[LGW]

Yep. I discovered PO in early high school (around 2000) and most everyone around me believed in technofixes when i brought the topic into discussion and they still do.

As for the skills in analytical science somebody mentioned. Entering college PO aware and following my interests at the same time I chose Electrical Engineering which is quite intensive on the mathematics side.

So the mathematics may be extraordinarily hard but this is not the hardest thing with it, but rather the fact that the analytical skills gained opens up one's mind to how grim the future looks on the oil side. Put it this simple: All reading about "positive" energy futures = debunked. All reading about a grim, energy scare future = statistically true and very real. People take so many things for granted, quite simply. Telling them that many of the world economies might grind to a halt in a timeframe of decades just doesn't work.

DENIAL.

[aragon]

Oddly enough my mother got it right away.Her response was that it would happen, only not in her life time.She is 76 so i had to concede the point.My best friend saw the problem but believes in a tecno fix.I tried to point him in the direction of the peak oil web site but with little success.Lets face it most people are in denial.Does the image of the three monkeys come to mind..........

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('aragon', 'O')ddly enough my mother got it right away.Her response was that it would happen, only not in her life time.She is 76 so i had to concede the point.My best friend saw the problem but believes in a tecno fix.I tried to point him in the direction of the peak oil web site but with little success.Lets face it most people are in denial.Does the image of the three monkeys come to mind..........

[aragon]

Very true Ibon.That also explains why the U.S.is mired in the middle east.Their vested interests is the continueing flow of oil.Its halt is a consequence they are not willing to face.Im not trying to rattle your chain were all in this together .The problems ahead face the whole planet not just the U.S..Their choice is to secure the source and they had the means.Whether right or wrong this path was taken lets just hope it doesnt lead to the abyss...

[parsifal]

I came to PO after Katrina hit and caused oil madness. I was guided by some intuition I am unable to recall. It is lonely. The light went on a little in 2000 after the France and UK oil crisis. Now I feel it like a festering tumor about to metastisize.

[Cobra_Strike]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Balthasar', 'P')O is a lonesome journey for me, but there are many things specific to me that make me a loner no matter where I am at in life.

PO isn't the only thing that would make me look like a crackpot.

The fact that I have no friends, the fact that I have severe emotional problems and have a lot of social anxiety, and live in my dad's basement. My values are not compatible with most people: I am very anti-materialism, I am an anti-work-ethic person. I hate money. I am non-religious. Most people I am unable to relate to because they think on such elementary levels - they're only concerned with fuck buddies, or money, or their next set of video games, or whatever. Nobody my age is concerned with the world beyond the next day of their immediate lives, and most people appear incredibly shallow and plastic to me. It is all so sickening.

Take this IN COMBINATIOn with PO awareness, and it is VERY difficult.

[seven]

I've spoken to three relatives about PO - one gets it, but is a hopeless nutjob: therefore he is more a liability than a a useful ally. Another gets it but has too much other stuff to worry about at age 80, and the third gets it but is so busy working to support two small children by herself that she decided to just deal with it when it happens....although she did take my advice last year to buy as much gold as possible. The only one of the three who is willing to discuss it much is, of course, the nutjob.

I suppose some might find PO knowledge/the journey lonely, but being an adventurous recluse by nature, it doesn't affect me that way - to me it's more like being in an amorphous, clandestine society of sorts that exists openly but flies under the radar...not like a cult, but a loosely connected group bound by fact-based common knowledge. Within that set are subsets containing a myriad of opinions about exactly what will happen, when, and how bad it will be - but we all share a basic familiarity with the facts.

Since I spend a lot of time online because of both my work and interests, net PO communities are a perfect way to gain information and network with like-minded others without cutting substantially into my work time. Who could ask for more?

[Jellric]

Well it has been somewhat of a lonely journey for me.

*cue violin music* lol

I have brought up the topic to friends and family members. One friend pretty much gets it. I had hoped there would be more traction with this issue after Hurricane Katrina, but this is a very conservative area of the country (my state had the highest percentage vote for Bush in 00 and 04).

Bush can do no wrong here. If God hasn't whispered "peak oil" into his ear then as far as these people are concerned there is no problem. You may think I'm joking, but I'm dead serious. I would be very concerned living in the South after PO..and my brother and family live in Houston, TX. I worry a lot about them.

I am making a concerted effort NOT to come on too strong with what looms over the horizon. I just drop hints now and then..seeds that I hope will take root.

My brother traded in their SUV and got a fuel efficient sedan. I convinced him to put a few hundred dollars into PM mining stocks as a hedge against his portfolio. Small things. My financial power in my family is relatively tiny, but I am trying to leverage what I can.

One thing I did that I hope will help; I put my predictions for the near-term future into an envelope and sealed it last year. (It had to do with projected oil prices and economic recession among other things). I know they won't believe me now, but if I call it like it happens I will have more credibility. Even more so when I lay out the gold and silver coins- they should be worth plenty by then.

At that time I plan to open the scrolls (envelope) containing my fulfilled predictions in a family conference and lay out the future for them trusting they will see the light. By that time things will be dire. But you can be sure I have a backup plan if they don't get it even then.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't get him to drink.

[rwwff]

Don't be pushy. Make them feel like they've convinced you. Let'em take the credit. Who cares as long as you all end up on the same page if things do come apart. And does it matter if anyone ever comes out and says those two words? Maybe they understand and are making preperations, but just don't feel like having anything to do with a bunch of left wing nutjobs (as we call yall..).

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Jellric', '
')Bush can do no wrong here. If God hasn't whispered "peak oil" into his ear then as far as these people are concerned there is no problem.

[oowolf]

I've noticed, just in the last month or so, a definite willingness to listen to what oowolf says. Possibly because of my ability to "predict" gas price fluctuations and explain how this will cause food prices, etc. to also rise (food is generally up 40-50% around here) and some of the sheeple are starting snap out of it.

It's essentially getting people to realize how alarmingly dependent they are--on a "civilization" that functions in "continuous failure mode".

[spudbuddy]

I remember- it was May of 2005 when I rented End of Suburbia, and took it home and watched it all by myself.
Now I must admit - I'm actually good friends with the producer of the followup sequel to E.O.S (Escape From Suburbia)....so it was kind of easy to plug in right away, socially.

As to being a lonesome journey - I have to constantly remind myself that there are probably millions of us by now, on our own voyages of discovery, trading notes, comparing ideologies....

When you sit and look at mainstream "business as usual" it can feel like the whole world is carrying on as if nothing of this meant anything -

- but then again, I think it also depends on what you do with it.
I found in the beginning - any time I came across anyone discussing economics, geopolitics, globalization, unemployment, housing issues, poverty....and just about anything, the temptation was to just throw in the PO card like it would trump the works.

If nothing else - if it serves to slow down the mass hyper-consumptive sleepwalk, and in the initial stages anyway, cause more people to stop and think a bit about how we actually do things...well, it's a start.

The only thing about PO that makes me feel lonesome is the fact that I know there are a lot of people out there who just don't want to know, and that's an awful sad dividing line.