militant frugality 1 of 2

MILITANT FRUGALITY

Way back in the day when I first started out writing ( but before I was thrown into the deep end of a financial calamity pool without trunks or a floatation device-in other words when I still thought I was supposed to strive towards middle class and breeding future middle class clones until the ex-wife changed my mind for me ), there was a publication out “The Tightwad Gazette”.  You can find it reprinted in book form, now.  Then, it covered how to pretend to still be middle class but cheaper.  What it didn’t do was teach real financial frugality.  Neither did my childhood.  I learned old timey and crafts and off grid stuff but it was all still middle class orientated.  I’m glad my mom went through her Hippie and Mother Earth News phase as my learning curve in adulthood was shortened because of it, but there was never anything covering escaping the Rat Race.  I had to learn all that on my own.  And having learned it the hard way, I’m inclined to feel sorry for you people and give you the sixty second course on how to live frugally.  It has nothing to do with saving dryer lint for kids crafts projects or putting a brick in the toilet tank to save water.  That is White People Suburban Frugal.

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Here, as I’ve mentioned it before, is the meat of REAL frugality.  You can’t have a car, rent or any debt.  It doesn’t get any simpler than that-although because you desperately want to live a middle class life to retain your chimp society rank you’ll make excuses to retain each one.  But those are actually the easy parts.  The hard part is, You Can’t Always Get What You Want.  Every purchase in life must always be viewed through the lens of BTN & Good Enough.  Better Than Nothing is, why, Un-American! And Good Enough?  Nothing is too good for you because you are Baby Jesus’ Super Double Time Favorite Person!  Who am I to argue with that?  Well, here is the thing, skipper.  In case you kind of missed it, we have been in a Greater Depression for over eight years now.  And, because that Depression was started by global Peak Oil in 2005 and both BTU delivered and Net Energy has declined and the Fracking Fags were as wrong as wrong can be, we CAN’T go back to before 2005 or 2007.  It is simply impossible-every day the oil tank decreases in volume and another huge chunk of population is added.  The fundamentals are solid.  Economic contraction is here to stay.  So, you have very little choice in the matter as to whether you want to live frugally or not. 

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It is going to happen to you.  The question, besides the timing, is whether you want to control that descent or not.  When you reply, “You might as well enjoy the good life while you can”, what I am hearing is, “I’ll live middle class until I lose it and then we will be living out of a tent”.  That is not controlling the economic and financial descent but just reacting badly to it.  Just like moving out to the country and trying to pacify the natives, just like starting to garden, just like most things done correctly, you need the tools and you need the learning experience.  It isn’t something done well by being done half-assed.  You need time.  Time to get it right.  You call yourselves survivalists, buying all those gee-whiz flash-bang tools of war, and you have no idea how to live frugally.  That knowledge is a tool.  You can’t read it, you have to live it.  And it takes close to zero money.  It just SAVES you money.  And you can’t do it.  You are too lazy and spoiled. 

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Let me give you a nice example.  You had a great life, living in the suburbs.  Drinking K-cup coffee and driving a SUV.  Your preps were semi-automatic carbines and freeze dried foods.  And that was all you needed.  Because, you know, a disaster of your choice would wipe out the banks instantly and you would never lose your home or job.  Why practice living cheaper?  You needed MORE money, for more deadly zombie killing firepower.  Suddenly, you get a pink slip and the bank doesn’t play nice and you get kicked out of your home quickly.  You want to stay at friends, but they are all homeless too.  Family is too far away and you don’t have enough gas money because all your savings were used to stay in the house longer.  Nobody has a job and can’t buy any of your junk you had one weekend to sell at a garage sale.  You have freeze dried foods, and there always is Food Stamps, so you can eat.  But that is the only good thing.  One traffic ticket and they find out your car is trying to be repo’ed.  Where can you live?  In Hobo Town?  You have the kids to think of, and you figure half those bums are off the grid to avoid pedophile charges.  No matter, you’ll live in a tent in a patch of weeds if you have to.

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But you’ll be moving about constantly, won’t you?  It is an illegal squat.  And the cops have no problem busting you and demanding fines.  As you are unemployed.  You might get a cool judge, play the Kid Card.  Or, you might be weeks in jail and working for free in Community Service.  Way to provide for your family.  Just the slightest Economic Depression Preps would have sufficed to avoid all that, and the smallest experience living frugally would have cushioned the blow further.  More Tomorrow.

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