Survivalism as an impediment to survival

I was thinking: in a hypothetical TEOTWAKI scenario, could having a short-mid term BoB actually prevent one from adapting to the new environment? I mean sure, you have a slightly better chance to survive any immediate collapse, but won't you be like a spoiled baby when your high-end supplies run out?

Yeah, I know knives need no ammo. Look, it's more of a psychological question...

P.S. Note that I am talking here about normal people with a Bug Out plan, not organized militia... Those will do just fine.

Wouldn't the right equipment ease you into the new environment if that were to happen?

Edit: I may have to rethink my response for reasons that, based on my understanding of the rules, don't belong in this forum.

Jeanette Isabelle

Careful with the "TEOTWAWKI" reference. Read the Policies for the use and participation on The Forum.

http://forums.equipped.org/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=125282#Post125282

I have read the rules before posting and I do not see how my question violates their letter or spirit. As DR said himself, survivalists and independent security enthusiasts "co-pollinate". The OP is about the practical and psychological aspects of surviving long-term with no help from civilization. Isn't this what ETS is all about?

When you say "psychological," are you asking about the will to survive? I'm confused.

Jeanette Isabelle

I think that the issue here is not TEOTWAWKI but the use of the term "survivalism."

As a point of clarification we do not refer to what we do as "survivalism" because certain categories of ill-informed individuals (think woolly here...) try to stygmatise us by lumping us in with the Rambo Brigade.

Well, it's shorted than anything else I can come up with for you guys.



Nooo. Let's say you and a group of others are stranded on a deserted island with only what you had on your person. You each live in seclusion for a month, then meet up. While sitting around the campfire (started with your keychain firesteel) you start showing off the skills you have learned.

Who is going to have more to show?

In your desert island scenario, you need to survive long enough to become acclimated to your new environment. Whether or not you learn to adapt will not be hindered by good EDC and may be enhanced because you have bought yourself a period of adjustment.

Depends on your point of view once the situation begins. If you think I'll be here a couple of days every fire can use a match, maybe so. If you think, I don't know how long I'll be here, every match is precious, I don't think so. Even in a bad situation, life can get worse. So saving your supplies until you absolutely need them is always important. The best example is the question, do I destroy my knife so I can survive now? No, not if there is any other option available even if its harder and takes longer.

Oh yes, certainly. It's going to be a textbook case of natural selection: The weak, slow and unlucky will die out, leaving behind the strong, fast and resourceful, as well as survivalads. Now, where as the latter will be perfectly content with camping, as their ample supplies allow, the former may well start building a house, herding local animals and merging into boyscout troops with the rest of the island brigade.

Basically, I am talking about the fact that lesser stimulation (in the form of lesser stress, "bought" by prior preparations) might result in a less active response from the survivor and, consequently, a lower level of general achievement than would be possible otherwise.

It doesn't even matter if you've read this and said "okay, now I'll try to rely less on my gear", because the adrenaline is simply not going to be there.

If you had a BOB, and it really was TEOTWAKI, then hopefully, the BOB will have some things in it that will allow you to survive long enough to begin thinking about the longterm. If you don't make it past the first 72-hours, if you do not have something in which to keep water, if you have no idea about how to try and ensure you have a clean water supply, then you are probably in more trouble than the person who does. In other words, I think the simple answer to the first question is a probable no, with no way of finding out until TEOTWAKI.

Also, I think tools in your BOB that would allow you to make a transition toward developing a sustainable lifestyle would be an ideal thing to have. I think any tools you have cannot hurt. The decision is what tools, and the knowledge about which ones to choose is somewhat an exercise in forecasting the conditions you might encounter. But some of the tools you are likely to think are useful for the short term, could last you a good long time. For example, I think any knife worthy of being in the BOB is a potential longterm tool.

IMHO, based upon real-time experience in life and death emergencies in ER's, adrenaline does not help me function effectively, Training helps. Equipment helps. Being part of a team that has done this stuff before helps. Adrenaline makes my hand shake, and I miss the IV start. Adrenaline makes me respond to the obvious and apparent injuries without checking for the hidden, more serious problems. Nurses and soldiers and LEO's and fire fighters practice and equip and train and rehearse so that they will not have to rely on adrenaline to succeed, and not have to suffer for adrenaline induced errors in judgment. Adrenaline is not a solution to survival situations, it is an additional problem with which to cope. The less a life and death situation seems like a life and death situation, the more likely it will turn out to be a life situation.

