What kind of collapse i mean?: Global.
I’ve just just just started preparing, well, better late than never, right?
I’m going to sound confident here but I’m not this is just what I am doing.
Build and participate in systems of support. There are almost certainly already people in your area experiencing a collapse of social systems.
If you’re now thinking, “i’d love too but I can’t afford to” I would see what people actually need in your community and try to see what you personally can actually provide yourself. Not what you can afford from your job or could give up from your stuff, but what you could repeatably do to help even just a little.
You will build a niche that helps your community be more resilient and yourself too.
I’ve been making soaps for people and myself for example, and cleaning vinegar. I also been able help move people to more secure software, which is one my interests.
You can’t prepare for a collapse because the circumstances will be unpredictable and probably not how you imagine.
What you can do is prepare for temporary events like blackouts, floods and so on. The German civil protection office has some helpful guidelines: https://www.bbk.bund.de/EN/Prepare-for-disasters/prepare-for-disasters_node.html
Know your neighbors, befriend your neighbors, when the collapse happens you’ll need food in your gardens sure, but you’ll need your neighbors to think you’re more than a spare pantry when their food gets low, even better if you like each other enough to form a real community thats more defendable and resilient than any single household could be
Being there for your neighbours and building community is also a great way to reduce dependence on billionaires
Introduce yourself to your neighbours. Communities share resources and it makes them resilient.
Bingo. My plan is already in works. Intention is to move back to a small town where everyone knows everyone. Safety in numbers.
First off start building yourself a “Shit has hit the fan and I need to get out of dodge.” kit to keep in your car/close to your door so you can grab and run if it gets REAL bad.
Keep it stocked and up to date (certain first aid items are only sterile for a year. Antiseptic Creams like Savlon go VERY bad when they degrade)
https://youtube.com/GXYdQJsJ2JE
Additional components; heavy duty needles and some aramid or Dyneema thread (brand name of the high density polyethylene rope that’s strong as Fkk) for repairing things that need structure.
Also get yourself on an emergency first aid course, one that covers serious injuries and stopping bleeding is more than worth any price you pay for the lessons.
Learning practical skills like simple electronic repairs (I’m not talking about house electronics, that’s how you meet god in one of the most painful ways possible), how to diagnose car issues how to effectively tie knots in rope, and a few sewing stitches to repair clothes.
(I’m not talking about house electronics, that’s how you meet god in one of the most painful ways possible)
Learning how to do basic household wiring is seriously not that hard, and has an almost negligible chance of bodily harm as long as you do the basics like… turning off the breaker you are working with. If it is an old house and you arent sure what breakers control what, there are plenty of devices for checking if any given outlet/light switch is still hot before you work on it.
Oh aye, especially over in america the 110 out the wall isn’t all that bad, its how they can get away without earthing any of their appliances.
But as a general rule, not going poking around and finding out, is probably one of the easier ways to avoid getting bitten by the grid (or by the last guy’s “professional wiring job”)
One of those Fluke non-contact live detection pens is a solid thing to have with you, if you don’t have a voltage detector and proving unit
I drink whiskey and enjoy the sunset.
When you step back even chaos is beautiful so I get it. Good whisky I hope!
By living my best life now while I can.
Collapse, a world war, apocalypse etc? Fuck that I’m out.
Exactly. I’m spending within my means but buying what I want because why wait? Take the trip now, buy the thing now, because you probably won’t be able to in a few years.
Been learning to garden for a few years. This year I’m focusing on perennials, specifically heirloom species that were staple food crops prior to the modern agricultural era.
Turns out pretty much every non native plant in North America is a food crop. These plants often have superiour nutritional content as well as being more drought resistant, hardy, and ecologically sustainable.
A few to google.
Bambara ‘Beans’ - West African Staple for 300 years. All 9 amino acids. Bio available B12. Grows like legumes. Nitrogen fixer
Bamboo - Edible varieties have lots of fiber and potassium, some protein and low fat.
Old King Henry - Edible shoots like asparagus, edible leaves like spinach, edible grainlike seeds similar to quinoa
Skirret - clumping root vegetable that looks like carrots. Has higher carb density than carrots.
Comfrey - Top Tier mulch/fertilizer.
Clover - Edible nitrogen fixer
Dandelions - Edible nitrogen fixer
Cat Tails - Indigenous, all parts are edible, winter survival crop.
Ashitaba - apparently this plant has insane nutritional benefits for the body and originates from an Okinawan island with the longes average lifspan in the world.
Most prepping is bullshit, right wing fantasy jerking. How they’ll be the lone man in an unjust land, killing and pillaging as they please. Realistically, if there’s an event that there’s a global collapse, you’ll likely die from it as well.
Nuclear war? Best hope you’re in a target zone, you don’t want to try and live through a nightmare where growing food may be impossible. Your canned goods will run out in months unless you can supplement them.
