News Flash: You ain’t Tokyo Rose. Further news flash: No one is paying you to spread fear and despondency. So I guess you’re doing it pour l’amour or le sport, uh?
Look, everyone gets scared, okay? And sometimes you’re so terrified you just blurt it out. You can’t stop it. You partly need reassurance, and partly the nightmare is trying to come out. I’ve been known to do, but I usually do it in a small group, who then beat me about the face and head. Until I stop doing it.
Because let’s be real: The nightmare you’re having is a nightmare. It’s composed mostly of the narrative of every movie you’ve watched. It won’t actually work in real life.
I will grant you that’s what the left is trying to make happen. They watched the same movies. Worse, they made those movies. But it’s not real.
Note I’m not immune to them. I’m also narrativium poisoned. My only advantages in this are two: I’ve seen a country (much smaller and more vulnerable) come apart once, and it’s not like the movies. In fact, if you need a motto, let it be “THIS IS NOT A MOVIE. IT WON’T HAPPEN LIKE THAT.” Even in the middle of utter chaos order remains. And the enemy’s plan ALSO does not survive contact with reality.
AND I’m a massive, clinical depressive who doesn’t want to be treated. No judgement on anyone who gets treatment, okay? It’s just that a) I like to know what I’m thinking with is my thinking meat. and b) I know what lies buried in mom’s family tree, and the tendency of anything I take to have bizarre side effects. As a friend told me, who refuses to take pain meds for fear of becoming a mass murderer “you don’t want to know what me on those rare side effects would be or do. Neither do I.”
So, my only means of controlling depression is what I call “Continuous reality checking.”
Which means I think through things, and go on the instances of what has actually happened in the past. Which is rarely what people are afraid of/Hollywood pushes.
So when I posted yesterday’s post, someone took that picture of rural solitude and said “Until the hordes from the city arrive.” Head>desk.
What hordes? This is one of the most persistent myths, and it is totally Hollywood fueled.
It only survives if you don’t think of real life, and what real life looks like. We’ve done a lot of driving these last three years, while rarely leaving the west (and that only one trip.) There is a lot — A LOT — of rural solitude out there. Miles and miles of miles and miles, and fields tended by robotic machinery. Maybe a farmhouse in the distance.
Now those farmhouses would be awfully easy to overpower. Probably. I mean, I happen to know what some of those people have in their outbuildings because I come from a family that had things in their outbuildings. Even not counting “armed to the teeth” there are parts of this country I do not encourage you to invade. But yeah, you could probably overpower one or two farm houses. Except this is not the 1930s. People would find out. And the next farmhouse, anyone trying to overpower it would be in a world of hurt.
But even then you need to unpack it further: Who is going to do the overpowering?
Sure, maybe they can get the army in. And that’s a shortcut to that incident that sets fire to the powder keg. But otherwise? Uh…. So, they’ve been trying. They even tried to show people how to do it. Yep, that was that OWS and BLM were all about. “If we show the proles how to revolt.” It didn’t work. Both movements remained movements of hired hands and psychos. (Most of them white, btw.) And neither moved on to the country side. Because urban populations don’t. Because they don’t organize well, and even agents provocateurs have problem organizing them. Because the countryside is armed, and small towns have a weird cohesiveness that makes strangers stick out like a sore thumb. Because between the city and “targets of opportunity” there’s miles and miles of miles and miles. Because small towns have notoriously poor looting. Because, because, because.
I stand by my predictions for when/if EBT cards fail: a population trained for this for generations will only burn their own neighborhood, then sit down waiting for the cameras. Because it always worked in the past. And that’s what humans do, preferentially.
Yes, it will change if REAL famine is involved, but that’s not EBT that’s “total collapse of society”. Because before that, churches move in and treat the inner cities like we treat Haiti or parts of Africa when a need is perceived. “Bury them in donations.”
And even real famine…. well…. look, I grew up rural, and I have no idea how one butchers a cow. My expertise stops at chickens. I could figure out rabbits. But other than that? Yeah, no. And people who never really cooked, which is a problem for our welfare class? Yeah. No. There just aren’t a ton of McDonalds and such to loot in the countryside.
Then put in the size of this country and variable climates.
Sure, okay, you can hurt people. But even that, not on a grand scale, and it might be indistinguishable from meth heads committing theft and arson in rural areas.
It just does NOT happen that way. It’s not the way it works.
And with just about everything, when you imagine apocalyptic scenarios, that’s actually impossible.
You have to remember that you too are under the influence of the same stories that activate the left. You just don’t think they’re wonderful, but you don’t see the holes unless you really stare at it.