"...Adrenaline is not a solution to survival situations, it is an additional problem with which to cope..."

Yup. There are probably times when adrenealine will see you thru a problem, but training works better as far as I am concerned...

"...not organized militia... Those will do just fine.."

Please define organized militia???

If he means what I think he does, wow, will he be surprised.

*laughs*

It is all about mental planning, not your toys. I can remake a lot of things, even not as good as what I start with, and I can usually deal with the loss of the rest.

Not in my opinion. IMHO, a Bob will buy you the time to adapt & overcome obstacles.

The real problem lies not in surviving the incident, But in surviving the year following the incident.

Look at: "You Will Survive Doomsday" by Bruce Beach; it's a very short, to the point article.

Why would we live in seclusion for a month and then meet up? In a survival situation there is strength in numbers.

Jeanette Isabelle

"...wow, will he be surprised..."

That's exactly what I was thinking...

One thing I was thinking is that although I have all of this stuff(see school E.Q. kit) I am counting on actually surviving the incident, so none of my toys will help me if I'm trapped under 40 tons of building!

Look at is as a thought experiment.

Assume we have 100 people with comparable physical abilities and knowledge. We give 50 of them a BOB (same stuff in all) and the other 50 we give nothing but the clothes on their back. We then spread them across a sufficiently large area that they are alone.

While some of the unequipped people may well survive, there are huge obstacles they must overcome relative to the BOB equipped group.

1. They have to forage for their first meal.
2. They have to find a water supply.
3. They have to not become sickened by said food/water
4. They have to construct shelter (and do it without tools)
5. They have to do all this during times there is enough light

Even assuming an extremely benign environment, the difficulty in overcoming a lack of basic tools is huge. I would venture to guess that having a BOB would give the 'average' person at least an equal chance of surviving as the most fantastically trained expert who had no gear.

Pardon my French, but that's a bullsh*t question. In a hypothetical TEOTWAWKI scenario - off the scale of what we generally consider here - what you carry on your back doesn't really relate to your chances of long term survival. First, if I'm actually living out of my BOB for more than a few days, I can guarantee you I'm not a spoiled baby (and there's nothing high end about my preparedness supplies, fwiw). Second, if I'm faced with a scenario of living outside my BOB for a considerable time, I'm looking at alot of active scavenging for food, warmth, humanity. My first objective would be to collect everything and anything that I might eat or I might use or learn to use, and to find people with similar wants and a desire to live on. That's because the principle of the BOB is a restoration of civil order after a relatively short time, and a return of the flow of supplies of food etc. Civilization in other words. Some in this forum may be situated where they hope to grow crops to sustain themselves after such an event - I hope they're pretty well practiced at sustainable non-mechanical argriculture, and I wish them well (and just the right bit of rain, and very few marauders). You want to posit the end of civilization and wonder how we all might fare if we had a knapsack on our backs - it's a bullsh*t question. Regardless the state of our BOBs, 95% of the most prepared of us would be dead by the first winter, and its a crapshoot which of any of us here might defy those odds. It's a question for some other forum if you ask me.

First winter? Lets make it our goal to all meet up in so-cal if anything bad were to happen!

I think you have it backwards.

Practical preparations for known, expected and understood short and mid-term situations are not likely to interfere with less well understood, less probable, possibly more extreme and long-term situations.

Generally I have found the more a person or group concentrates on the less probable and fringe possibilities the less likely they are to have real and practical preparations in place and ready to go for the short-term situations that everyone will be facing. Things like storms and blizzards.

A friend recently spent a bit more than $500 on radiation meters and KI but his family doesn't have even a three-day bag. Their important papers are scattered. They always eat out so there is little food in the house. There is no reserve of water or provision for obtaining, storing or treating water. When his kid fell down his wife, a nurse, didn't have enough on hand to produce even a simple bandage.

Preparing for an imaginary and unlikely mega-event he has failed to prepare for things that happen every year. Last storm that came through I gave him a flashlight and spare batteries.

I have noticed a lot of guys in the same boat. Bomb shelters, radiation meters and guns maintain their interest and get the vast majority of resources. Batteries and and bleach and toilet paper are just too mundane to hold their interest. They can see themselves wearing their MOPP gear and heroically fighting off villainous marauders amidst the fallout and it is a role they relish.

