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Reply to: Common survival myths among preppers Posted December 7, 2020

I ran into a group with that plan in the very early 1980s and I high tailed it away from them in a hurry. I was living in Honolulu, when I attended a gun show at which a book dealer was set up. Every time he recommended a survivalist oriented book I had to tell him I already had it. Eventually he decided I was serious about prepping and suggested I attend a meeting of his group. The major concern in those days was all out nuclear war with the Soviet Union. The group plan was to sail away at the first warning of trouble. At some level that wasn’t a bad idea except for likely lack of sufficient warning. The deal breaker for me: they didn’t own a sailboat, much less one big enough to carry a dozen people and supplies. They told me in as many words that they would steal a big sailboat and escape.  So, before the bombs arrived, they planned on committing the major felony of stealing a multi-hundred thousand dollar sailboat, possibly assaulting or even killing people to do so. I wasn’t even sure where to start. Since they obviously had no moral qualms about their plans I can only suggest some practical aspects: What if the nuke war didn’t happen, and the entire group had feloniously conspired to commit multiple major felonies, and had actually committed them? Oops. No war: now what do they do? If they planned on robbery and possible killing, why would individual in the group think the group wouldn’t rob or kill THEM? How would they select an appropriate boat, ready and equipped for the nuclear apocalypse? And as a matter of simple group operational security, why on earth had they told me, a complete stranger, all about their criminal plans the first time they met me? Unprepared, criminal, and stupid is not a good combination for them or anyone near them. The meeting broke up, I left, and never looked back. These weren’t preppers at all: they were the predators preppers worry about.

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Reply to: Common survival myths among preppers Posted December 7, 2020

I ran into a group with that plan in the very early 1980s and I high tailed it away from them in a hurry. I was living in Honolulu, when I attended a gun show at which a book dealer was set up. Every time he recommended a survivalist oriented book I had to tell him I already had it. Eventually he decided I was serious about prepping and suggested I attend a meeting of his group. The major concern in those days was all out nuclear war with the Soviet Union. The group plan was to sail away at the first warning of trouble. At some level that wasn’t a bad idea except for likely lack of sufficient warning. The deal breaker for me: they didn’t own a sailboat, much less one big enough to carry a dozen people and supplies. They told me in as many words that they would steal a big sailboat and escape.  So, before the bombs arrived, they planned on committing the major felony of stealing a multi-hundred thousand dollar sailboat, possibly assaulting or even killing people to do so. I wasn’t even sure where to start. Since they obviously had no moral qualms about their plans I can only suggest some practical aspects: What if the nuke war didn’t happen, and the entire group had feloniously conspired to commit multiple major felonies, and had actually committed them? Oops. No war: now what do they do? If they planned on robbery and possible killing, why would individual in the group think the group wouldn’t rob or kill THEM? How would they select an appropriate boat, ready and equipped for the nuclear apocalypse? And as a matter of simple group operational security, why on earth had they told me, a complete stranger, all about their criminal plans the first time they met me? Unprepared, criminal, and stupid is not a good combination for them or anyone near them. The meeting broke up, I left, and never looked back. These weren’t preppers at all: they were the predators preppers worry about.