Stare at it.
This is not the end of the world. This is not the great revolution.
This is the equivalent of trying to build up the Berlin wall while others are demolishing it. That’s what the left is doing.
The strange idea that communism would win in the end was just communist propaganda. That’s the only strength they ever had. And now even that is losing its power. Because we have alternative media and other means.
The only reason the USSR even survived as long as it did was the connivance and help of the richest country in the world.
I’m not saying — AND I WANT YOU TO UNDERSTAND I’M NOT SAYING — it’s all going to be sweetness and roses.
We’re in a really bad spot, and good people are going to get hurt before this is fixed. Plus decades of wealth and advance in health and science are going to be sacrificed.
But this is not the end. And when you run around posting fear-porn, what are you helping?
Because the only way they hold on, even for a little while, is if we give up and self-defeat.
You’re not Tokyo Rose. And no one is paying you.
Be not afraid. We win, they lose.
This one is going to hurt like a mother, but we’ll be okay in the end.
According To Hoyt 
First? That’s a first.
Even if a mob makes it from a city to the countryside and overruns some farms, while it sucks for those farmers, then what? They all still die of starvation. It’s not as if food grows itself if you just happen to be standing in a field.
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and that’s if the farm actually grows foodstuffs
some grow the stuff you need to feed food, and some grow what you need to then grow the stuff you feed food. Some grow the stuff you then plant to grow stuff that after processing correctly you then get a food.
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The reality check is much appreciated. Should I deposit it, or cash it for the weekend? ;-)
All kidding aside, it’s very hard not to think of the future (and the present) in terms of stories, and stories notoriously possess Beginnings and Endings, whereas daily life takes the form of One Dang Thing After Another, and the story only takes form when one selects certain Dang Things in consecutive order and assembles the story after the fact, using assorted deductions, a prejudice or two, and a generous pat of see-I-told-you-so as adhesives. Not that I’m eager to find out what stories will be cobbled together from the mess that has been the first quarter of a very irritating century ….
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People on the coasts, particularly in the leftist enclaves on the coasts, are a bit like Europeans who think they can visit New York City, and take a day to drive to Texas, look around, and drive back.
Thinking the urban masses can overwhelm the rural rubes makes a certain amount of sense in their context. First of all, there are a lot of people in the greater Los Angeles area, and it covers a lot of area. To think they could flood out and overwhelm the countryside is not insane, if one doesn’t have a solid idea of what “the countryside” actually is.
Also, keep in mind, these people are pure “primacy of consciousness”. That is, they don’t care about (or really understand) the physical world, they only understand people as objects of manipulation. They see the numbers of people in LA, and how few people are elsewhere, and think of course the outnumbered rubes will have to bend and sway to the mob rule. Because they don’t have a clue about reality, only about people.
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Or fly into Pittsburgh and drive down to Disney World for a long weekend. Had to try and talk one European family out of that particular trip back when I worked in Hell on Earth, aka Airport Wrent-A-Wreck Counter.
And I would argue that they don’t have a clue about people either. Not people in general, at least; only the tiny amount of people in their bubble. The rest of their “understanding” comes form social media (which the algorithms skew very heavily) and the Legacy Media, which is so biased (and even more clueless about everywhere that isn’t NYC and LA) it’s funny.
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I did not mean that they understood people in fact, only that they saw the world purely as groups of people, to be manipulated to achieve their desired outcome.
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Ah. Gotcha. Mea Culpa. And agreed: they see people as interchangeable widgets, to be used, manipulated, and discarded as needed.
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Not your fault, I was less than perfectly clear.
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and Cornish friend was boggled at my “quick trip to visit the parents” from NOLA to Memphis, reinforcing the “In the USA 100 years is a long time, and in Europe 100 miles is a long trip” meme.
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Absolutely true. We drove four hours to get from one side of Scotland to the other and our bnb hosts were AGHAST that we would drive so far. “You came from Edinborough today? Wow!”
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They don’t really know NYC either, they only know a few neighborhoods in Manhattan and Brooklyn, a few suburbs, and the affluent areas at the shore. the vast majority of NYC is terra incognito to them.
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I’ve coined the term “urban provincial” for them. They think that their urban enclaves are the entire world.
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I’ll add that the passes through the San Gabriel range are perfectly defensible. And that California Aqueduct that waters LA…runs right through the Mojave Desert.
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California can be seriously fucked by four knowledgeable men with power saws and a case of dynamite.
Sure, fixable. On the right bad day? Hooooeeeee.