Chemical toilets, primitive hygiene; living off canned goods and bottled water for a fortnight; practical survival and preparations; are not so heroic. They are virtues of bean counters, list makers, shepherds; servants to friends, family and neighbors. Much harder to be heroic filling these rolls. But much more practical.

It reminds me of boys playing cowboys. They are keen to play the shootouts against the indians or rustlers or, given a mature bent, the romance and wild times of going to town. But kids and young men seldom play out the 100 hours a week riding drag. The long hours. Working in the heat and dust and rain. The lousy food. The monotony and boredom. The stuff that makes up 99% of what it is to work cattle.

If anything I see the focus on the possible adventure heroics and highly unlikely situations of mass collapse and apocalypse as being a detriment to practical, mid and short-term, real-world preparations. Not the other way round.

Thanks for the thoughtful responses.



Then you don't really need your BoB, do you?

*giggles*

In one of Heinlein's books he makes a similar point about guns. As I recall, he argued you'd be better off unarmed because you'd feel more paranoid and would avoid the dangerous situations where a gun would help. If you have a gun, you need to guard against any sense of invulnerability. (Heinlein has made pro-gun arguments in other books. I don't intend to start a gun debate here, but just to give a perspective on the original question.)

However, I think a short-term BoB would mainly be a benefit. It'd help keep you alive and so give you time to adapt. Bootstrapping. For example, you could use commercial cordage to build a shelter, and then sit in the shelter while you figure out how to extract natural cordage from plants. There's a danger that you might decide you don't need to figure it out because you have your commercial cordage, but in an EOTWAKI scenario hopefully you'd know you were in it for the long haul and wouldn't get complacent.

I completely agree with Art_in_FL. Whenever I talk to my friends and neighbors about preparing, they always think I’m talking about the end of the world. They say “it’ll never happen” or that I’m just paranoid. But I always tell then that I’m not prepared for the end of the world and that I don’t think anyone could be. Living in Minnesota we get a lot of different types of severe weather from blizzards to ice storms to tornados. People ask me if I think the Mall of America is going to be bombed. It doesn’t really matter! We KNOW that bad weather is going to happen… it happens every year! It’s only a matter of time until the right combination hits us with an ice storm (that knocks out the power) followed by a blizzard (which hinders attempts to fix it) and a lot of people are in a lot of trouble. My standard question is “What will you do when the power goes out for a week in the middle of January?” That usually gets my point across. I’m trying to prepare for likely scenarios, not ones from a Hollywood script. That being said; being prepared for the probable problems, I believe, puts you in a better position to cope with (or even think about) something bigger.

Same here. The more stuff you have the harder it is to hide it and the more likely you're going to have it taken from you.

I don't even think about stuff like TEOTW...what's the point? I'm more worried about real threats to my future like breaking a leg hiking or getting mugged at night waiting for the bus.

Only if you look like a soft target. I'm concerned that a Texan is concerned about people owning guns.

If you've got a good set-up don't bug out. Do the Alamo thing and make them come to you. . . okay, bad example.

Getting caught in the open "camping out" would put you at a disadvantage. Staying home with your supplies (shelter food, water, ammo) is almost always a better option. All you need is a fortified shooting point with clear lines of fire. Are you on good terms with your neighbors?

Yeah, I don't even have a BOB. I have a 96 hr kit that looks a lot like my truck and I have a get home bag that looks like a small backpack and which is part of the 96 kit on wheels. Bug out from San Diego? Where you gonna go? North to LA? East into the desert? Good luck with that. It's a pretty crowded neighborhood and very dependent on a supply infrastructure. If I bug-out it's because I sensed a problem and left way ahead of time -- driving.

Yeah, bugging out from san diego i would either go northto my grandpa's of go east to my cousins(who have guns), or I could start swimming to hawaii

I would use a boat of some sort.

Jeanette Isabelle

with a lot of gas! But if I had to go,I would probably go to Catalina, as it's beautiful, and very much a wilderness!

