[Ainan]

This is a thread aimed at the young POilers like myself, in their late teens or early 20s, just going out into the world. But i would also like to get input from all age groups, particularly baby boomers.

Knowing what the future probably has in store, would you rather be born as a baby boomer? The baby boomers grew up in the last 60 years of relative world peace and unparrelled prosperity. Western boomers could have done anything they wanted with their lifes, travelled all over the world, enjoyed almost any activity they desired. I realise most of them wasted it in front of the idiotbox.

Or, would you prefer to be young now, riding the train at full speed over the cliff?

Increasingly I have been seeing PO as an adventure, a challenge, an opportunity for a 'real' life. You often hear those who survived the world wars saying 'they were the worst of times, they were the best of times'. Will we end up saying that?

I am very naive. I have never seen war, death, famine, epidemics. Never seen people fight over things they need to survive, (except beer ) and of course if I end up doing just that, I would pray for a return to the oil age.


I'm just starting my soon to be redundant career, 9-5 and all the rubbish that comes with it. Work for the next 50 years, mortgage, wife and 2.4 children while watching the insanity all around me OR a life well lived, a life of survival and adventure, the end of our insane backwards world?

Hard choice. Which would you choose?

[Eli]

Youth always has its advantages.

As long as you adapt and are willing to work you can eek out a living.

The babyboomers are fubar, they will die off fast without their medication. They won't be fit enough, most of them for decent physical labor and 90% of the jobs that they have expertise in will be gone.

[Ludi]

Woo hoo! I'll get to die of pneumonia! Whee!


No, not an adventure, actually.



But you can have fun with it.

[Revi]

Peak oil will be a real adventure. They thought that the world as we know it was coming to an end in the 1940's with Fachism, and in the 60's and 70's we grew up in the shadow of nuclear annihalation. You guys are coming of age in the teeth of peak oil and global warming. It's going to be a wild ride!

I am only about 49, and I can see that things will be getting really wild in the next few years.

I am trying to see it as an adventure too.

It sure beats the heck out of a humdrum life.

These next few decades are going to be dramatic.

I'd like to stick around to see them.

[POAlex]

We're certainly living in challenging and dangerous times.

Alex

[Dezakin]

It'll be incredibly boring. Everything will get expensive, and your job wont pay as much as you want. At the same time there wont be any exciting wars except regional conflicts in some undeveloped hellhole or holy land. Society wont collapse despite the fact that you want an excuse not to go to work in the morning, and the ultimate effect is you wont be able to afford quite as much plastic junk from overseas.

[Plantagenet]

"May you live in interesting times"

--ancient Chinese curse

[ohanian]

Peak oil is an adventure in pain and suffering.

I hope you like pain.

[seldom_seen]

Ainan,

Yes, boomers suck. They we're all "into the sixties" and long hair and bullshit and then what did they do?

They sucked up to the system like a dehydrated leech. Their so called "rebellion" from the system, actually was just the reverse power complex reinforcing itself. It's pathetic when you think about it. It's scary and sad.

I don't want to dwell. I've seen like three Toyota hybrids today with "Obama" stickers on them. What is it with "Obama" and "hyrbids." It makes the hair stand up on my back.

You reap what you sow, and half the story has never been told...

[Micki]

It will be a break from the normal rut and holds a whole lot of unknown events, so from that sense it will be an adventure.
But once you gone 3 months without toilet paper, eating bugs for lunch and you and your family have been ass raped by the zombie hoards for the third time, I think it will just plain suck.
(Sorry, my doomer day today. )

[wisconsin_cur]

yeah, "an adventure." Call it what ever you want... the end result for billions, including some of your loved ones, is just the same.

[grampybone]

Dangerous road lies ahead. Peak oil and everything that it brings won't be an adventure. It will be your lifestyle.

[Munqi]

I have to admit i have had similar thoughts with the first poster.


Life the way it is now seems so boring that peak oil doesnt sound all that bad. But then i am young and i have never really seen hard life either so im probably wrong. Theres just something about challenges and danger thats more compelling to young men than "normal life".

But again, once i get to experience these challenges i'll probably miss the days when i could just write about them at my computer

[socrates1fan]

How else are we supposed to look at it?
I'm not a doomer, I believe we will be hit hard but not totally killed.
Humans will have to live with one another.
Being a teen I have a great advantage over most people I know.
I can run very fast for long periods of time while holding things.
Self defense is also something my family was taught from an early age.
You don't have to be buffed to defend yourself.
But the police arent going to vanish either, try and remember that.

[Revi]

Things never seem to be as bad as you think they could be, but they aren't always a bed of roses, either.

If you like gardening and living in a small community you'll keep eating. You might need the run and hide skills and some defensive ones as well.

The world hasn't been like it is now for very long. People lived in castles and defensible caves for a long time.

I'm thinking the ideal place is either in a small city or town, or in a house like Michael Caine's in Children of Men.

Start to look at things like it's 5 years post peak.

That will give you a huge advantage over most people.

Money will have turned into toilet paper from inflation, the amount of gas the average person can buy will be miniscule and the status symbol will be the neighborhood electric vehicle.

Knowing about peak oil gives you a huge advantage.

It's like having a racing form from the future. The only problem is that most of the race horses die. But you'll know which ones finish!

[NoWorries]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dezakin', 'I')t'll be incredibly boring. Everything will get expensive, and your job wont pay as much as you want. At the same time there wont be any exciting wars except regional conflicts in some undeveloped hellhole or holy land. Society wont collapse despite the fact that you want an excuse not to go to work in the morning, and the ultimate effect is you wont be able to afford quite as much plastic junk from overseas.

[mos6507]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', '
')in a house like Michael Caine's in Children of Men.

[biofuel13]

In this adventure the young will have the advantage.

[wellbehaved]

I think western society had to come to this..How can we keep living the way we are living without some major paradigm shift? Capitalism is not sustainable..Consumption is not sustainable. Current western societal structure does not foster relationships. How can you have a relationship with Wal-Mart or McDonalds?

I spend a few weeks a year in Mexico. Most people are poor but they get by. They do what they have to do to survive and they are very resourceful. I have family that lives on $5-$10 a day. They don´t have cars. They walk or take the bus. There are still neighborhood stores. You go to the meat store to buy meat, you go to the fruteria to buy your fruit, the stationary store to buy your office supplies. You go to your neighborhood internet cafe to chat. Not everyone has a computer. There is a true sense of community and everyone knows each other.

I welcome this transition...What choice do we have?