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quite possible without the tnt or nitro
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Denver likewise, but most people don’t talk about it as much. (OK, they’d lose a substantial chunk of their water, but not 95% of it like parts of CA would.)
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Greater LA is odd, as I’ve noted a time or three in the past. It’s very unusual compared to most urban areas.
But even if you could get a mob together in LA that felt like going somewhere else, it’d run east, hit the few small rural towns out that way… and then run smack into the Sierra Nevadas. And that would be the end of that. There’s a reason why mountains have traditionally served as barriers for travelers and armies.
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People on the coasts think they can go to New York City and pop up to visit Niagara Falls for a day. No, that would be two days full of driving and a quick ride on Maid of the Mist.
I have to explain to them “No, we live as far from New York City as LA is from SF.
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Problem is they don’t know how far it is from LA to SF. Also, bad analogy for those of us on the west coast. Hubby and I (okay, I rode) have driven from SF to LA, and *longer, in one day. So I suspect the roads from NYC to Niagara Falls are highway, not freeway, and not at 80+ MPH.
(*) Bend to San Diego. Eugene to San Diego. I get sick, two or three days later, but we have done it, twice (I refused to do the Eugene to LA drive when we took our 4 year old to Disney, we flew). Hubby did the Covallis to San Diego most holidays, in one day, while in college. The freeway run, then, was not at 80+ MPH, not unless one wanted a ticket or two. We regularly drive from Tetons or Yellowstone to Eugene, in one day (13 hours driving, 850 miles, half freeway at 80+ MPH minimum, now). Coming home, not going, I refuse to be sick once there.
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I live 20 miles from downtown Newark NJ and 30 from NYC. Even here on the coast I can’t really see the urban masses flooding out to where I am, especially through the blue collar working class neighborhoods they’d have to go through. The roads will quickly become clogged, the ghettos will quickly become a killing ground, and 20 miles is a long way to walk under intermittent fire. Despite what you might read, an awful lot of people here are armed so those few who manage to get this far will face … consequences.
Of course, if there’s a general collapse I’m dead too since the food has to be trucked in but A) I very much doubt there’ll be a general collapse, most of that thinking is just disaster porn, and B) I have no interest in surviving one should it occur.
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I’ve been thinking along those lines recently.
I live in a ‘gentrifying neighborhood’. I mean, it’s always been quite a few of the upscale types in the bigger houses that are also century homes. But, a minority, even so.
Many of the houses were sold cheap a long time ago, and some were held for rental property.
But, over the last decade or so, there have been people who were leaving the nearby suburbs for city life.
I understand the attraction – less need for multiple cars, easy access to medical care, less of a hassle to shop and get groceries.
When we moved in, I could see the potential for a regrowth. Covid was still keeping many indoors, and the houses were big enough to have a home office, and close enough to delivery services (Amazon, DoorDash, pizza) to facilitate the lockdown.
In just a little over a year, the value of the house has risen, nearby houses are being rehabbed, and the outlook for the neighborhood’s future is bright.
And, yet, there are those who are pushing back. Most recently, there was a family with multiple dogs, that were in the habit of letting them roam the neighborhood.
They knocked down trash bins, pooped everywhere, barked freely and were quick to charge people and other animals.
A nuisance.
And, some of the neighbors called the cops on them. When the cops arrived, in the process of trying to corral the dogs, one was shot.
Was it a justified shooting? Opinions differ. In the newspapers and on television reports, the outraged owners of the dogs have pushed for the officer who used his gun to be charged with – not quite murder, but close to it.
If you paid attention to the media’s flogging the story, you would think that the neighborhood was on the verge of rising up, with pitchforks, to demand justice for the dead animal.
And, yet, that’s not the full truth. Not even close.
A few neighbors are on the side of the dog owners.
Most are not. They may not be vocal, but they are also not posting inflammatory flyers around the neighborhood.
Most of us regret the death of the dog, but also believe that such an action wouldn’t have been taken, had the owners not made a regular practice of loosing their animals in an urban neighborhood, and letting everyone else deal with the consequences of that negligence.
Is the split Old Settlers vs. the New Residents?
Somewhat, but not completely. Quite a few of those who have lived here longer like the peace and quiet that has followed the ‘White Colonists’.
I expect that’s common; probably the majority of the Aztecs were glad to see the blood sacrifices end, too.
Most people just want to have a peaceful environment.
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I don’t have any problem with a cop shooting a dog that’s attacking someone, including themselves.
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There’s a reason they really don’t like body-cams for these stories.
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I grew up around farms. Nuisance dogs disappeared. You might get one call to come get the mutt if no damage and the dog was “nice”.
