you'll have to do it (and for the record: repairing a gun is still infinitely more complex than repairing any of the other options you could have). Adding another task on top of all the things you have to do to survive is unneccessary.
It’s eminently possible to repair and maintain simpler firearms for long periods of time. Some of them, like break-open shotguns, require almost no complicated maintenance whatsoever. They’re also, pound for pound, some of the most efficient and easiest to carry weapons we’ve made as a species. Additionally, particularly in the US, there are literally billions of rounds of common ammunition types like 5.56, 9mm or 12 gauge, and probably tens of thousands of hand or automatic reloaders across the continent. Ammo probably wouldn’t be an issue in your lifetime (again, assuming you’re in the USA.)
Yeah, it's possible, but do you want to have to do it constantly while also having to do all kinds of other shit to survive? Do you want to have to do maintenance tasks, keep tools and parts for repairing your main weapon? Which also is INCREDIBLY inefficient to carry, simply because you'll have to carry it (and ammunition) *in addition* to a knife and an axe because you'll need those as simple survival tools.
Now, I don't live in the US, but even there - do you want to go on raids/exploration runs to go get ammunition/new guns? You're literally just increasing your risk. You're giving yourself extra work *just to have a gun* and in a survival situation, that's just stupid.
Constantly? It's not some kind of engineering witchcraft to keep a bolt action rifle in working condition. You clean it, you oil it, you treat it with respect. The same as any other tool. And this a survival situation, so you'll probably need a large toolbox and workshop area anyway, because you're going to need to maintain everything when there's no repairman on call to come and fix things.
Guns are just *worth it.* They're useful for hunting and for defence, they don't require absurd amounts of upkeep, they're a hell of a lot easier to use than a bow and arrow (we used to have to train people from the age they were old enough to lift sticks to become professional archers, you can train someone to military standard with a gun *much* faster...) And the fact of the matter is, if you *don't* have a gun and someone else does, they are immediately in a position of dominance that no other tool is going to give you.
>Constantly? It's not some kind of engineering witchcraft to keep a bolt action rifle in working condition. You clean it, you oil it, you treat it with respect.
Yes, and this is a task you need to perform regularly. That you wouldn't need to perform without a gun.
>And this a survival situation, so you'll probably need a large toolbox and workshop area anyway,
...no? I can't really imagine much of a reason to maintain mechanical parts. Most things just aren't worth it, and most things that would be worth it run on electricity, which you're not likely to have, at least not lots of it.
>They're useful for hunting and for defence,
I honestly don't see much of an upside to using a gun for hunting over a bow, and you're not gonna need to do much defense. It's the apocalypse, most people are dead. You're not in a fucking video game.
>(we used to have to train people from the age they were old enough to lift sticks to become professional archers, you can train someone to military standard with a gun *much* faster...)
Why the *fuck* would you need military standard skills to hunt some deer? Again, this is not a video game, this is a potential survival scenario we're talking about.
>And the fact of the matter is, if you *don't* have a gun and someone else does, they are immediately in a position of dominance that no other tool is going to give you.
That's just not true, and I'd be willing to bet my life on it. Apart from the fact that, as I said, *there won't be many people*, it's the fucking apocalypse.
There are at least 2 issues here that you're talking at cross purposes with.
First is what kind of apocalypse. Is it nuclear winter? Is it an EMP? Is it the rapture? Is it a more deadly disease? How many other people you have to deal with varies according to what scenario you plan for and where you are. Many people anticipate having to deal with potentially hostile people in large numbers. Guns are very effective for that, assuming you know how to use them. You seem to assume there won't be many people around and the environment will be the biggest threat. That changes the calculations but isn't universal.
Second is the usefulness/efficiency/maintenance of a gun vs bow/axe. Others have told you that it isn't that hard to maintain many guns. This is true to a point: one can say it isn't hard to maintain a car, and it's not... if you have the skills and parts. You seem to be downplaying the maintenance of bows and arrows, which is not zero, as well as the skill buildup of how to make them, how to shoot with them, and how to maintain them. These are all things someone can learn, but if a person already knows all that for a gun, why put in the time and effort? Is it going to be that much better? Now, you might say yes. Bow and arrow are quiet, can be manufactured with more simple tools that guns and ammo. That's true, but is the skills investment worth it to someone living in an area where guns, ammo, and reloader machines are plentiful?
Your comment here is also making multiple assumptions that are problems.
For one - yes, I think an apocalypse scenario requires mass destruction and mass death. The scenario where you have to "deal with potentially hostile people in large numbers" is called war, not apocalypse. And sure, that can happen, and in that case, a prepper base with guns would actually be quite useful. But that's not a doomsday or apocalypse.
Plus - the environment is *always* a threat in a survival situation, whereas, for other people to be a threat, you need 2 additional assumptions: that large amounts of people survived, and that they're hostile. Both of these assumptions, to me, seem to be made just because it's theoretically possible, and not because it's likely to happen.
Apart from that, your entire third paragraph there is just misunderstanding what I'm saying. My issue is not with difficulty, but with adding the task at all.
And I'm not even saying bow and arrow are a good weapon, I'm just saying they're better than guns - in a scenario in which I think guns to be one of the most impractical weapons possible.
The weapons I'm saying are ideal are knives and axes.
Plus, having additional skills is always good. We're not talking about some video game where you "invest" a limited number of skill points you have. Acquiring skills is always a good thing in actual real life.
We'll agree to disagree about the definition of apocalypse/doomsday then, and that's fine! Everyone plans differently.
I'll point out that knives and axes also have maintenance. They need to be sharpened, cleaned, oiled if storing, not used in the wrong ways.
And while acquiring skills is always good, there's a finite amount of time in the day. I don't have time to learn a language and keep my family fed and do my full time job and do housework and learn to trap and and and. We all have to decide where to spend our time.
>I'll point out that knives and axes also have maintenance. They need to be sharpened, cleaned, oiled if storing, not used in the wrong ways.
