[Loki]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ennui2', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Loki', '
')Maybe they should cut production so their competitors in the US will fare better? Is that what you're arguing?

[ralfy]

It's also helpful to keep in mind that most people worldwide do not have the means to access many of the resources that middle class survivalists have because they earn only around two to three dollars daily. In addition, it is likely that governments, military forces, and businesses look out for themselves first rather than citizens or customers, which means in the long term people will receive less support in terms of emergency aid given natural disasters coupled with a higher cost of living, shortages, etc.

[Revi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'P')erhaps they should invest in solar panels, maybe become the Saudi Arabia of solar electricity? lol

[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Loki', '
')What "both sides of the fence?" Saudis are dependent on oil revenues

[Pops]

Haven't seen this at the library yet but from what you all have reported I think the guy is pretty close, as far as he gets. In my mind the apocalyptic environmentalist believes we humans are way past overshoot and will be getting our earned comeuppance along about Tuesday when the big Die-Off begins. We're nothing more than a mistake of nature, a pathogen on Gaia. Our imminent and well deserved demise has been cheered here at PO since day one.

--
What the author, in his youth and inexperience, misses, is that there are lots of apocalyptic flavors, not just enviros. Obviously the original are the religious zealots of whatever stripe who are certain God loves them but hates you. And others who don't need to come up with any complicated enviro or mystical justifications for die-off, they are simply misanthropes. They usually talk about how the Sheeple will all die because they are losers, weak, stupid... and low energy, LoL.

--
But there is another kind of peaker. He doesn't "believe" in the various apocalyptic faiths. He simply doesn't trust the status quo. Call him a neo-Luddite, agnostic-survivalist, back-2-lander or the currently fashionable "prepper." His knee-jerk opinion isn't as predictable as the apocalyptist but usually doesn't read "We're Dead! Just look at [insert pretty much anything here]!" It isn't that he is more or less of anything in particular, mostly just that he doesn't believe in fate and thinks doing pretty well anything is better than just sitting and fretting.

That's me. Preppish isn't a new trait or a passing fad for me and lots of folks, and it didn't come from watching a movie. I'm pretty sure I came by my planning gene naturally and I'm sure most people like me did too. The old folks' stories about once upon a time having it pretty good only to have "it" snatched away unexpectedly stuck with me. My folks had a big garden and pantry and never hired a repairman because they pretty well just dug in and did whatever themselves. They knew how to get by and I guess I picked that up. I tend to look the gift horse in the mouth. But really, if you don't, how do you get an idea how long before you should plan on being back to walking?


--
PO.com came online the same month as Facebook. There were a few static PO sites at the time: DieOff, LATOC, WolfAtTheDoor; but no forum type boards that gained much traffic on the web to that point. There were and had been quite a few survivalist type boards since the early days of the BBSs but the survivalists weren't all that hep to the idea the old 4x4 might not be the ultimate bug out vehicle. I have more in common with survivalists who do stuff with their hands (other than just wring them) than I do with the enviro or misanthropic apolalypsists who take die-off as fate. Aside from politics that is.

I started pushing the planning aspects of PO pretty soon after arriving here because the "enviro faith based" apocalypse arguments didn't ring any truer than the religious or misanthropic arguments on the typical survivalist boards. Right off the bat there was a tension here between the die-off crowd and the planning crowd. To the believers and hopers-for-apocalypse, peak oil is the means the to an end, TheEnd. To the planners and preppers on the other hand, PO is an obstacle to be overcome with the end goal being survival.

--
The latest phase of the conversation has been interesting. Like someone upstream said, it surprises me somewhat that the survivor element has faded from sight. Perhaps post-recession, our painted-over economic malaise makes play acting doom less entertaining and maybe a little too close to home?

Likewise the shift from overnight civilizational collapse via PO to boiling in our skins sometime next century. On a site ostensibly about the existential danger of a forced reduction in FF burning it's been amusing to watch the shift from PO to AGW as the favored horseman of doom. The very thing apocalyptic environmentalists once promoted as the killer of civilization is now promoted as the only hope of avoiding environmental apocalypse.

Oh well. Doom on.

