I formerly belonged to a local group that was originally interested in studying the effects of Peak Oil and find ways to work cooperatively to improve a future where oil (the life blood of modern society) would be in short supply.
I watched it evolve into a network of people who shared the understanding that the scenario of hard times ahead was a distinct possibility.
I saw the group grow in numbers and ultimately have a positive effect on the way our city
plans for the future.
Then I noticed that the number of participants began to drop rapidly and I realized that
a new mindset was driving out people who were interested in cooperative work toward a better future, considering scenarios of resource limitations.
The new mindset was the mindset of survivalism (distinctly different from surviving)... a mindset of fear and guns and food hording and razor wire barriers and guard dogs.
There was also talk about what to do when 'they' came to get our food and water and valuables. I came to understand that 'they' were dark and lazy and dangerous. In other words, 'they' were blacks and Latinos.
This was all around the time of hurricane Katrina, and in the aftermath of that disaster, there were shaded comments about the "lessons of Katrina".
It was racism wearing a very thin veil.
And always, 'they' had a sense of entitlement... (how ironic)
* * *
I came across a film called "Welcome To New Orleans", which was done by Rasmus Holm, a documentary film maker from Denmark who was visiting New Orleans when Katrina hit.
In the film, there is a segment where drunken survivalists are bragging about the (black) people they killed, for the crime of being out on the street.
* * *
I read a very interesting book about the San Francisco earth quake of 1906, and the subsequent fire that engulfed the city. It was very interesting the way people behaved in the face of a total actual disaster, that cut across racial and class lines.
The surprise was that people of all races and classes opened their hearts & homes to help others in need.
* * *
So I think that the real danger is not the starving, dark, pillaging mobs, but instead it is the more real threat of white people with guns who are ready and willing to kill to protect their own sense of entitlement.
* * *
I have wondered what is behind the survivalist bravado... I hear the very same talk, the same words over time, from many different locations.
I think it springs from a sense of social isolation combined with a sense of helplessness... a potentially dangerous combination. It is a combination where weapons replace vibrant social connections, and bravado and swagger attempt to fill the void where hope used to exist.
In many ways it strongly resembles a fixation on pornography... where an abstracted symbol is used as a stand-in for a complex reality. And I think that very similar forces are driving it.
-AC_Hacker