Damaged livestock? Snapped at someone? You might hear the shotgun. You wouldn’t find the remains.
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Most areas have leash laws. At large dogs are taken in by the dog catcher, now called a animal shelter. Locally residents will catch loose dogs and post “Found”. Suppose to also call animal shelter and report they have the dog. Depending animal shelter will let them foster said dog if rescuer is willing (after checking for chip and lost dog reports). Most rescuers avoid that because owner can be fined for having a dog at large. The dog at large is waved for working dogs on farms, ranches, or with public land grazing stock. People who regularly let one, let alone 4 dogs roam by turning them out, known by the neighborhood, won’t have said dogs. Neglect, at minimum, will be charged, and the dogs held until resolution, if not convinced to surrender the dogs before then. This has been the county law since mid to late ’60s. Not an unusual law, at least in Oregon or Washington Counties (Lane, Benton, Douglas, and Cowlitz, counties, which is where I have lived).
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Ooh yeah. My friend who grew up rural has been known to shoot nuisance dogs near his family home . . . most of the time with one warning to the owners, but not if they were harassing livestock. Oh, the owners got mad? shrugs We warned you, you didn’t train your dog correctly or keep it on your property, you’ve made your problem my problem to solve.
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(Shrug) “What dog?”
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I had to help put down a pack of dogs that were attacking livestock. Those of us who hung out around the stable checked with the sheriff, and the property owner had warned the dogs’ owners three times. The next time the pack showed up? There were four fewer dogs in [redacted] county. None of us liked having to do it. The owners posted “missing pet” notices but no one said a word.
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There are areas where owners get no, none, zip, notice. Dog does not belong on the rural property. Dog is shot. Did not matter if dog was not ever allowed to roam at will. Just took once. (Might have changed now.) But it is something that terrifies the hell out of me.
Not only do we take gate and door security extremely serious with our dog, now and in the past, I threshold train from the time a dog enters our home. This means if a gate/door is accidentally left open the dog should not cross the threshold unless explicitly invited. I also train for public off leash control. Our fear here is roads and vehicles. There are fields with livestock well within roaming distance (< 2 miles away), but at least not right next door.
Although our current dog is both public off leash and threshold trained, I do not want that training put to test outside of training.
Not too concerned about someone in the neighborhood shooting loose dogs, that would get the shooter in bigger trouble than the person with a dog at large; exception would be if dog invaded the shooters house aggressively. While our neighborhood is county, it is considered urban, until get to the many acres of land with livestock, not rural. Discharging a firearm is illegal in the urban neighborhoods, officially city, or not. Even the near by rural properties, as close as they are to neighborhoods, discharging a firearm is sketchy.
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Nemo me impune lacessit
To every thing, there is a season.
And those who would be our masters have been sowing the wind for generations.
It will be a bitter harvest.
I will quibble that the communism is mostly window dressing to attract pawns.
What they actually want, is Oligarchy. A neo-feudalism without reciprocal duties, with them as gentry (at least).
That said, those not in the inner circle have a weakness for buying their own propaganda.
I’m hopeful that this will lead to the threat tearing itself apart before things become fully unpleasant. It’s still likely to be rough, though.
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Agreed – that communism is just feudalism in drab 20th century robes, without any of the feudal sense of duty and obligation to the peons/proletariat. Or the spiffy armor, gorgeous churches and spectacular castles. Just a new oligarchical class, sniffling around for the goodies.
And the urban orcs generally have no freaking notion of how empty the rest of the US is. Of how far between towns, or how … very hostile the locals will be to outsiders who come to loot, rape and burn.
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We are in escrow on a little farm in the Sierra foothills Tried fleeing CA entirely, but we want to see the grandkids grow up. Good news: we’re only 45 minutes from the kids. Bad news: that means we’re only about an hour from a big blue city, and may 30 minutes from suburbs of same.
Farm used to be an orchard, and is now set up for cattle, sheep, goats maybe – whatever I eventually want. I garden; I’ve planted fruit trees. Chickens don’t seem too hard…. Start slow, but not too slow – need to get the fruit trees in the ground, and a big garden planted (long growing season here in CA).
We’re not far enough away. But I think, from what I know of the neighbors, it would not go well for anyone attempting to violate property or personal rights out here.
Hope we never find out.
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An hour by motor vehicle, without road blocks.
Something goes really wrong no one’s going to drop trailers on those roads? I’d bet someone will. Cars will break down or people wreck, and no one shows up to tow. Interstates aren’t even a century old.
Walking time, how far are you? I’m going to guess at least thirty miles. Are your hordes fitness nuts, and are they prepared to scrounge safe water and overnight shelter?
