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Green survivalist movement grows in U.S. (7 posts)

  1. chrisc
    Member

    Convinced the planet's oil supply is dwindling and the world's economies are heading for a crash, some people around the country are moving onto homesteads, learning to live off their land, conserving fuel and, in some cases, stocking up on guns they expect to use to defend themselves and their supplies from desperate crowds of people who didn't prepare.

    The exact number of people taking such steps is impossible to determine, but anecdotal evidence suggests that the movement has been gaining momentum in the past few years.

    These energy survivalists are not leading some sort of green revolution meant to save the planet. Many of them believe it is too late for that, seeing signs in soaring fuel and food prices and a faltering U.S. economy, and are largely focused on saving themselves.

    Some are doing it quietly, giving few details of their preparations -- afraid that revealing such information as the location of their supplies will endanger themselves and their loved ones. They envision a future in which the country's cities will be filled with hungry, desperate refugees forced to go looking for food, shelter and water.

    http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNew...

    The most positive response in the UK is the transition initiative: http://transitiontowns.org/

    I'm reading their book, The Transition Handbook -- it's good, positive, collective suggestions to counteract the doomers... http://transitionculture.org/shop/the-transition-h...

    Posted 16 years ago #
  2. truthmover
    Administrator

    Thanks for that last part. I'm not sure we need to go from capitalist radical self-interest to post-capitalist radical self-interest. We need more social thinking, and I keep hoping all these problems will make people more socially oriented instead of less so.

    I appreciate people starting these sustainable communities as examples for others. But the reality is that most, but certainly not all, of that survivalist movement referred to above is white, middle-class, and not all too concerned about the fact that lots of poor people of color can't afford to do the same.

    And from a broad view, it was our system that turned indigenous people all over the world away from subsistence farming toward the indentured servitude of producing cash crops. Are we really going to re-learn what we stole from them while we let them rot?

    We have a debt to pay. I'm not sure how.

    Posted 16 years ago #
  3. chrisc
    Member

    Do you think the transition initiative represents "post-capitalist radical self-interest"? I'm not sure this is the case, perhaps we should have a separate thread on this and things like the Post Carbon Cities initiative http://postcarboncities.net/ which does appear to be less grassroots...?

    We have a debt to pay. I'm not sure how.

    Yeah.

    Posted 16 years ago #
  4. truthmover
    Administrator

    No. I meant thanks for that last part because the first part seemed to be about "post-capitalist radical self-interest."

    Posted 16 years ago #
  5. chrisc
    Member

    Ahh :-)

    Posted 16 years ago #
  6. truthmod
    Administrator

    Some other resources:

    http://www.postcarbon.org/

    http://www.relocalize.net/

    The media likes to spin this as a dismissable paranoid survivalist phenomenon that's just about self-interest. But I believe that becoming more self-sustaining and building a real community are just about the most revolutionary and compassionate actions you can take.

    It's also good to align your lifestyle with your ideals. Whether it's a sudden collapse or a drawn out decline, unplugging from the domination/deception/death economy is an admirable thing to do. It's also a lot realer than chatting on the internet.

    Posted 16 years ago #
  7. truthmod
    Administrator

    Richard Heinberg recently wrote a detailed guide for building what he calls, "Resilient Communities."

    http://www.richardheinberg.com/museletter/192

    Resilient Communities: A Guide to Disaster Management

    The following is a proposal to help make communities better able to respond to the coming economic shocks from resource depletion, beginning with Peak Oil, and perhaps also to shocks from other causes (such as the ongoing subprime mortgage and credit collapse). In searching for a name for the strategy, I have settled on the phrase "Resilient Communities," which comes with considerable baggage—useful baggage in this instance. Once I have described and discussed the proposal, I will offer some background materials regarding the terms resilience and resilient communities, mentioning some other projects that have used the same title or that pursue similar goals.

    ...

    Posted 16 years ago #

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