Topic: Doomsday Preppers are selfish

[Weisshaupt]

http://www.emergencymgmt.com/emergency-blogs/campus/Doomsday-Preppers-Emergency-Management-112912.html

Hell Yeah.  Know what is more selfish?  Expecting others to come to your aid and take care of you because you are a stupid, non-contributing zero who is incapable of living without the herd.  Damn Eloi.

[IronDioPriest]

To her credit, she did offer a mea culpa of sorts, linked right at the top.

[charlesoakwood]

Unless one is part of the collective one is an aberration.

[Libertas]

To her credit, she did offer a mea culpa of sorts, linked right at the top.

Yeah, about that...

"Finally, one commenter dared me to make a video apology and post it on YouTube and offered me $100 if I did.  Uh … I’m not gonna do that.  Besides, I’d rather he used the money to buy disaster supplies for one of his unprepared neighbors."

So, didn't really mean the mea culpa, eh?     Oh, and my neighbor(s) are morons, unlike libiots I am not in favor of FORCED support of morons!   

[Weisshaupt]

To her credit, she did offer a mea culpa of sorts, linked right at the top.

Yeah, about that...

"Finally, one commenter dared me to make a video apology and post it on YouTube and offered me $100 if I did.  Uh … I’m not gonna do that.  Besides, I’d rather he used the money to buy disaster supplies for one of his unprepared neighbors."

So, didn't really mean the mea culpa, eh?     Oh, and my neighbor(s) are morons, unlike libiots I am not in favor of FORCED support of morons!   

No, she didn't mean it.  She thinks she is Queen of Disasters and that everyone should obey her in one. The fact the preppers are removing themselves from needing her help offends her a a deep level. She is the one saving people. She is superior because she cares, and anyone who doesn't willingly contribute their preps to her during a disaster is selfish.  Is the same entitled wail of the liberal we are used to hearing. She tolerates the "community" based preppers - because she figures they will be good resources to draw from when she is in charge.   

As far as I am concerned, the "community" can starve to death. They voted for it and its their bed, let them lie in it. I owe thieves nothing.

[Glock32]

This is the technocratic credentialism we see everywhere now. It's all tied in with the hyping of college and adding acronyms to ones name. It's really a leftover of feudalism, the guilds who controlled a particular trade. There's also a healthy dose of "effort justification", as in, she jumped through all the hoops to become this credentialed expert so she requires validation of that effort in the form of deference from anyone not similarly credentialed.

You can't even cut someone's hair without a license in most places now.  What cannot last won't.

[Alphabet Soup]

http://www.emergencymgmt.com/emergency-blogs/campus/Doomsday-Preppers-Emergency-Management-112912.html

Hell Yeah.  Know what is more selfish?  Expecting others to come to your aid and take care of you because you are a stupid, non-contributing zero who is incapable of living without the herd.  Damn Eloi.

Thanks for the link Weisshaupt. I find comfort and some encouragement in the comments following her whinging blog post. There are more folks out there who do in fact "get it" and are trying to spread to word about self-reliance and self-determinism directly in the face of her "dumbing down the sheeple" program.

[Weisshaupt]

Its really really worth reading through the comments.

I see lip service and attitude. I got my license too but you explain to me why the stats say energency mgrs dont on avg have 72hr kits? Thats why doomsday preparedness makes sense

to which the Author responds:

I'm not sure why other EM's don't have 72 hour kits, but I don't have one because I don't have a family at home any longer and I expect to be home myself. I expect to be in a local EOC (Emergency Operations Center) managing resources and personnel who are out there directly responding to the disaster.

and a third party chimes in

Valerie, with no food or water, how are you going to help anybody else at a local EOC? Ohhhh, I see, you're expected SOMEBODY ELSE to take care of you, while you justify that as helping a community. That you aren't prepared says it all.

and another

I find it humorous that you do not have a 72hr kit, because you expect to be at an "EOC", and you also expect those who have prepared to share what they have put up for the good of the community. Shouldn't you at least be putting up food and other needed items for your neighbors who have not prepared? Sharing after all, is what you are advocating for those who have prepared. Are you not being selfish in not supplying for those of your home community who have not taken the time to prepare? In a disaster it will not be your advice that people will want, it will be your food and other preps. I do not think that those working at the "EOC" will be going hungry, but you yourself admit that you have nothing to share other than advice. Before you state that those who have prepared are selfish for not giving out what they have put aside for an emergency, shouldn't you have some skin of your own in the game? You come across as just another government policy wank who expects others to follow without question your edicts and opinions. Our families are our responsibility, our neighbors not so much. We will help of course, because that's just the kind of people we are, but not to the detriment of our families or ourselves. I do not know of any "prepper" who would not help out someone in need, just do not expect them to welcome your demands of share your stuff or else, to be excepted very well. Most of the folks I know would be happiest if the government, and this includes those all cozy in the "EOC", would just leave them alone.