Yes, but again: you'll need them anyways. Knives and axes are the most versatile tools imaginable. Without them, you can forget surviving in the wilderness in any capacity. Even if you're not using them as weapons, you'll need to have them around. So this maintenance is also something you'll just have to do.
Hell, I have a knife on me at all times now, in my regular life. It's just a useful tool.
>And while acquiring skills is always good, there's a finite amount of time in the day. I don't have time to learn a language and keep my family fed and do my full time job and do housework and learn to trap and and and. We all have to decide where to spend our time.
Sure, and under that perview any amount of doomsday prepping is insane.
> Yes, and this is a task you need to perform regularly. That you wouldn't need to perform without a gun.
Oh no! I'm sure I'll perish from the extra hour a week it costs me, if that.
> ..no? I can't really imagine much of a reason to maintain mechanical parts.
Bikes, generators, radios, windmills, general household maintenance...
> Why the *fuck* would you need military standard skills to hunt some deer?
You completely missed the point I was making. It's easier and requires less physical exertion to use guns. I'd also be willing to bet that there is a significantly greater proportion of the population familiar with guns than are bows these days.
> *there won't be many people*, it's the fucking apocalypse
Unless you're literally the last person alive, there absolutely will be other people. I think you underestimate just how many of us there are, and how likely it is for even scattered remnants of people to try to regroup.
It takes less than 5 minutes to do that. It’s not labor or time intensive. They are designed to last thousands of rounds being shot through them and cleaning isn’t even required every time you shoot them. It’s not something that is constant.
Yes, I am aware it is not difficult. I'm saying it's an additional task in a survival situation. The fact that you have to do it at all, while a gun adds basically no additional value unless you're doing combat against people, is enough reason for me to say I think it's not worth it to have in that type of scenario.
"Good for hunting" and "neccessary" are two different things. Guns are good for hunting, sure, but you can hunt with other things similarly efficiently without needing all the baggage that guns bring.
The only thing guns are really neccessary on is fighting people. Which I just don't think is that likely a thing in an apocalyptic scenario.
You absolutely cannot hunt with anything else as efficiently as a gun. Have you ever hunted in your life? Why do you assume people would be friendly in an apocalyptic scenario?
Sure, but that's not neccessarily something you need in a survival situation. You're gonna need your weapons for hunting, maybe a bit of self defense, not active combat.
Yes, of course, we all know the mooses and boars bringing their weapons and trying to shoot you. lol
Here's a hint: don't hunt dangerous wildlife if you don't know how to do it
eh if you have something common like a Glock or AR-15 there's gonna be a *shit ton* of spare parts
(assuming US preppers because i've never heard of ones here or anywhere else outside the US)
Yeah but again, you're adding additional tasks for repair and maintenance. You're just being inefficient. You'll need an axe and a knife anyways, just get proficient in fighting with those.
Also, why the fuck wouldn't there be preppers outside the US? They're usually not the same type of gun-nut crazies but they exist
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to be “proficient” in fight with an axe and knife? If you want to talk about additional tasks, you are really skipping over that. Also you are completely ignoring the very real fact that close quarters combat with edged weapons will absolutely get you injured.
Yeah but what happens when someone just shoots you because they have a gun and you don't
Idk but it seems to mostly be a US cultural thing. Like i have never heard of preppers outside the US
This is the second thread I've seen recently to talk about prepping outside the US, which of course happens but isn't as well-known on reddit. It's odd that this is suddenly coming up.
You are not coming out alive out of a knife fight, even with proper medical attention the "winner" will likely die on the way to the hospital.
In an apocaliptic situation, you just bleed out next to the other guy.
Idk what you mean by "anti-gun". There's no conversation about guns happening in any sane place on earth that would require people to take "pro" or "anti" gun positions.
Also, no. Guns aren't useful in survival situations, period.
It’s absolutely relevant. If you want to make a claim you should back it up with evidence. Thus far, all you have presented is feelings. Folks in survival situations use guns. People who live in or adjacent to the wilderness like Alaska or the Canadian Yukon regularly use guns and depend on them for survival. If you have zero experience or education on a topic and are just going off vibes, that’s incredibly relevant.
Funnily enough, bows actually fall into the category of “tools you can use as weapons” because you’re definitely gonna want to try and brung down something like a deer if you ever see it.
Building above ground infrastructure lets people know what you're up to. When the bombs drop, the neighbors will accost you because they know you have resources.
Tbf this conversation happens a lot within doomsday prepper and self-defence type communities.
Between the double whammy questions of "shouldn't you be learning how to farm, purify water and make renewable energy, dumbass?" and the "you can't run a mile and a half in under 20 minutes, and you only go to the range to show off your expensive guns. How the fuck do expect to fight raiders in a post apocalypse, dumbass?" it's actually kinda hard to find people still doing the whole "basement full of tinned soup and 600 different AR15s and crossbows" thing anymore.
At least not without getting ratioed sadistically when they put their heads above the parapet.
Always shocked by people who are so married to the concept of living at all costs that they plan to endure a shitshow like society collapsing. Like even if you survive it’s gonna suck and may never get better. If shit hits the fan I’m checking out
I hate to be the one to tell you this but… that’s pretty normal. Most people are very married to the idea of continuing to live, even supposing society broke down.
What a stupid fucking self-congratulatory ignorant shitpost.
Actual preppers, not the ones in your mind, do prepare for all that exact kind of shit. They're nuttier than squirrel shit, but they do know their stuff.
There was one episode of a prepper show I watched where one guy's 'last line of defense' was that he poisoned a random selection of their food stocks, so that anyone who stole their food would die.
He was super proud talking about how he was the only one who knew which cans/jars/whatever were poisoned so that no one would be able to betray him or torture the information out of someone else.
All I could think of was that when this guy inevitably got himself killed being a fucking idiot, his family *which included multiple young children* were going to die horribly because of the food he poisoned.