Lots of things could affect it, but a boat to Hawaii might not need a lot of gas if it has a big piece of cloth suspended from a tall upright thing. If memory serves me correctly, the conditions would allow, during much to the year, for one to sail downwind from California to Hawaii. This is not something I would attempt without lots of prior preparation. For some ideas, see: http://www.equipped.org/0698rescue.htm

I will readily admit that despite some years of sailing, a few working commercially, a number racing sailboats and some other experience, I would not want to take it on with inexperienced sailors. However, if I knew people who had a capable boat and the necessary skills, I might go long for a ride.

It would at least be better than swimming to Hawaii. Not only would you be very limited as to what you could bring, you will be tired out rather quickly.

I would rather walk from California to Toledo Ohio (I wonder who would catch that M*A*S*H reference).

Jeanette Isabelle

The good thing about Catalina is that i am only about 20-30 miles away from it so if I had a plane with a little fuel or a plane with a lot of fuel that wasn't very trustworthy I would only have to get about high enough so that i can glide 10-15 miles, which is a hight that varies by model of plane, but not all that high.

Bugging from a big city, ya need to keep in mind that a lot of other folks will have the same idea. Roads get clogged up, you can't get into a gas station, and it will be out of fuel anyway 'cuz the tankers can't get to them. I just don't think that buggin' from a city is gonna work, unless you get a really big head start...

Maybe I should just get my pilots license because even if the airport shuts down, theres no traffic in the sky (:; Maybe some on the tarmac, but thats all!!

With fuel prices going up daily, I fill up just about every time I pass a station! But, given the departure location of course, one might not be able to make it very far from that big city anyway, crawling along for hours and hours in bumper to bumper traffic...

We live on the outskirts of Chicago. Ordinary holiday traffic brings the local roads to a standstill, suggesting that a natural disaster evacuation will be breathtakingly slow. There is an intriguing alternative bug-out mode: paddling down the Des Plaines River. Every spring, on a Sunday afternoon, about a thousand canoes and kayaks participate in the 19 mile marathon and it generally goes well-better in high water than low, but it is flat water navigation, no rapids or falls. Occasional dams and strainers. And the river flows through Chicago and down to the Mississippi. Loading the canoe with camping gear and paddling beats loading me with camping gear and walking. Most of the river is surprisingly non-urban-the flood plain is a bad place to build, so it is mostly park land, with lots of deer, raccoons, possums, herons and ducks, and few people. Travel at night, lay up under camo taps during the day. 85% of the water in the river in the summer is actually Lake Michigan water that has made it through municipal water/sewage systems, so it might need a bit of work to make it potable. No gasoline required, not even much paddling because it is downhill all the way. Anybody else considering a canoe-kayak based bug out plan?

Interesting Idea Mike.

I live downtown in a city of about a million. If everybody were trying to get the hell out of town, I'd be stuck unless I got on my bike or started walking...but the city isn't really dense and that would take a while just to get to the city limits.

On the other hand I can walk to the North Saskatchewan River in 15 minutes. If I had to, I could carry a River Kayak (or a small canoe?) that far. It's the biggest river system in Canada and is navigable for almost 1300km. Could get pretty far from the city if one had to...or to another city.

Damn. Makes me want to take up kayaking!

Thanks, Hacksaw-I prefer canoes to kayaks-more capacity, less claustrophobic, and no necessity to eskimo roll if the going gets rough-you just get out. They seem to carry better, and are lighter-my kevlar solo weighs 22 pounds, 450 pound capacity. I don't think that the rivers will be crowded , and even if they are, they'll be crowded with kindred spirits. Silent, pleasant way to travel, except for the bitter citizens on the bridges, stuck in gridlock as you go quietly paddling by. They might be inclined to throw stuff.

My issue with canoes is that they seem to command a crazy price these days while kayak prices are going down continuously...and small canoes are a rare find. After your post I looked for used ones and couldn't find one anywhere in the area for less than $1200...too much and they're all heavy and/or leisure models so no good for what I'd want anyhow.