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I’m 45 minutes from the largest city in Flyover County, a not very big city. 20K people, with about 3 times that in the county. Go east another county and it would add maybe 5-10K people (haven’t seen the latest census guess).
A while ago, I went through the exercise of what Flyover Falls could do if the big cities went bonkers. Short answer, the teeming hordes could be stopped by a handful of motivated teams with the usual tools at hand. (That’s assuming the junta didn’t try to contribute an F-15 or two, but the local ANG would have opinions on that, too.)
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Good points, There are some windy narrow parts on the interstate where a few well-placed wrecks could shut it down. Lots of windy back roads, also easy to block/defend.
When we were property hunting in the area, saw plenty of deer heads and such mounted on walls. One guy we know is ready to pop a mountain lion (they have been known to eat his sheep). Everybody is equipped to handle smaller vermin – coyotes, racoons, the usual suspects.
Getting all the way back to our (we hope!) future place is 30 minutes of driving on the interstate, and then 16 minutes winding up into the hills a bit, past dozens of other little farms and ranches. If you have a car and roads are clear – and they could be made unclear very quickly.
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Get to know some of your neighbors.
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Hordes from the cities?
My first thought is “who’s going to organize the hordes”?
Because, I suspect that the majority of people “leaving the cities” will
be traveling as small groups (perhaps under 20 people).
Such groups will have limited supplies (especially food) and likely
won’t want to share their supplies with “just anybody”.
Why should they allow people into their group who are “just hungry
mouths” and aren’t “anybody they know”?
Of course, there might be several of these small groups traveling in the
same direction but I suspect the small groups would be more concerned
about other small groups than about the country folk that they might see.
Of course, there might be mobs streaming out of the cities but mobs
would likely “loose their energy/anger” quite quickly as they travel any
“long distance” especially if they’re marching far from “places to loot”
or far from “people to beat up on”.
*
Paul (Drak Bibliophile) Howard
*
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Remember, IIRC, the Ferguson riots, and the group that was going to march to Jefferson City (And be bused back to St. Louis every night)? I think it lasted maybe 2 days before it faded to nothing. And that was through relatively settled areas. Hordes from the city wouldn’t get anywhere.
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One of the drivers to my early retirement was the frustration of dealing with hordes of people who know absolutely nothing. They don’t know how anything works, they don’t know how to fix anything, they cannot hunt or farm or cook or anything! They can use their thumbs to press buttons on a little screen.
They are not reality based but feelings based. So when reality happens they will collapse and sit on a rock and cry. Yes, they have some power right now, and can do a lot of damage. But in the end reality will win!
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I’ve mentioned this story before, but I think it bears repeating here:
Back during the Summer of Love and Fiery But Mostly-Peaceful Protests, after successfully sacking downtown of Nearby Major City, BLM and ANTIFA announced that they would be spreading their protest to Town About An Hour North. Town About An Hour North’s leadership let it be known that while they lacked the manpower to stop the “mostly-peaceful protest” (and possibly had been ordered to stand down by the state attorney general, I’ve heard it both ways)…. but that also meant that they lacked the manpower to protect the “mostly-peaceful protestors” from the townspeople. Most of whom, they were careful to note, avidly embraced their Second Amendment rights. They were also careful to note that it was, in fact, legal in Town About An Hour North to use lethal force to defend one’s life, and dropped several not-so-subtle hints that they’d look the other way if lethal force was used to protect property.
Either ANTIFA and BLM chickened out and never showed at all, or (and this is the version of the story I hope is true), drove into town, saw several individuals armed with long guns standing on rooftops, and kept on driving.
Point of the story: I think if The Hordes do empty out of the cities and attempt to sack the countryside or “Punish those evil ignorant racist country bumpkins,” or whatever (assuming, as has been pointed out above, they can get organized into large enough groups to actually pose a sustained threat), they are gonna be in for a great big frakking surprise, especially if they manage to successfully sack a few suburbs or small towns. Once word gets out (and word WILL get out), the next few towns in their path will probably decide that they aren’t interested in Going Quietly Into The Night just yet. Nor, I suspect, will they be all that interested in taking prisoners.
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“Buzzards gotta eat too.” (Just don’t be like the idiots from farther east who thought that leaving a body fifty yards from I-40 on a New Mexico ranch would conceal it forever because it was in the middle of nowhere. Rancher found the deceased the next day. The perps couldn’t believe that anyone would find the body so fast.)
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Perps must’ve been city boys.
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City boys just seem to find out early,
how not to hide bodies in a field.
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Digging a proper grave is hard work.