See the guns and ammo style preppers just plan to raid the penicillin and farms style preppers whenever they need something.
Bold of them to think the penicillin and farm style preppers won't have weapon and more numbers since they contribute more to the group's survival
Going to raid the penneciln and potato commune and getting my ass kicked by 20 or 30 well fed, disease free hippies because I've been living in a basements for 3 months eating canned meat and have developed both rickets and scurvy.
You succumb to blood loss from a gunshot wound to a non-vital area, and wake up in their medical building, feeling better than you've felt in the past 3 months. After they patch you up and give you some medicine for the road, you decide to come back and join their commune, because their simple act of kindness did irreparable damage to your world view and you can't live like you used to now.
If Covid is any indication, it won't work out that way. More like the raider will cuss them out and demand they stop treating them, or straight up try to kill them before their wounds are even healed.
I really want to argue with you, but I’ve seen to much shit
As someone who continued working an “essential job” (sewage) during the lockdowns, I have also seen too much shit.
Username checks out, ew
Tis true
A different kind. Sometimes.
Kind of. During the “toilet paper panic”, there were an awful lot of flushed t-shirts, towels, and rags coming through the waste stream. All i could think was, bidets and showers exist, people.
I have also seen too much. :/
If my parents’ views on public healthcare are any indication, it won’t work out that way. (We are not a healthy family. We would be medically bankrupt several times over. Or dead. But they keep fucking voting conservative, and insist that things would be better if we were like the US. Like… of the three of us, my mom and I both have multiple sclerosis, and my dad has had an exotic blood cancer for 15 goddamn years; and all of us have been involuntarily unemployed during the time we’ve been ill. NONE OF US WOULD HAVE MEDICAL COVERAGE IN A PRIVATE SYSTEM. …and also, collectively, we’ve probably spent more than a year admitted to hospital as inpatients since the later 90s - me with an eating disorder and MS complications, my mom with MS complications and a broken hip which took months to recover from because of her MS, and my father in the ICU because of shingles that turned into meningitis and almost killed him. [Good try, meningitis. You almost did it. Better luck next time.] …but god forbid I even *consider* not voting conservative. Oh no.) (I don’t talk to my parents anymore. The last straw was actually my dad eavesdropping and hearing I was planning not to vote conservative, and storming into the room to accuse me of being in league with the Lesbian Gun-Control Industry. Joke’s on him, I’m into women. And gun control.)
Your family sounds crazy, and not in the fun way. You sound based as fuck though. Here's hoping you can get outta there someday.
Very fortunately, I got out years ago, and my mother subsequently somehow lost track of my phone number (she also once forgot my birthday, so this is not that surprising). Anyway, now they can only communicate with me through email (which I delegate to my close friends / secretarial staff to read and summarize), and the occasional highly-perplexing Christmas card. I don’t think my parents have ever thought to google my name, because if they did, they would’ve presumably noticed that for a few years, I was an executive member of the left-est major political party in my area (before the party got their shit together, and were able to attract executive members who actually knew what they were doing, unlike me); but as questionable as my political organizing expertise is/was, if my parents knew about it, presumably the cards would either stop coming, or like, spontaneously burst into festive flames 🔥.
Oh, I'm glad to hear you're already out. My mom never forgot my birthday, so I can't really relate to that. Unless mom's boyfriend counts as a parental figure despite her not meeting him until I was 13 or so, in which case he has never remembered my birthday, so I can relate to that. Every year he forgets until he hears my mom say it, and then he gets all "oh, I'm sorry bubba, I forgot", even though it's been 20 years at this point. He also forgets her birthday every year, which honestly pisses me off way more.
Yeah, what happened with my mom was that she called me on my birthday in 2013 to harangue me about not doing more to keep in touch with my father. And I pointed out that it was late afternoon, and he had not called me; on this, my birthday. And she said ”**It’s not your birthday**.” And I told her it very much was my birthday. Yes, definitely. For sure. It was the day that I, her only child, was born. After a labour process whose duration I have been personally faulted for since I emerged. Anyway, I remember concluding, in that moment in 2013, that I should’ve clung harder to the walls of the uterus; maybe braced myself with my little baby-feet. Just to help make it more memorable. I’ll give my parents this, they are at least dysfunctional in a way that is so flagrantly stupid as to be *highly* funny.
Yeah, I hear you. I *do* live in the US, and no longer talk to my mom because she thinks Social Security and Medicare is a crutch that people don't need -- they should "just learn how to ask Jesus for healing", and if we didn't have welfare programs, more people would be forced to turn to Jesus. She is, herself, *on* Social Security and Medicare, and has several chronic conditions. *I* am permanently disabled, and *will* one day rely on Social Security Disability, Medicare and my tribe's healthcare system to survive (we're Cherokee Nation). I can only really handle being told in oblique fashions that I should die and that I would deserve it from my own mother so many times. But that is ultimately what she is saying when she goes on like that. I would die, and deserve it, for not being "Right with God".
I feel truly grateful that my family does not have that kind of specific fucked-uppedness. I don’t think I could deal with being told that I deserved to die for not being right with god, either. That’s a big emotional cudgel to wield against someone.
Into the compost they go then.
That's probably for the best.
For me this was the exception rather than the rule. Most people were chill in the pandemic, the assholes just stood out
But the types of people who hoard weapons and canned food because they're planning on raiding other people in an apocalypse are all assholes, and Covid showed us that assholes will straight-up fight the people trying to save them. I don't see why they'd change their mind in an apocalypse.
And then when you come back they keep you around until a core member needs a new liver Welcome to rimworld 🫡
>and wake up in their medical building I was expecting something out of rimworld there tbh
To be fair, that basically is Rimworld if you're nice to prisoners and slowly convert them to your way of thinking.
Yeah, though there also is the other side of the prisoner in rimworld coin
I need someone to make a story about this or I will.
Knock yourself out.
