last one in the stew pot

LAST ONE IN THE STEW POT
When I come up with a new phrase dripping with wit and being a bit playful I of course have to beat it to death like the drugged cancer plagued nag that it is. This is just another way of saying that Yuppie Survivalists are wrong, and here is why...Plus, no one commented on yesterday's article and now I'm all hurt and paranoid and so perhaps with this article I can pull a few more tails and get everyone awake again. Frugal survivalism is perfect in so many ways. Us peons, the proletariat masses, can easily afford it. In a lot of cases the equipment is much better ( commendable restraint as I fail to use the semi automatic rifle as an example as an unneeded, over recommended tool but instead use the more healthy, better cost effectiveness of grains and beans as an example, as they easily beat the over processed slop that is most freeze dried food ). You can panic now, before the rush, and not have to wait decades to be able to afford the needed stockpile. And now, let's add to that the fact that most expensive advice won't keep you alive much longer.
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The whole purpose behind survivalism is to stay alive during and after a collapse. Why else are we sacrificing and upsetting our lives? And yet, to be realistic, we are not assuring our survival. We are merely increasing the odds that we won't be the first ones to die. So when I say that you want to be the last one in the stew pot, I'm saying that you can't have unrealistic expectations. If you are last to be killed, you've achieved all that you could. The unspoken agreement seems to be that if you buy an authors or companies product, you will live forever in grotesque luxury, king of all you survey. Not only will you eat normally, you will live in a comfortable shelter and easily defend yourself with high tech machinery. After you clear out the rabble ( also unspoken, the poor ghetto dwellers or poor trailer trash are the ones to attack your mansion and stockpiled wealth ) you will be King. To appear a bit more democratic, you will be Captain In The Militia. But you will be in charge. Remember, you have wealth, and thus are far more noble and important. In fact, your purchases now not only protect you against the welfare scum, but also against survivalists that don't own a concrete McBunker.
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Nothing could be further from the truth. In a failing energy supply environment, your civilization collapses ( if any asshat points out the seventies as a false alarm [ see, we didn't collapse then, so why should we now? ] just point them to Easter Island or the Mayan Empire ). The die off is usually to a point far below the natural ecosystem carrying capacity. In other words, if a solar energy system, post-Oil Age, is capable of supporting a half billion globally then the die off could be as bad as leaving just a few tens of millions. So in that extremely violent spasm of destruction, do you really think that any of the "survival packet" solutions are a magic talisman to automatically save you? The Yuppie Bunker solution will see you quickly run out of irreplaceable Industrial Age supplies ( how can you possibly stockpile enough gasoline, propane or ammunition to sustain your present lifestyle? ). The Tree Hugger organic farming solution will see you buried under your garden as fertilizer by bandits or the new feudal king. My suggestion, the Wheat Eating Trailer Trash solution, will not keep you alive much longer. But it won't kill you any faster. And it won't have anywhere near the high price tag as the other two.
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The conventional advice to throw money at the problem of surviving the collapse is simply dead wrong. Money will not keep you alive longer. Okay, obscene amounts of money, a mountain fortress in the wilderness type of money, will increase your odds. But that kind of money is available to very few. But even if you are a doctor or corporate type, you don't have obscene amounts of money. Even if you do all this on credit ( a bit of a risk ) you don't have that much purchasing power. If you are close enough to people for a job or supplies, you are close enough to have them battle you for your processions. You are exposed either way. Only complete solitude is a hedge in protection. The rest of us, poor or rich, will be potential victims of the mobs. At that point, extra money in your preparations does you very little good. There was an interesting article in the newest Backwoodsman magazine ( better than usual issue, by the way ) on machetes. One point made was that the machete killed far more people in African massacres than high tech weapons did in a conventional war. The point being that, to point out the genius of Jim Morrison ( with a name like Jim, you belong to a special group ), they got the guns but we got the numbers. The mob will trump your semi-automatic battle rifle eventually.
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I'm not trying to say that preps are futile. They are necessary. I am saying you should not blind yourself to reality. If you don't expect the worse you can't prepare for it. Toys and money do not make you immune from the die-off. They help, they do not guarantee. So why kill yourself from debt and worry preparing as a Yuppie Survivalist. You might not live long enough to enjoy the Apocalypse. Just spend your several hundred to a couple thousand and prepare frugally. A few hundred in grain, a few hundred in a surplus gun. A $50 water filter. A couple thousand in a used trailer or Unibomber shack and some junk land. One tax return and a few months savings will do the trick. You will get far more than 80% of the protection for far less than 20% of the price. If this is only a depression, you protect yourself financially. If it is the collapse, you are prepared ahead of time with adequate supplies instead of never finishing being prepared with perfect supplies.
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