immediate tribe 3 of 3

IMMEDIATE TRIBE 3

*
note: Wal-Mart and Amazon have come way back down on their bucketed wheat prices.  Not the old $15, or the short lived $35, but now in the middle.  Wal-Mart is $23 store pick-up, Amazon is $26 with free shipping.  Are you sure you want to wait much longer?
*
note: if I recall correctly from all my post-apocalypse movie reviews ( http://amzn.to/2hFWFpt ) I'd call the darkest, doom-iest, gloomiest movies "Road Warriors" and "Tooth & Claw".  Well, if you have Netflix go watch "The Survivalist" ( or, DVD, http://amzn.to/2y3RndH ), which out does those two.  Super Deluxe Bison Seal Of Approval.  I thought I was paranoid and understood human vileness, and this film put me in a much darker place.  It isn't action, and lower budget, but the story is superb ( not without a few obvious flaws, but relatively benign ).  It starts with a animated graph showing a population line going up with an oil line, then oil turning down followed by the population.  Then it gets even better.
*
note: Green Mountain Dude ( here ) had another great article.  Heating your body rather than your space.  At the beginning he talks about wood heaters.  As in, why do you have another AR rifle and not a wood stove ( it is assumed you adjust the question by climate )?  Because it's too expensive?  Here is the po' boy answer to unaffordable woodstoves.  Rocket stove and a pipe running through a cobb mass.  You need a barrel and some pipe, that's it.  Anyone can afford them.  Here are some videos click here 
*

So, you can’t form a group retreat of survivors.  Few have the finances ( land is far more scarce and more insanely expensive than when this advice originally came about ).  Going with a militia is pointless since the default acceptable training is obsolete Oil Age second generational.  You are left with civilians.  A term of scorn directed at the untrained and unmotivated.  And most importantly, those outside your tribe.  Even though, let’s face it, you are barely over their level of incompetence if you live in their neck of the woods ( suburbs, on-grid, near the city ), so don’t get TOO condescending and judgmental. 

*

You are faced with financing the logistics of ingrate dumb asses.  THAT is your group.  You might fantasize about having professionals join your group and self-finance, but for 99% of us that will remain a fantasy.  I’m sure one or three of you have attained this ideal.  I submit to you that the NORM is for the need to feed a bunch of morons.  This is pretty bad.  If there is one life experience, time after time, I wish I could unlearn, it would be being surrounded by douche bag families I inherited at marriage.  Okay, now a caveat.  I know I attracted a certain kind of female.  Their families reflected their, ah, let’s call them proclivities to be nice ( previous wives-not the current ).

*

Yet, the stories I hear from minions on their extended families lead me to believe there is a certain universality to those families.  Which reflect the general public, and not in any stretch of imagination is that a good thing.  It has simply been far too long living in a centralized oil economy and nobody can conceive of hardship or self reliance.  Even us preppers, picking and choosing between luxury and poser pioneer levels of “roughing it”.  I say this not to belittle but to advise.  Even you are not above enjoying the modern lifestyle as much as possible ( you own a car, I live in town, we all communicate online ).  Think of it like learning a second language.

*

If you go overseas to a fuzzy foreigner country and immerse yourself in the language, you will pick up a rudimentary level of communication in very little time.  If you have a guide that speaks English, odds are good you will learn a few words for dinner, a lot of cussing and perhaps “bathroom” ( “taxi” is nearly universal-the one word least changed in the most languages ) and have absolutely no ability to speak the lingo.  Now, if you immerse yourself in an infrastructure, what is going to happen?  You start living and thinking in that system.  You are doing yourself very few favors prepping wise, because you will never master than type of living by NOT living it ( I speak long term, not two week disaster supplies.  Speaking of, how are those short term preppers making out on Puerto Rico about how? ).

*

I hope by facing the fact you are less prepared than you think because you are immersed in Oil Age Living, you’ll understand why your extended family members act as they do.  You are probably NOT living as if modern infrastructure is transitional, so why should your family?  Since prepping is a faith based act ( regardless of “proof”, it is still a very religious act of acceptance ), your family is merely an atheist caught at the door by Mormon missionaries on their way to work.  All your talking means nothing.  You think a hurricane hitting the entire state and forcing millions to evacuate is proof of the need to prep.  To them, it is proof things always go back to normal.

*

Family being your immediate tribe is the historical norm.  Professionals financing a retreat is definitely NOT.  You are looking at your tribe like you are looking at a perceived arsenal.  Based on myth and wishful thinking and a “norm” which was but an abnormality one-off event already obsolete.  You are working with outdated information.  Sorry.  I’m here to collect obscene wealth by telling you everything you are doing wrong.  Like mucking out a clogged sewer pipe or embalming corpses, it is far from the most glamorous job, but it needs to be done.

*

Are your future squad mates a bunch of complete douche bags incapable of independent thought, completely lazy and worth less than a bucket of warm spit?  Probably.  And so are most recruits joining the military.  You aren’t going to be faced with a surplus of choices, so you lower your standards.  With the military, you spend lots of money trying to turn the majority into mediocre soldiers.  Your retreat group, your immediate tribe, also requires that kind of level of investment.  You can’t train them, you can only equip them.  On The Job training is the only answer.  At BEST, you have a buddy you also prep for, who is less of a moron. 

*

Don’t try to turn anyone to The Dark Side of preparedness.  If they show an interest, by all means nurture it as you would a single spark in tinder ( actually a better analogy might be trying to get a spark from a friction bow, to reflect the effort and lack of success ).  But your feeble efforts at getting anyone to self-finance are going to be, again 99 out of a hundred, worthless.  Look at the state of the economy where for the last decade the middle class has been bled of all home equity and the true unemployment late is worse than the Depression of ’29.  Few have money, at least on the level of perception ( but perception is reality, is it not? ).

*

You already own a crappot full of guns.  Make sure your family can use them.  You merely need far more ammunition and wheat.  It is STILL going to be expensive, given the Long Tale of support personnel each potential combatant brings along.  Are you sure you have an alternate choice?  Family isn’t only an obligation, they are your only real means of support and help.  They are worthless as preppers, but they are your only tribe.  What?  You think after the collapse you can wander the land and pick and choose survivors who are still stockpiled?  Why would they want anything to do with you?  At least with your family, they must accept you.  They might be worthless but they are one huge leap above strangers.

*

When you wish upon a pre-stocked prepper group star, do you know who you remind me of?  A selfish greedy corporation who wants you to work for them for nearly free, AFTER you have been trained on your own dime.  Don’t be that guy.  We all wish we could be the rich guy with a Korean hooker, but it isn’t realistic.

END ( today's related link http://amzn.to/2yg9lOn )

 

Please support Bison by buying through the Amazon ad graphics at the top of the page. ***You can make donations or book purchases through PayPal ( www.paypal.me/jimd303 )

*** Unless you are in extreme poverty, spend a buck a month here, by the above donation methods or buy a book. If you don't do Kindle, send me a buck and I'll e-mail it to you in a PDF file.  If you donated, you may request books no charge.   My e-mail is: jimd303@reagan.com  My address is: James M Dakin, 181 W Bullion Rd #12, Elko NV 89801-4184

*** Pay your author-no one works for free.  I’m nice enough to publish for barely above Mere Book Money, so do your part.***   Land In Elko*  Lord Bison* my bio & biblio*   my web site is www.bisonprepper.com *** Wal-Mart wheat***Amazon Author Page
* By the by, all my writing is copyrighted. For the obtuse out there