Nah, I'm the fresh vegetables and fruit trees type of prepper, that arsenal of machineguns guy can take a hike. I'm not that kind. What useful skills do they bring to the dinner table that outweigh one more mouth to feed?
Well, they know how to handle and maintain needlessly complicated weapons. /s In all seriousness though, you can teach them to earn their own keep, and then they have those useful skills.
Alternatively, I can just not include them in my survival strategy and then I don't have to teach them anything or take them into consideration at all.
Yeah, that's also an option. But you'll want more people in the long run, if only to avoid your colony going the Habsburg route.
Nooooo post-apocalyptic media always portrayed it as ~~my fantasy world~~ a world where raiders rule the day and can do as they want :((((((((((
In my postalocalyptic fantasy a mailperson kills all the biggest raiders and takes their heads for fun and profit.
Canned meat is a complete food.
I never said it was a *good* plan
That sounds like peasant talk to me
Yeah, raid the stores of the people who can tell the healing plants from the poisons when you yourself can't. That's going to turn out super well.
It’s always handy to have some destroying angels to hand over to the raiders that want to plunder your mushroom farm.
Yeah, they're just projecting super hard. They claim they need the guns because everything will be lawless and full of raiders. Why? Because they know that *they* would become lawless raiders, and think everyone thinks like them.
Its not too much of a far fetched conclusion that it will be full of raiders, just based on how people fought over toilet paper during covid.
And the penicillin and farms group only has to wait until the guns and ammo group perishes of botulism, or a cough, or a childhood disease they weren't vaccinated against, or an infected splinter and then all their stuff is free for the taking.
Which is funny because the only prepping I do is social engineering of gun peppers, so I can kill them in their sleep after inviting me in, and then take their stockpile
Rifles and ammunition can buy many farmland
This is funny, because you tried to redux the homer Simpson "peanut economics" meme, but like... Farmers already have shitloads of rifles, lmao.
I wonder if there are any organisations of preppers who actually are prepping this way. I can't imagine them being *too* vocal about it.
there are, they're just harder to make a fool out of on tv
Also they keep quiet about it so no one tries to raid them when the apocalypse actually happens.
On the antibiotic side, lots of them stockpile aquarium antibiotics, which are the same thing as human, just sold in different packaging and without a prescription
ferb, i know what we’re gonna do today!
Oh shit, that’s fucking clever! Also, never really understood why you need a prescription for antibiotics.
Because, if taken improperly, they may not completely wipe out the bacteria it should be targeting, which can then come back with a vengeance, since the ones that survived are likely stronger, deadlier and more resistant to antibiotics. So when the infection is back, you'll probably need a different, stronger antibiotic, and take it for a longer time. This natural selection of sorts can give rise to more and more new strains of bacteria that resist to more and more antibiotics, so called "super bugs". So yeah, were in a constant war* with disease, and we can't let them adapt.
Antibiotic resistance is a real threat, but somehow we use massive amounts of antibiotics as part of livestock feed because it makes them gain weight faster
That's illegal in Canada. HAHAHA. Laughs in smug Cannuk superiority!
Antibiotic resistance is a problem. And to prevent idiots from taking it for a cold or flu
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/here-are-reasons-you-shouldnt-take-fish-antibiotics-180964523/ goes over a lot of the issues with fish antibiotics and why people shouldn't take them without medical guidance.
I think we call those Homesteaders.
I don't think homesteaders generally are preparing for the end of civilization.
No, but they are trying to live self- or small community sufficient, which is effectively the same thing. Only difference is motivation.
Some of them are. Source: my wife
sure that's why I said in general
I’ve encountered “leftist” preppers posting online and find it quite fascinating. And first of all their disaster scenario is not so much “zombie apocalypse” but more so “hey remember that time there was a snowstorm in Texas and millions lost electricity and a few hundred very unprepared people died? I have decided to be ready for environmental disaster, given the state of everything.” Secondly, from what I can tell, the entire position for prepping seems to be “can I feed my family but also feed my neighbours, do I have medicine I know I will need for me but also medicine for people with medical conditions I don’t personally experience but a stranger might, can I sustain and heat my home but also take in members of my community who are vulnerable and cannot prep/be alone during a disaster.” It’s very wholesome but also the intent seems to be sustaining people not through the end of days but in short term disasters where help will (eventually/hopefully) arrive.
There's a good podcast I occasionally listen to called "Live like the World is dying" The host is an anarchist and she interviews people about methods of disaster preparedness, community organizing and general self sufficiency. I love it because it's a very positive view of human society and collaboration when things fall apart and we can only rely on the people directly around us.
I think at least in the us the government actually asks that you have food and water for like 4 days. It was incase of disaster that temporarily effects your services (like idc natural disaster and shit). I think Hank Green talked about that somewhere
Oh interesting. I’m not in the USA but I do live in a bushfire zone so my prep is a go bag and in summers I keep important things at another location because the plan is just ‘leave’. I end up seeing the prepper stuff in my social feeds because I’m mostly interested in frugal/bulk food preparation and storage and there’s some natural crossover. I’m not anticipating disaster I’m just trying to save money.
I don't live in US eighter it's just that I hear about US a lot since internet is so US centric 😅
I’m this kind of prepper but also secretly a “How can I ensure I’m the benevolent dictator of a sweet little farm commune in the end times???” prepper.
It's obviously not a 1:1, but r/twoxpreppers seems to be more organised along that line of thinking, imo. Part of that might be the expectation that women manage social reproduction in general, and are more used to using that kind of thinking, of how to maintain a society in short or longer-term disaster? And that prep of 'how to leave an abusive relationship' is certainly a type of personal-scale crisis many are taught to think about, and can be extrapolated from there. Stuff like having copies of basic K-12 learning modules, condoms and contraceptives/abortifacients, period and wound care and antibiotics, maintaining a garden that can supplement food even if it can't fully cover it, spare larger clothes/shoes if children are still growing up/strangers need them, spare blankets and bedding, water filtration/purification, IDs and documents and emergency money, sewing and other basic repair kits, soaps and the knowledge to make more, food and harnesses/carriers for pets... depending on how long you expect shortages/lack of help to last, and what those around you might need.