Mind if I ask what make/model you have? 22 lbs is a great weight.

http://www.hornbeckboats.com/index.htm
Usual no relation to vendor disclaimer.
I spent most of my life 30 miles south of this guy. I was content with the 70 pound skow until I blew out some discs in my neck, and needed something lighter. The prices are daunting, but the product is great, nearly indestructible-several have left the roof racks at highway speeds-broke the wooden gunwales but left the kevlar intact. The lower priced kayaks are usually roto-molded polyethylene, which, I suspect, eventually sustains enough UV damage and loss of solvent to become brittle.(of course, I too am sustaining UV damage and becoming brittle, so the yak might outlast me). The builder is a retired teacher, the boats are, or were, being built by hand in the barn. Chances are that there is someone closer to you making kevlar boats. There are DIY plans available (http://absolutelyfreeplans.com/Boat%20Plans/boat_plans.htm) My brother bought some old wood-canvas canoes, peeled off the canvas and recovered them with fibreglass cloth and resin. Heavy, but pretty.

Ah!

I've seen his site before while researching Nessmuk and his gear. The prices are a bit high for me but I'm crazy over that carbon fiber canoe...under 12 lbs! Wow!

Yeah, 12 lbs is sort of amazing. The flip side of the ultralight canoe is that it doesn't just sit there in the water or on the ground. Doesn't have the stability/inertia of a big clunky fiberglass boat, so I can't walk around in it on the water, and any little wind will blow it around on the ground. Plenty stable when I sit in it, but a little dicey on the way in and out. Hornbeck's barn is an official boat-building facility, inspected by NYS according to the same standards as places where they build steel-hulled merchant ships- inspections are apparently quite complicated. We suggested that he redefine his product as being hats, with an incidental use, upside down, as boats.

I can see no downside to a BOB. Better to have something than nothing. But were I ever to have need (and opportunity, please God) to bug out among the critical items I'd take are a few very informative books on survival. That and a trailer full of gasoline would be very helpful.

Living in a major metropolitan area on the east coast (Washington, D.C. in my case) certainly provides a perspective on the prospects of bugging out (and on living in a major, the major, terror target). Even a normal evening rush hour is instructive and on occasion when sitting still in I-66 westbound traffic jams on Fridays while trying to get away for a weekend I have considered what a mass evac of DC would look like.

Pretty grim. Even if everyone remained civilized (on 9/11 when there was much uncertainty for hours, DC did empty out in terms of commuters within a few hours, in a remarkably orderly and polite manner).

Cannot even begin to imagine a mass evac of a large portion of the east coast. There are 100 million people in the DC-Boston corridor.

I came to this website via camping gear and to preparedness awareness via a week of rolling blackouts during a succession of early 1990s ice storms, Y2K and 9/11.

Agree with the observations that it seems silly to have Armageddon gear without first building the capacity to cope with garden variety natural disasters.

My BOB is set up for a week or more of self-sufficiency (depending on how much food I toss into the top) but the tools I carry in it would enable me to make, build, forage, trap or snare whatever I would need to live for several months and probably a year or more. (even with our Wisconsin winters). Add the debris and detritus of our society after a pandemic or such and I'll get along quite comfortably for the rest of my life. I seriously doubt that someone who has made no preparations would last through the first month unless they happen to hook up with someone who has prepared.

Going back to the original scenario...

"... could having a short-mid term BoB actually prevent one from adapting to the new environment?

Would you be able to repair a roof without a hammer? How long would it take you to reshingle with a rock? How long would it take you to make a serviceable hammer? And while you were doing this job, what would you be doing about water, signaling, and food? Having a tool for likely jobs is a plus, not a minus.

"While sitting around the campfire (started with your keychain firesteel) you start showing off the skills you have learned.
Who is going to have more to show?"

The one who didn't have to reinvent the wheel under stressful survival conditions.

"... the adrenaline is simply not going to be there."

Adrenaline is short-term. It's to get you from an immediately-dangerous situation to a less-dangerous situation where you can start thinking instead of reacting. Constant adrenaline is exhausting. Why would this be valuable?

Sue

Not to be a jerk but if you didn't have a hammer, would you have shingles?

Seriously though it's a good point...without a certain level of resources and skill, you're stuck in the stone age.

"... How long would it take you to make a serviceable hammer?..."

Hammer is easy. Nails, on the other hand, would take a bunch of time...

CS, are you sure you're that close to Catalina? Remember, it's already about 20 miles offshore, and that's from Orange county.

Don't forget that there are other islands off the CA coast that are less populated.

Worse comes to worse, run down to TJ, where your dollars will get you more than they would in the US.

"...it's already about 20 miles offshore..."

Sung offkey...twenty six miles across the sea, Santa Catalina Island is waiting for me...