Global pandemic beyond what COVID-19 was? Yeah, COVID sucked, but it had a rather low kill rate. A super bug that has a rate to kill society as we know it around the globe is going to spread quickly, easily, and be highly deadly by comparison. You’re more likely to contract it and die than survive.
Climate change? You may be able to survive this one but you’ll need to think of how high waters will rise, how that’ll effect local growing ecology for food, etc. It’s going to be insanely rough.
Any other plausible event? Again, it requires a massive die off in a short time or just general destructiveness that’ll kill a lot of people initially then everyone slowly afterwards.
Nuclear war? Best hope you’re in a target zone, you don’t want to try and live through a nightmare where growing food may be impossible. Your canned goods will run out in months unless you can supplement them.
Your food will be fine. Animals are going to die WAY before plants, they’re much more resistant to radiation than we are. System failure is much more likely to kill you than actual fallout.
Global pandemic beyond what COVID-19 was? Yeah, COVID sucked, but it had a rather low kill rate. A super bug that has a rate to kill society as we know it around the globe is going to spread quickly, easily, and be highly deadly by comparison. You’re more likely to contract it and die than survive.
A disease that kills quickly is much more likely not to spread too far. One problem with COVID-19 was that you can walk around spreading it, that doesn’t happen with ebola because by the time you’re contagious, you’re not moving. What you should worry about is a slow spreader like COVID-19, but only a few times more deadly. It doesn’t take much to collapse food and energy distribution.
Climate change? You may be able to survive this one but you’ll need to think of how high waters will rise, how that’ll effect local growing ecology for food, etc. It’s going to be insanely rough.
Nah, sea level rise won’t kill you. It might kill your grandkids, but climate change is mostly going to cause massive storms, and ruin farmland and destroy water supplies. System failure will kill you, not drowning. Unless you live in a river floodplain with inadequate defenses or a low shore, in which case storm-caused flooding might kill you.
Any other plausible event? Again, it requires a massive die off in a short time or just general destructiveness that’ll kill a lot of people initially then everyone slowly afterwards.
Oh yeah, really anything that will stop food, water or power getting to you. Or getting to someone with the ability to come get yours.
Yeah, the loss/collapse of important social structures like farming and such is going to kill the most people. With climate change, there is going to be a lot less “safe” farmland. For nuclear war I was talking more of the general uptake of radioactive particles increasing causing further ailments. There will be food but it’s likely to be contaminated for a long while.
Gardening, getting solar panels and a well is the regular way to handle a crisis.
You can download a lot of data - like Wikipedia, getting books to live on, get a novie collection going, get a sewing machine and good thread also. Global collapse can be just a blink or go mad max. That case guns also.
I don’t believe it will be that bad, but the signs for sure sow a lot of upcoming troubles.Forgot to mention: look up Food Forrest layouts for your climate.
You can have some chickens also. If you don’t want to eat them for meat eggs are still important source of protein.You can even avoid buying chicken feed if you plant correctly!
Yes, a good Food Forrest will provide even for some livestock, chickens and rabbits.
Establish or join mutual aid networks and learn practical skills like gardening, sewing, or mechanics. Ideally don’t live in a city (assuming total trade collapse)
If you can’t do the long term stuff others have been mentioning here is a bit more short term stuff:
- Make sure you have bottled water. Ideally a few weeks worth per person in your household. Remember that cooking uses water too.
- Medication for as long a period as you can reasonably cover for the people in your household
- potassium iodine tablets to protect the thyroid in case of nuclear fallout
- Canned food
- remember your pets need stuff too if you have them
- in case there is an infant involved baby formula, diapers and other baby needs
More long term:
- look into MeshCore or meshtastic for communication
- radio with a hand crank + spare batteries
- medkit with bandages, tourniquet, etc. Also learn how to use it.
- we have 3 ways of heating our house: fireplace, electric and gas. I’m sure that won’t be possible for everyone but the point is diversification where possible.
I always see some truly naive optimism in threads like these. Global collapse means shipping is dead, which means every city is in a state of famine.
Pick your closest city, split the population in 4 for each cardinal direction and run some rough estimates on how many will be walking near your door. That’s ignoring all the people in your own town that don’t have gardens.
I know I have close to a million people coming my way, and someone’s going to kill me for my little dozen potatoes. You can’t fight off that many people with a handful of neighbors. It also takes a shit load of gardening to keep a family of 4 alive.
If your plan doesn’t involve getting the fuck out of dodge and having a cache of food somewhere remote (with a cottage or small cabin if you live in a winter region), it will fail.
You probably have the most realistic advice, I support it, but I’m afraid we will have to move a lot just like in the book McCarthy Road.
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If something happens I will try my best to die at the first blast. I am too old and tired and blasee for any apocalypse.
And do what, exactly?
If you are self preparing, all that is happening is that you are creating a stockpile for a group of raiders to sack.
The groups that will succeed the most are going to be tight knit small towns with an armory and the ability to be self sufficient for most essentials.
If you don’t have a group to plan a strategy around now, you’re just LARPing.