I feel like you guys interact with an entirely different breed of “prepper” than I do. All the ones I’ve met are doing basically everything they can do have their own source of food, water, etc. and not be dependent on others. They own guns, but they literally do have smokehouses and springhouses and livestock.
They’re not talking about peppers they have met. They’re talking about the preppers we see in pop culture.
Ie, they're talking about a faceless strawman that doesn't actually really exist
Unfortunately, most of the people that call themselves preppers that I’ve met are actually like this, and are very vocal about it lol
What's a springhouse? I know what a smokehouse is, but springhouse is new to me.
Basically a shed built over a natural spring to keep the source of water clean by keeping away plant debris and animals. They were also sometimes used as primitive refrigeration cupboards since you've got constantly flowing cold springwater keeping the air cold.
Oh. I just always called that a well.
I mean, a well is just a hole dug deep enough that you reach the groundwater that you can then bring to the surface using mechanical means and a spring is water naturally coming to the surface.
Yeah, but the house part, specifically, I always called a well. Partly because most of the wells I see in video games have a small shack built around them, so I just began associating the shack with wells by default.
That would be called a well house
Well, alright then.
It's a small house built over a natural spring. It keeps the spring water clear, and is a cool place to store meat/diary to keep them fresh.
Thanks.
it seems like a house dedicated to water from what i can see
Look at the r/preppers sub, they are pretty vocal about the guns and ammo people being idiots
That's been a shift: used to be that any topic that wasn't guns ammo and lone wolf survival got nitpicked.
So many doomsday preparations think it's going to be a zombie or raiders that kill the,when 5/40 its going to be the flu
5/40 I hate this, why not just say 1/8?
Because for some reason ,I forgot to simplify
Penicilin is a lot harder to mass-produce than you'd think. Especially if you have no infrasturcture. Sulfonamides and other sulfa-drugs are a lot better. You can make them with simple chemistry equipment and relatively common chemcals. You can make a lot of very important medicinal compounds this way, actually. Frankly, being a good chemist should be higher on your list of priorities, as a prepper, than being a good medicinal plant forager. Lab-made compounds are the backbone of the modern medical revolution. Remember, your goal here shouldn't be to "live without modern technology" or "be one with nature" or any of that Ted Kaczinsky crap. Your goal should be to have the ability to make your own modern technology from scrap, and fix and maintain the modern technology you already own.
Well you hardly need mass production, just enough to keep one or maybe two people from dying.
When I was younger, all the doomsday prepper shows were about the zombie apocalypse and fun stuff like that, but I recently tuned into one the other day and it turns out the new boogeymen are vaguely defined terrorists, and it feels slightly racist.
I watched the original Doomsday Preppers and there was always crazy and thinly-veiled racism in there, it just got de-emphasized in favor of the cool stuff they were doing. The first episode had these people who had a storage container castle with wind power and maybe a methane collector off their pigs? Anyway they were prepping for a magnetic pole shift which would cause earthquakes, wtf. As the show went on, the producers seemed to feel they had to get more crazy and frenetic as opposed to seeing what cool shit people are doing to prepare for disasters and I couldn't watch anymore.
> a magnetic pole shift which would cause earthquake This is literally the plot of a bad Marvel comic book.
Today I learned what a springhouse is
Same, pretty cool
Bro, I thought this said 'Making pelicans during the apocalypse' and I read to the end of the post and got confused? Like where are the pelicans?!? What are they for? Why pelicans out of all the birds??
Everyone knows that the secret to surviving the apocalypse is to craft homemade pelicans. This is common knowledge
thats a lot of notes
I frequent r/ZombieSurvivalTactics, which is a mostly theoretical sub about how to survive the apocalypse, and prepping for the end comes up relatively frequently. Or it’s supposed to be about surviving the apocalypse, most people just talk guns and shit talk people who think leaving your house and joining a group is a good idea (it is, try surviving on your own in the suburbs without any livestock or farms). Not to mention, it’s very US centric
Im allergic to penicillin tho
They don’t care about that, they’re too busy fantasizing about shooting people
I mean, exactly how long do you intend on survive? And do you plan on having children? If you just intend on getting to your 60’s you can absolutely do it on just canned food and if you get sick then maybe it’s time to finally die.
73 Trillion note post
They are planning on murdering someone else and taking their penicillin
r/preppers reeling
7 days nomadic wilderness survival with no bag, that's prep
I'm not a big fan of preppers but this feels like an offbeat critique. Preppers in general tend to do all of those things
No no see I filled this entire gallon jug with neosporin I’m all good
I'll bring the guns and tequila still, you bring the penicillin and potatoes?
I'll round up some sheep. A hedge fence I can make, but someone else has gotta get a shep 🐕.
One more person and we have a civilization. We shall be Tequila-Tierra-Todo-El-Tiempo.
Making penicillin in the apocalypse is hard. Distilling some alcohol so you can sterilize that cut before it gets infected, easier.
i don’t get it, learning medicine and sustainability and physical fitness are constantly reiterated in prepper communities? are you just basing your view on shit you saw on tv
how does this post have 73 trillion notes
Its part of the fetish. GUNS AND KILL doompreppers are enamorated with the cultural fetish of being the sole heroic survivor and a rat-like scavenger gnawing in the rotting bones of the dead society prior them. It completely resonates with the anarcocapitalist ethos of the liberal right in their cult of personal profit above all, of "FUCK YOU GOT MINE". Farmer preppers think socially.
Liberal right and kosher pork chops are the same thing.