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Prep to make sure it isn’t found or disturbed immediately takes some time as well.
There’s a reason why I have a big canister of cayenne pepper powder…
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Hrmm…. not that I expect to need such beyond seasoning and squirrel deterrent (the local squirrels seem to have an odd affinity for vehicle wiring, at least mine… last plug wire I installed got a coating of hot hot sauce first. Another cover got sprat-glued and coated in LOTS of cayenne…) but I can see stocking up on such.
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“the local squirrels seem to have an odd affinity for
vehiclewiring,”FTFY. Any kind of wiring / electricity transmitting is apparently tasty. This is a problem,,,,,,
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Never had issues OTHER than vehicle. Then, I do likes me my High Voltage…
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no. They make vehicle wire coverings from soy, because global warming or something.
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They were.
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They forgot (or didn’t hear of) the second of the 3 Ses.
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Pa: “It’s sort of amazing how little effort some go to in hiding bodies.”
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The Hordes may not even get out of city limits, if my own outer-ring suburb is anything to go by. Decide that you wanna beat up on the suburbanites in our tidy little homes to the north of town, loot our small businesses, show them all who’s boss?.
Well, bless your heart. There are a lot of military veterans here, who love our modest small homes, and if you tossed my neighborhood alone, there would be enough small arms to outfit a very small European country, I am certain.
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Oh. I am sure that your neighborhood is the only one in the US. /sarcasm off
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TOTALLY. The rest of us lost all hardware in a boating accident.
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As been pointed out many times. We are lousy boaters.
In that vein, we donated all the life jackets we had to the Sheriff boat patrol. (Seriously we did.) Not needed for us to
dredgeretrieve ours from our lake.LikeLiked by 1 person
I was canoeing out on Lake Superior one November . . .
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One pissed off vet with a Garand can wreck a whole riot.
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Indeed. Heck, any motivated citizen with good aim could fill in for said veteran in a pinch.
I’ve done some reading and observation, and I know which of the people in those “mostly peaceful” protests need to quit breathing first. A Garand would be a fine thing (I do want one), but just about any serviceable rifle would be sufficient to the task. When those m-f’ers are dead or trying with all their might not to be, all that’s left is lemmings.
Anyway, pretty sure there won’t be any of those big social events happening in my smallish town out in the middle of nowhere. No apocalyptic urban horde is ever going to make it out here, five hours’ drive from the nearest big city and three hours’ drive off the interstate on little winding highways. But there are quite a few idiot college students in town, and some of them have got a bit spicy in the past (not about politics, yet; there was a beer riot once). It never hurts to prepare just a bit.
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Let me guess.. it’s NOT the obviously ‘active’ ratfinks, but the quieter ones egging them on that need to… er… go underground?
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Indeed. If you’re inside a location they’re targeting, you’re not likely to see any of them, but if you have a good vantage point, there are tells as to who these people are.
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IIRC anyone with a skateboard or a backpack with “medic” markings.
Y’know, according to rumor.
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I have heard those rumors too. Also rumors about bike riders, helmets w/cams. And add “observer” and “press” to the so-called medics.
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Students and beer riots are an ancient tradition. As in “goes back to the Middle Ages.” Apprentice riots could also get sporting.
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Yep. The one that happened here back in the ’90s was more like a gargantuan, out-of-control block party at which police were not welcome than anything else. There was one really spicy night where they burned things in the streets, threw stuff at the cops who tried (and failed) to break it up, and generally behaved like idiots. Then hangovers kicked in and things calmed down.
Not something I’m super worried about, as I don’t live on college hill and it only happened once, 25 years ago, but it is worth being aware of. Nobody was prepared for that, especially not the police. Now they have riot training (for whatever that’s worth) and the campus has its own fully functional police force that coordinates with the city. And still, if enough students decide to cause a problem at the same time for any reason, it could become a big problem for this small, isolated locality.
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I recall a YouTube clip of Clint Smith recounting a conversation he’d had with a Korean War vet who’d been at Chosin Reservoir in Korea. The initial discussion was if the PING! of the Garand’s clip ejecting was a hazard that alerted the enemy the gun was unloaded. Clint reported that the Vet said something to the effect of “I never heard the PING!, I just kept shooting and reloading and thanking God I had an Aught-Six, because it would kill ’em three, four, five, six deep.”
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these folk did a decent job of keeping things from getting out of hand in their ‘hood.
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That’s more or less what happened with BLM decided to bring the Summer of Love to Flyover Falls’ downtown district. After they saw the shop owners with AR-15s, and their friends with AR-15s and friends of friends, so it ended up being a Truly Peaceful Protest.
