Prepping, as it’s popularly known, is short for ’preparation‘.
This preparation is oriented toward disaster or cataclysmic scenarios. These scenarios can be anything from civil unrest to natural disasters to economic collapse.
A common narrative is that the electrical grid goes down, either during a singular event or overall collapse of the systems that enable us to live with modern necessities.
After the immediate shock, where the authorities and institutions meant to protect our livelihoods are unable to reach us, there tends to be destabilization in resource distribution and medical assistance.
However, prepping also considers the longer term ramifications in the aftermath of these scenarios. Immediate needs such as water, food, and shelter can quickly mount especially if the impact is widespread such as at a city scale or larger.
Preppers maintain the necessities for themselves or their families, and this is where the limit of the prepper outlook lies.
America’s individualism is both a blessing and a curse in this consideration. We want to protect and shore up the situation around us, because each of us is only in control of the local situation (domestic), and Americans believe it is up to each person to look after themselves.
However, this doesn’t take into consideration longer term collapse such as an era defining ‘doomsday’ in which the former institutions are irrevocably changed or eliminated altogether.
We know that when the rubber hits the road, so to speak, the institutions are more likely to protect moneyed elites. This is apparent during any localized disaster and thereafter, where large companies and wealthy individuals buy up the land, infrastructure, and resources of an impacted area.
Therefore, it is necessary to expand this notion of prepping (preparing water, food, shelter for the inevitable) to the community level.
This does several things: 1) It lessens the impact to individuals if there are plans and resources in place to secure the needs of a community. 2) It ensures a level of civil and social stability. You may have enough water, food, fuel, and bullets for yourself but you’re only one man (or one family). And as desperation mounts in those in your community, your cache of resources makes you a target.
The best way to ensure your safety in this longer term scenario is to make sure the community also has resources and procedures in place to develop resilience against these harsh conditions.
Community prepping not only acknowledges that a group of individuals is always safer working together than a single individual (or family) working only toward his safety, but also acknowledges the immutability of economies of scale. Multiple cavemen working together can bring in more while hunting and gathering per caveman, than a single caveman working alone.
Prepping speaks to the American notions of independence and expertise, as well as its frontier history. But it’s worth mentioning that in a larger group of people, there’s likely to be one in the group with expertise to meet the specific need of another individual.
As an example, we rely on everything from prescription glasses to medical treatment to communication; all these come from individuals we neither know nor live near.
No one man (or family) can be expected to know how to fashion replacement glasses or treat medical conditions or maintain outside communication to address the needs that arise from the collapse of infrastructure and institutions.
A community has a much greater chance of survival. Ape together strong. 🦍 ☀️