and another

Valerie, Hopefully this is a significant learning experience for you. There is no need to "apologize" because readers are too obtuse to infer a distinction between "doomsday" and "disaster" prepping, since that distinction is simply a rhetorical artifice which you desperately created after realizing your argument was indefensible. You've already insulted readers enough, and your "apology" only adds to it. Instead, a true apology from you would state, "I was wrong. Being prepared, for disasters large or small, is commendable--not 'socially selfish.'" You might also want to thank all the commenters for paying the taxes that afford you a government-funded lifestyle and pension, enabling you to pontificate about things you don't understand and to judge others because they may or may not "share" as much as you think they should--when a primary motivation for most, if not nearly all preppers, is a) to not be a burden and b) to be a blessing, to others. In fact, I'll paypal you $100 if, in the form of a youtube video, you will a) make a meaningful apology as described above and, this will be my favorite part, b) recognize the irony of you actually judging individuals negatively for not possibly "sharing" enough at some undefined disaster-impacted point in the future--even though it is precisely their "sharing" of hard-earned dollars in the form of taxes that provides you the career, pension, lifestyle and media platform to criticize them in the first place! Having been in government for 25 years, including work in federal and state inter-agency response to large-scale disasters, I suspect you might feel too enlightened and entitled to take me up on my offer. Nevertheless, the offer stands. Looking forward to seeing the YouTube link in your third article on this topic

kittycat    |    Commented 9 Days Ago
You know, it is that *management* part of FEMA that I really object to. I, too, have a few initials after my name, but I wouldn't presume to think that the American People want to be *managed* by the governernment. Especially not by know-nothing administrators like most of the people that I know that work in *.gov*. The preppers that are responding to this article know a lot more than the author about the risks that we face. They know it because it is a passion, not just a job for them. I am still astounded that you admitted that you don't have a GOBAG or provisions for yourself and that you can ONLY imagine a scenario where you are at your job's pre-established "battle station" and getting there and staying there works our 100% perfectly for you. I for one am concerned about US financial risk - that really doesn't really have a "battle station" now does it, Valerie? If the US dollar becomes worthless, your .gov salary won't help you at all, but a few bags of rice on your shelf might. My parents survived the Dust Bowl and the Depression. It was reality for them not just *fearmongering*. I'll take my lessons from them - pardon me, but I and most really intellegent people who have bothered to think all of this through don't trust YOU to manage us in a an emergency, nor do we want you to do so.

Part 2 of 2 You in the emergency management community are always decrying that you cannot get people to listen to you, you can't get them to prepare, to keep some food in stock, some candles, some water & some way to clean water, some basic sanitation devices. You feel like you are beating your head against the wall. I feel the same way. I've tried, and people just will not listen. I don't have a fancy degree in emergency management sciences, but I PAY people who do. If they… YOU… the experts in the community… can't figure out how to get people to pay attention, how on earth do you expect ME… some nobody taxpayer out here in flyover country… to get them to listen? You can expect me to pay my taxes. You can expect me to do my civic duty, and to support my local emergency services. You can expect me to go to the rescue squad's fish fry and give them $20 in donations so they can get better lights on their trucks or to put towards that third set of "jaws of life". I've done it, I will continue to do it. You CANNOT reasonably expect me to feed an entire town that refuses to prepare during times of plenty. I just can't do it. I can prepare enough for my family, and I can expect them to prepare for theirs. Their way or "prepping" may be to wait until FEMA shows up, that's really kinda their deal, to each their own. At least I PAID for FEMA (my share, at least) so they have that. The disconnect that you are seeing between the prepping community and what you have been saying, I think, is that you need to consider how much we ALREADY do as a part of the social contract. Prepping is OVER AND ABOVE our responsibility to society. We pay our taxes, and you, the experts, are responsible for using those resources that we GIVE you wisely. Prepping is beyond that, and really, you should have zero expectation that people are going to starve their own families to feed strangers.