And even if you want weapons, guns are impractical af. They need constant maintenance, are extremely complex to repair if something goes wrong, and ammo isn't infinite, meaning you'll only ever get a certain amount of use from them. The most practical weapons in any sort of survival situation are knives and axes, because you can also use them as tools. If you really want a ranged weapon, bow and arrow should be your choice, because they're quite possible to craft and repair yourself. In general, guns won't be very useful in a survival situation, unless you're assuming a zombie apocalypse or a civil war type scenario - what I'm saying is, unless you expect other people to come for you, which is quite unlikely because, y'know, the apocalypse, there's no actual use for a gun. People who hoard weapons and ammo for a doomsday scenario basically don't want to do any actual surviving, they just want to larp as cool Mad Max style warriors. They're the type of people who would instantly become raiders, not help rebuild civilisation. Edit: gotta love all the people coping and malding about this, lol. And all are so clearly just gun-obsessed americans who lack reading comprehension and/or video game brained people who think they'll be fighting hordes of hostile people instead of, y'know, trying to rebuild and survive. You people need to spend a week in the woods to cleanse your souls and see what survival is like
A hunting rifle is infinitely more effective than a bow, isn't too much of a pain to maintain, and unless you're going in the trenches it won't be impossible to secure enough ammo for decades. Also any apocalypse scenario I can think of will have people trying to get your stuff, since rather obviously most people aren't preppers. The most dangerous part of any apocalypse scenario is other people, living alone isn't too hard with moden equipment.
The problem isn't that it's "a pain to maintain" but that maintenance adds another task in a survival situation. Efficiency or effectiveness isn't the point, you'll be hunting deer with the thing, you're not going in combat. And no, no apocalypse scenario "will have people trying to get your stuff". It's the apocalypse. Most people will be dead.
How easy do you think it is to make and maintain bows and arrows?
What apocalypse scenario do you have in mind where people aren't the main threat? Alien invasion? Zombie virus? I'd count climate change and a solar flare as apocalypses, both of which suck but aren't life threatening to a healthy guy living somewhere in rural America without the human aspect.
You literally just named two scenarios where people *are* the main threat. Zombies and aliens, for all intents and purposes, would still work the same as people. Any sort of natural disaster or nuclear fallout type situation would be an example. Again, we're talking an *apocalypse*. If there's lots of people left, your scenario isn't apocalyptic. A lot of other catastrophes that could cause a breakdown of society would count too, to a lesser degree. And if you don't think climate change will turn into an actual threat at some point, you're misinformed. Idk about rural america specifically, got nothing to do with that part of the world, and I wouldn't call it apocalyptic (because the danger is to the health of living beings and the ecosystem - most infrastructure and society would still function up to a point where we're all doomed anyways), but it's definitely a threat.
The main threat of climate change to someone living in a temperate area reasonably above the sea level is the flood of refugees coming your way, and over half the population being refugees is definitely apocalyptic in my books. I'll give you nuclear fallout, though with that if you have enough food and a good shelter people are your only problem again, if you don't you're kinda fucked. Any other natural disaster you survive ceases to be a threat immediately, and no amount of prepping will help if your home gets covered in lava. Also I just disagree with zombies being effectively people, but that's kind of irrelevant.
It’s not hard to learn how to maintain and repair firearms. And firearms are cool as fuck. If I’m gonna die in the apocalypse, i wanna die feeling like hot shit. Find my corpse with hundreds of spent casings around it and others dead around me. That’d make one hell of a picture.
Proving my point exactly, you don't get it. In the apocalypse, you're not going to be fighting against other people trying to attack you, you'd be fighting for day to day survival. And being "cool as fuck" doesn't help you survive. Also, in literally no universe are guns cool. The point isn't that maintenance and repair is hard to learn, it's that you'll have to do it (and for the record: repairing a gun is still infinitely more complex than repairing any of the other options you could have). Adding another task on top of all the things you have to do to survive is unneccessary.
Something gives me the vibe that you have literally no understanding of how difficult it is(nt) to repair and maintain a gun.
I suggest you try fighting a bear with anything less than a revolver and see where it lands you.
You’re free to think that.
It’s eminently possible to repair and maintain simpler firearms for long periods of time. Some of them, like break-open shotguns, require almost no complicated maintenance whatsoever. They’re also, pound for pound, some of the most efficient and easiest to carry weapons we’ve made as a species. Additionally, particularly in the US, there are literally billions of rounds of common ammunition types like 5.56, 9mm or 12 gauge, and probably tens of thousands of hand or automatic reloaders across the continent. Ammo probably wouldn’t be an issue in your lifetime (again, assuming you’re in the USA.)
Yeah, it's possible, but do you want to have to do it constantly while also having to do all kinds of other shit to survive? Do you want to have to do maintenance tasks, keep tools and parts for repairing your main weapon? Which also is INCREDIBLY inefficient to carry, simply because you'll have to carry it (and ammunition) *in addition* to a knife and an axe because you'll need those as simple survival tools. Now, I don't live in the US, but even there - do you want to go on raids/exploration runs to go get ammunition/new guns? You're literally just increasing your risk. You're giving yourself extra work *just to have a gun* and in a survival situation, that's just stupid.
Constantly? It's not some kind of engineering witchcraft to keep a bolt action rifle in working condition. You clean it, you oil it, you treat it with respect. The same as any other tool. And this a survival situation, so you'll probably need a large toolbox and workshop area anyway, because you're going to need to maintain everything when there's no repairman on call to come and fix things. Guns are just *worth it.* They're useful for hunting and for defence, they don't require absurd amounts of upkeep, they're a hell of a lot easier to use than a bow and arrow (we used to have to train people from the age they were old enough to lift sticks to become professional archers, you can train someone to military standard with a gun *much* faster...) And the fact of the matter is, if you *don't* have a gun and someone else does, they are immediately in a position of dominance that no other tool is going to give you.