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Springfield Oregon less than a block off of Main (Hwy 126 E) street. And Springfield is along I-5 corridor, right next to Eugene. Of coarse Eugene couldn’t get any more than 2 people to protest by walking down River Road from the north. The two did say they got waves of support by the people driving by. Um. More like pointing and laughing. But, whatever.
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The hard-core of the anarcho-communists are gunning up big-time.
Still outnumbered badly. They wont be “fish in the sea”. More like turds circling the bowl. They may count significant Coup. Then they get existentially extinguished.
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Heck I know a few farmers who are just outside of the metro areas (Portland Metro). Bring up the concept of said inner city groups marching out of the city looking for farmers to loot? They won’t stop laughing for days, if not months.
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The ones who give me the chuckles are those who think that the Mormons-with-full-sheds will roll over and give up. That’s a hard nope with 0.308 chaser.
I recall one LDS member who suggested the best way to deal with the “re”introduced wolves (rumor has it those aren’t the wolves who were native but are much more aggressive), with the Faraday addition to the 3Ss. He didn’t say it, I didn’t hear it and he doesn’t live here any more.
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A fella at the Maker Space where I (used to) hang out once stated that his SHTF plan was to “Just take what (he) need(s) from the Mormons.” He was a bit boggled when I told him he’d proposed a novel way of committing suicide . . .
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LDS are not Mennonites or Amish. How many people don’t realize that?
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Mormons are religious and therefore stupid, to their way of thinking.
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Besides, they are BAD CHRISTIANS if they don’t do what secular liberals say Christians should do.
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I mean, all christians are bad christians, sorta by defintion. But also, I’ve heard “good” conservative Catholics rail against Mormonism at length, so it’s hardly just the secular left.
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In the late 60s to about mid 80s, a lot of the folks who…. um…. had reasons to not want to be too closely observed by mainstream Mormon practitioners… moved into largely Catholic areas. (Because “poor European immigrant” type rural areas are still relatively inexpensive and not strongly observed.)
Had a nasty habit of acting like mobsters, to be blunt, and that’s when it wasn’t one guy and his Hey Let’s Set Off All The Predator Warnings nonsense.
Going off of the very carefully not cursing my neighbor did when I carefully warned her about my mom possibly acting weird until she got to know them*, those jerks are a known problem both inside and out of their church.
mom behaved; I knew she’d like them as soon as she knew them, but that gap…
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Christianity is doing whatever leftists demand by whatever forced interpretation they use.
This is distinct from differences of opinion where the people admit of standards of evidence.
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They’re probably confusing “nice” (which most people agree your typical Latter-Day Saint is) with “easy mark”. But those two words are not synonamous.
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I mean there are definitely some liberal Mormons who are the world’s easiest marks but otherwise not a great plan.
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The liberal Mormons are, in my experience, more likely to be on church welfare than to have any actual food storage or preparedness for any kind of emergency. shrugs They get all cerebral and forget the physical world, I guess.
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Not too many people steal from the Amish.
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But the ILOH will be happy to feature him as Target #1 in a blog post.
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Not novel at all. When I was a kid a neighbor told my Dad he didn’t need food storage. “You have your food storage, I have my guns, I’ll just come take yours.”
He apparently hadn’t considered the possibility that Dad might have weapons too.
They’re an interesting breed. Not very intelligent, but interesting.
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Good luck trying that on Larry Correia.
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Dibs on the beer stand…..
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Not such, but granny hunted. ’nuff said.
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Rule 308.
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I sort of like the mental image of a group of city folks trying to get one cow out of a feed lot. Or trying to slaughter and butcher a cow in a feedlot. beatificlly evil kitty smile
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Add this one. One of the group “Look! That one is in a field all by itself!” The one that normally has a sign that says “Hope you can cross the field in 9 seconds because the bull can do it in 10” conveniently removed. OTOH if the farmer really wanted to be nasty, the bull would be in with the rest of the herd instead. Least the group decides to go after the sheep. Um. Well. Um. Locally anyway the Great Pyrenees, Donkey, and/or Llama, guardians might have a word or two with the group members. Cougars would rather go after deer, bison, or elk, etc., than deal with 4 legged livestock guardians. But the cougars are more intelligent than the would be urban looters.
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There is a difference between ‘moo’ and, roughly, ‘Moo, damnit!’
I’ve been in fields where ‘moo’ might be heard. Even I don’t venture into fields that indicate (sign or no, there IS indication) ‘Moo, damnit!’ is the default.
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“Dang, that cow has a thick neck and heavy shoulders.”