Stop rolling out the age old party line of "the common/greater good". We are not insects, we are free individuals with rights and hopes and dreams and a right to do what we think is best for us. That includes our greatest right, the right to life. We have taken responsibility for our own safety and that of our families. We don't sit back and expect everyone else to pay our way and come running when something goes wrong. Does that make us selfish? I think you seriously need a new dictionary. It seems to have confused "Selfish" with Adult and "community" with totalitarian communism. Get your hands off our property, get your own and if we see people who deserve our help, its our choice to help them or not. If you don't like that. Tough! Thats how freedom works!

Its really amazing that she doesn't acknowledge that  preppers are already giving to thier communities ( and funding her worthless ass) with their taxpayer dollars. Funny how "community" seems to be always defined as some mandatory groups, rather than one that is voluntary. My inalienable right of association means I define who is and is not within my community, and liberal, EBT laden, non contributing zeros need not apply.  I think the liberals in this country are really thinking that we are still one family - that the old moral bonds that have kept us supporting them are still there to depend on.  With Obamacare they declared the right to force us into a community not of our choosing, to force us to support it and its moral degeneracy  with our blood and work, and they still have no clue what damage that did to the social fabric.  Boy are they gonna learn.

[Predator Don]

She should create her own reality show: Doomsday Takers.

[Pandora]

I am still astounded that you admitted that you don't have a GOBAG or provisions for yourself and that you can ONLY imagine a scenario where you are at your job's pre-established "battle station" and getting there and staying there works our 100% perfectly for you.

This part is a perfect critique of Valerie's own head-up-her-* thinking -- which is to say, she isn't.  She's made no provisions at home because she assumes she won't be home, and no provisions for dealing with any difficulty in getting to her assigned location.  But we preppers are the ignorant, selfish ones.

I'm becoming increasingly pissed at the government on all levels pushing the idea that unless I'm doing it their way, I'm doing it wrong, and that I need to be managed into their 'collective'.  This is more and more a denigration of the individual and a refusal to acknowledge that it is the many independent, self-reliant individuals, associating as they see fit, that comprise the sort of "collective" that actually works.

And Valerie, in her arrogance, is the sort that keeps regenerating my daymare of "the authorities" showing up with orders to "take it all".

[Alphabet Soup]

It's pretty amazing reading back through all of that and seeing her defiance in spite of the upbraiding she has received. Very revealing and indicative of what happens when you put fools in charge of anything.

[Pandora]

It's pretty amazing reading back through all of that and seeing her defiance in spite of the upbraiding she has received. Very revealing and indicative of what happens when you put fools in charge of anything.

And sort of scary, if I may say so.  Folks like her showing up, throwing their weight around, herding people "for their own good", telling folks what they may or may not do, with no regard for those who neither need nor want their "help".

Where the hell was FEMA in Staten Island, after Sandy, to assist people whose houses still stood?  Or, for that matter, where were the State and local emergency "management" people who could have kicked-started the debris removal folks?  Many of the residents were in good enough condition to want to begin cleaning up and if the authorities did anything, it was to obstruct.

A while ago, I read "One Second After", a book about the aftermath of an EMP attack and one thing struck me particularly hard.  The community --  a neighborhood and its immediate surrounds -- got themselves organized and functioning well enough that they knew if "the authorities" showed up, said authorities needed to be persuaded that their "help" was unnecessary.

Sometime after the Y2K hoohah, my county officials looked into "disaster preparedness" and put out the word that in case of a widespread emergency, folks should at least "check in" at the shelters, even if they decided not to stay, so everyone could be "accounted for".

Right.  Like that's ever gonna happen.  I don't want nor need them "accounting" for me and mine; I'm not their concern.

eta:  Aha.  I see Weisshaupt has struck a blow for us self-reliant types in the comments section at the last piece.

[AlanS]

And Valerie, in her arrogance, is the sort that keeps regenerating my daymare of "the authorities" showing up with orders to "take it all".

Coming soon to a disaster near you.

[Pandora]

And Valerie, in her arrogance, is the sort that keeps regenerating my daymare of "the authorities" showing up with orders to "take it all".

Coming soon to a disaster near you.

That's what *they* think.  "Over my dead body" is not an offer to negotiate.

[John Florida]

   Screw those that don't do a daned thing to take care of themselves and wait for people like her to come and save them.

   I on the other hand bought 4 more cans of coffee today(on sale of course) and I had coupons for it too.