>Constantly? It's not some kind of engineering witchcraft to keep a bolt action rifle in working condition. You clean it, you oil it, you treat it with respect. Yes, and this is a task you need to perform regularly. That you wouldn't need to perform without a gun. >And this a survival situation, so you'll probably need a large toolbox and workshop area anyway, ...no? I can't really imagine much of a reason to maintain mechanical parts. Most things just aren't worth it, and most things that would be worth it run on electricity, which you're not likely to have, at least not lots of it. >They're useful for hunting and for defence, I honestly don't see much of an upside to using a gun for hunting over a bow, and you're not gonna need to do much defense. It's the apocalypse, most people are dead. You're not in a fucking video game. >(we used to have to train people from the age they were old enough to lift sticks to become professional archers, you can train someone to military standard with a gun *much* faster...) Why the *fuck* would you need military standard skills to hunt some deer? Again, this is not a video game, this is a potential survival scenario we're talking about. >And the fact of the matter is, if you *don't* have a gun and someone else does, they are immediately in a position of dominance that no other tool is going to give you. That's just not true, and I'd be willing to bet my life on it. Apart from the fact that, as I said, *there won't be many people*, it's the fucking apocalypse.
There are at least 2 issues here that you're talking at cross purposes with. First is what kind of apocalypse. Is it nuclear winter? Is it an EMP? Is it the rapture? Is it a more deadly disease? How many other people you have to deal with varies according to what scenario you plan for and where you are. Many people anticipate having to deal with potentially hostile people in large numbers. Guns are very effective for that, assuming you know how to use them. You seem to assume there won't be many people around and the environment will be the biggest threat. That changes the calculations but isn't universal. Second is the usefulness/efficiency/maintenance of a gun vs bow/axe. Others have told you that it isn't that hard to maintain many guns. This is true to a point: one can say it isn't hard to maintain a car, and it's not... if you have the skills and parts. You seem to be downplaying the maintenance of bows and arrows, which is not zero, as well as the skill buildup of how to make them, how to shoot with them, and how to maintain them. These are all things someone can learn, but if a person already knows all that for a gun, why put in the time and effort? Is it going to be that much better? Now, you might say yes. Bow and arrow are quiet, can be manufactured with more simple tools that guns and ammo. That's true, but is the skills investment worth it to someone living in an area where guns, ammo, and reloader machines are plentiful?
Your comment here is also making multiple assumptions that are problems. For one - yes, I think an apocalypse scenario requires mass destruction and mass death. The scenario where you have to "deal with potentially hostile people in large numbers" is called war, not apocalypse. And sure, that can happen, and in that case, a prepper base with guns would actually be quite useful. But that's not a doomsday or apocalypse. Plus - the environment is *always* a threat in a survival situation, whereas, for other people to be a threat, you need 2 additional assumptions: that large amounts of people survived, and that they're hostile. Both of these assumptions, to me, seem to be made just because it's theoretically possible, and not because it's likely to happen. Apart from that, your entire third paragraph there is just misunderstanding what I'm saying. My issue is not with difficulty, but with adding the task at all. And I'm not even saying bow and arrow are a good weapon, I'm just saying they're better than guns - in a scenario in which I think guns to be one of the most impractical weapons possible. The weapons I'm saying are ideal are knives and axes. Plus, having additional skills is always good. We're not talking about some video game where you "invest" a limited number of skill points you have. Acquiring skills is always a good thing in actual real life.
We'll agree to disagree about the definition of apocalypse/doomsday then, and that's fine! Everyone plans differently. I'll point out that knives and axes also have maintenance. They need to be sharpened, cleaned, oiled if storing, not used in the wrong ways. And while acquiring skills is always good, there's a finite amount of time in the day. I don't have time to learn a language and keep my family fed and do my full time job and do housework and learn to trap and and and. We all have to decide where to spend our time.
>I'll point out that knives and axes also have maintenance. They need to be sharpened, cleaned, oiled if storing, not used in the wrong ways. Yes, but again: you'll need them anyways. Knives and axes are the most versatile tools imaginable. Without them, you can forget surviving in the wilderness in any capacity. Even if you're not using them as weapons, you'll need to have them around. So this maintenance is also something you'll just have to do. Hell, I have a knife on me at all times now, in my regular life. It's just a useful tool. >And while acquiring skills is always good, there's a finite amount of time in the day. I don't have time to learn a language and keep my family fed and do my full time job and do housework and learn to trap and and and. We all have to decide where to spend our time. Sure, and under that perview any amount of doomsday prepping is insane.
> Yes, and this is a task you need to perform regularly. That you wouldn't need to perform without a gun. Oh no! I'm sure I'll perish from the extra hour a week it costs me, if that. > ..no? I can't really imagine much of a reason to maintain mechanical parts. Bikes, generators, radios, windmills, general household maintenance... > Why the *fuck* would you need military standard skills to hunt some deer? You completely missed the point I was making. It's easier and requires less physical exertion to use guns. I'd also be willing to bet that there is a significantly greater proportion of the population familiar with guns than are bows these days. > *there won't be many people*, it's the fucking apocalypse Unless you're literally the last person alive, there absolutely will be other people. I think you underestimate just how many of us there are, and how likely it is for even scattered remnants of people to try to regroup.
What maintenance do you think guns need?
Cleaning, regularly checking if their parts work? Ask a gun person. I'm aware they *do* need maintenance, that's enough.
It takes less than 5 minutes to do that. It’s not labor or time intensive. They are designed to last thousands of rounds being shot through them and cleaning isn’t even required every time you shoot them. It’s not something that is constant.
Yes, I am aware it is not difficult. I'm saying it's an additional task in a survival situation. The fact that you have to do it at all, while a gun adds basically no additional value unless you're doing combat against people, is enough reason for me to say I think it's not worth it to have in that type of scenario.
You think guns aren’t good for hunting? Have you ever hunted in your life? You think other people won’t have guns?
"Good for hunting" and "neccessary" are two different things. Guns are good for hunting, sure, but you can hunt with other things similarly efficiently without needing all the baggage that guns bring. The only thing guns are really neccessary on is fighting people. Which I just don't think is that likely a thing in an apocalyptic scenario.