[onlooker]

Yes and I would add us Apocalyptic types now see a vexing Catch 22 staring at the entire human race. If we drastically curtail CO2 emission we face a real unraveling of civilization, on the other hand if we continue utilizing fossil fuels and thus emitting CO2 we very likely face Climate Armageddon. Of course, I am not really a doomer, I am a realist. Oh heck we are all going to die anyway.

[Revi]

Here's a review of the book that recently came out. I disagree with this review almost as much as some of the conclusions of the book:
https://www.insidehighered.com/views/20 ... talism-and

"Schneider-Mayerson interprets the tendency towards insularity and inactivism as a sign of the peak-oil subculture having accepted more of the dominant mentality of the past few decades than one might expect: in particular, a deep distrust of collective action, and of the state as capable of doing anything without screwing it up, combined with fatalism and an abiding sense of powerlessness. And feeling powerless, one places no demands on those who do have power (the first step toward gaining any). The belief in an inevitable collapse and disintegration of society is stupefying, if not self-fulfilling. “There is no alternative,” it says. “Let us tend our gardens.” But that's no strategy, just a symptom of decline."

[Pops]

We all know why we get on here and yell down the silo rather than talk to our friends and neighbors... it isn't "tendency towards insularity and inactivism"...

How many threads have there been about spreading the word, banging the drum, or just plain talking to non-peakers and being pooh-poohed? I mean it gives me an understanding of what it must be like for the Jehovahs and Mormons on mission.

It can give a person a "cassandra" complex, even a fairly moderate doomer such as myself gets the sidelong glance for a mere mention of the idea that oil won't always be cheap.

[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'g')ood government underminded by the wealthy and their corrupt lapdogs.

[onlooker]

yes the masses bear responsibility also for being so naive not to mention self-interested.

[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('onlooker', 'y')es the masses bear responsibility also for being so naive not to mention self-interested.

[onlooker]

Well we disagree on a few things but I totally agree with your Donald Trump comment.

[ROCKMAN]

"...yes the masses bear responsibility also for being so naive not to mention self-interested." I agree: y'all are being rather patronizing towards our fellow citizens IMHO. And in the process giving them a pass to some degree. They are not being duped. They are not naïve. Do y'all not have honest conversations with your fellow man? From my experiences most folks know exactly what the score is and what the future will look like. Granted many won't admit it publicly but the vast majority are only concerned about their personal future. We have exactly the world the vast majority of the global population is willing to accept. They are not being forced to accept it...they are fully onboard with it. The lower 50% of global fossil fuel consumers are more interested in increasing their consumption then seeing the upper 50% of the population lowering their consumption of fossil fuels.

[ennui2]

Patronizing is the right word. There's a tendency to view the unwashed masses as if they are children that need to be told the truth at all times, otherwise they will be led over a cliff like lemmings. At what point should we expect the masses to be capable of independent thought or should we always view them as mindless automatons who are simply programmed how to think and act? It's a fantasy because it's a lot easier to envision a world where some benign leader takes over and reeducates the masses than it is to expect a sea-change in the way the average person sees the world from the bottom up.

I think psychologically humans have a tendency to want to anthpomorphize problems anyway. To find a singular villain. The fact we have a difficulty in seeing things holistically is why we're in this mess in the first place. How many times do I have to post this picture?

[Revi]

I am sorry, and I might sound a little elitist, but I feel like us "peakists" have discovered an algorithm that allows us to understand what is actually going on. Everyone else is operating in the dark. They are having a good time being there, and are mildly buzzed on fossil fuels. Telling them that it's running out is like telling a junkie that this is his last fix. Not bound to be popular....

[SeaGypsy]

Spot on Revi. Even as much as we disagree on here on pretty much everything else. The one consensus is BAU is being blindsided by PO. Only AGW is of this scale of problem. Even the MIC can do nothing about either.

[ROCKMAN]

"Telling them that it's running out is like telling a junkie that this is his last fix. Not bound to be popular..." Which is why we rarely see a D or R politician explaining the reality. Last time a POTUS tried that approach was President Carter...and we remember how that turned out for him. LOL.