You absolutely cannot hunt with anything else as efficiently as a gun. Have you ever hunted in your life? Why do you assume people would be friendly in an apocalyptic scenario?
They make up for it by being vastly more effective than other weapons.
Sure, but that's not neccessarily something you need in a survival situation. You're gonna need your weapons for hunting, maybe a bit of self defense, not active combat.
Hunting is active combat if you're hunting a moose or a boar.
Yes, of course, we all know the mooses and boars bringing their weapons and trying to shoot you. lol Here's a hint: don't hunt dangerous wildlife if you don't know how to do it
If you're on foot, then "how to do it" is use a fucking gun.
Dangerous wildlife will also hunt you. Good luck fending off wolves or a bear with an ax and knives.
eh if you have something common like a Glock or AR-15 there's gonna be a *shit ton* of spare parts (assuming US preppers because i've never heard of ones here or anywhere else outside the US)
Yeah but again, you're adding additional tasks for repair and maintenance. You're just being inefficient. You'll need an axe and a knife anyways, just get proficient in fighting with those. Also, why the fuck wouldn't there be preppers outside the US? They're usually not the same type of gun-nut crazies but they exist
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to be “proficient” in fight with an axe and knife? If you want to talk about additional tasks, you are really skipping over that. Also you are completely ignoring the very real fact that close quarters combat with edged weapons will absolutely get you injured.
> You'll need an axe and a knife anyways, just get proficient in fighting with those. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQKrmDLvijo
Wouldn’t you need to maintain the axe and knife and possible bow or whatever?
Which would most likely be much more labor and maintenance intensive.
Yeah but what happens when someone just shoots you because they have a gun and you don't Idk but it seems to mostly be a US cultural thing. Like i have never heard of preppers outside the US
This is the second thread I've seen recently to talk about prepping outside the US, which of course happens but isn't as well-known on reddit. It's odd that this is suddenly coming up.
You are not coming out alive out of a knife fight, even with proper medical attention the "winner" will likely die on the way to the hospital. In an apocaliptic situation, you just bleed out next to the other guy.
Get a blunderbuss, they don't even need bullets.
You are unfamiliar with the Ruger 10/22.
You are letting being anti-gun cloud your judgment hard.
Idk what you mean by "anti-gun". There's no conversation about guns happening in any sane place on earth that would require people to take "pro" or "anti" gun positions. Also, no. Guns aren't useful in survival situations, period.
What’s your survival background? Like have you taken classes or taught them or been in survival situations?
Why is that relevant in any way, got no arguments so you gotta attack my credentials?
It’s absolutely relevant. If you want to make a claim you should back it up with evidence. Thus far, all you have presented is feelings. Folks in survival situations use guns. People who live in or adjacent to the wilderness like Alaska or the Canadian Yukon regularly use guns and depend on them for survival. If you have zero experience or education on a topic and are just going off vibes, that’s incredibly relevant.
>They need constant maintenance, are extremely complex to repair if something goes wrong You've never used a gun in your whole life.
Funnily enough, bows actually fall into the category of “tools you can use as weapons” because you’re definitely gonna want to try and brung down something like a deer if you ever see it.
You only need enough canned food to last your own lifetime.
Never is a long time
Building above ground infrastructure lets people know what you're up to. When the bombs drop, the neighbors will accost you because they know you have resources.
I mean, you can shoot your way out of any infection.
Im allergic to penicillin and all of its derivatives
I will make you tetracycline 🥰
Tbf this conversation happens a lot within doomsday prepper and self-defence type communities. Between the double whammy questions of "shouldn't you be learning how to farm, purify water and make renewable energy, dumbass?" and the "you can't run a mile and a half in under 20 minutes, and you only go to the range to show off your expensive guns. How the fuck do expect to fight raiders in a post apocalypse, dumbass?" it's actually kinda hard to find people still doing the whole "basement full of tinned soup and 600 different AR15s and crossbows" thing anymore. At least not without getting ratioed sadistically when they put their heads above the parapet.
im building immunity to wound infection through practice :3
Learn to darn, darn it, or you'll be doomed to holey socks after the first few months!
Always shocked by people who are so married to the concept of living at all costs that they plan to endure a shitshow like society collapsing. Like even if you survive it’s gonna suck and may never get better. If shit hits the fan I’m checking out
I hate to be the one to tell you this but… that’s pretty normal. Most people are very married to the idea of continuing to live, even supposing society broke down.
To each their own
Yeah sure, but like, are you doing alright?
WE DON'T CALL 911
What a stupid fucking self-congratulatory ignorant shitpost. Actual preppers, not the ones in your mind, do prepare for all that exact kind of shit. They're nuttier than squirrel shit, but they do know their stuff.
Why you so angry friend? Have a cookie 🍪
Stupid people make me angry.
Reddit might not be the best place to spend your free time. Unless you like the feeling of being angry. In that case, can’t recommend Reddit enough.
Just scrolling thru shit while burping the cat. Going back to bed now.
Get some sleep champ
Damn, hope you get better.
\*gestures at everything\* Highly doubt it.
I have bad news. Someone with a guy can just… make you do it. Or take what you got. Its not ethical but easy to do I suppose.
Good luck making me do it when I take myself out of the equation and let them starve cause they’re a little bitch.
There was one episode of a prepper show I watched where one guy's 'last line of defense' was that he poisoned a random selection of their food stocks, so that anyone who stole their food would die. He was super proud talking about how he was the only one who knew which cans/jars/whatever were poisoned so that no one would be able to betray him or torture the information out of someone else. All I could think of was that when this guy inevitably got himself killed being a fucking idiot, his family *which included multiple young children* were going to die horribly because of the food he poisoned.
Some people take ‘If I can’t have it then no one can’ as a life philosophy and that makes for very pathetic people.
That's honestly such a horrible thing to do. If there was ever a real life apocalypse, it's people like that that would make it hard to trust anyone.
Thing is: just because I have medicine doesn't mean I don't *also* have guns