Me: “Ah, that’s the gentleman cow. And you caught his eye. Let’s leave, shall we?” The other Victorian term I like is “cow brute.”
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The joke – and there are actual signs, so it seems real – around here is “don’t pet the furry cows”. Apparently, tourists think bison are pet-able.
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I’ve seen people in Yellowstone trying to take selfies with the buffalo.
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Humans!
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And they should be encouraged, to keep evolution a working proposition.
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Not only selfies with bison, but with moose, elk, pronghorn, wolf, and bears (both kinds). Unfortunately when mamma bear or wolf takes exception (and she will) it is the bear or wolf (and probably the babies too) who dies. The others, because harmless grazers, don’t. I have a huge problem with that policy. The perpetrators if they live, will be fined, maybe jailed, and banned from national parks for X years (should be banned for life).
There was a huge uproar (I even commented) when one of 399’s 2020 quads was killed (after 399 kicked them out on their own at 2 1/2) for hitting up neighborhood garbage in south Jackson, where garbage is not required to be bear proof. The Wyoming game (not national park) rangers should have blisters just from the comments. The locals should have blisters from the comments for not having bear proof garbage containers. This year 399 only has one COY. While she is raising it in the front country (near roads) she is not expected to leave the park with it like she did with the quads when she was trying to keep herself and 4 yearling-then-two-year-olds fed.
While not residing in the greater YNP/Teton ecological system, we visit a lot. I follow wildlife/bear developments there.
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I’ve heard of people trying to lure a buffalo calf from its mother so they could take pictures of it with their children.
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That truly is a case of mindboggling stupidity.
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When Deion Broxton had his famous encounter with buffalo, I saw someone post some ridicule on the grounds that buffalo were just shaggy cows.
Someone else did patiently explain that COWS aren’t a joke, either, but I doubt it sunk in.
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Anyone whoever has worked with cows on a family farm. Cows can be downright dangerous. Not as bad as pigs. At least cows won’t eat you.
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“What a DOPE! Acting like a toyota pickup dressed in fuzzy leather is a threat, ha-ha!”
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(We had several traffic accidents where those little toyota 80s style pickups hit a cow. That outweighed them. So that’s what always comes to mind for me.)
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The international gangs, terrorists (but I repeat myself), and the organized bad guys are more of a concern where I am. Our local unorganized problem children? Yes, they would/will be a problem to an extent. But I suspect there are a goodly number of people who would gladly provide security to charities. [Several groups already coordinate to reduce double-dipping and other fraud.]
“No, sir, you need to have children and their ID with you to get children’s things.” Large handgun briefly becomes visible “You’ll come back later? Certainly, sir. Jose, please show him the proper door. Thanks.”
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I had a conversation with a lefty coworker the other day that mildly amused me. I had mentioned that I rather enjoy some of the “reacts so” videos on the tube of yous, particularly regarding people finding out that slavery didn’t start in the USA, that there were black slave owners (mostly of family, but still a fair number for work) who supported the Confederacy, and that Lincoln didn’t actually free the slaves in the USA (he freed the ones in the CSA, which could admittedly still be considered a part of the USA). It eventually came around to how people could have morally supported the CSA. I eventually got her to admit that under the constitution each state was actually its own country, and that the states were really only using the federal government to represent them internationally and to keep the peace between the states. Therefore, the soldiers were fighting for their country against the Union.
She couldn’t quite see the link from that to the USA pulling out of NATO or the UN, and kept getting hung up on “well, no state would be able to go it alone against the rest of the USA.
Kamas716
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I’d say it’s a fair bet that Texas could beat the rest of the U.S. if it came to a knock-down, drag out. But both sides would be in severe hurting status afterwards. Easy pickings for the New World Order Vultures.
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I’m pretty sure a bunch of states would side with Texas.
Any issue big enough for them to start a conflict wouldn’t leave them fighting by themselves.
I’m just saying.
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I kinda figured that in with the bet. At the very least, some of those other states wouldn’t be supporting a national offensive against Texas, or would be providing the most incompetent literal support possible.
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I remember reading the book “One Second After” and it seemed to me to be a lot more like what “could” happen. I don’t think we would really get roaming hordes or cannibal armies but it does make a good story. In reality the city hordes would likely tear themselves apart before becoming any sort of organized threat beyond their original neighborhood.
The few gangs/groups that did get out to the countryside would indeed run into major issues and the locals would be much more likely to prevail over time. The average city type would also be lost in the country and unable to find food, water or shelter and Mother Nature would not be kind. Would it be rough for the rural folks? Sure but not something the majority of them wouldn’t be able to overcome. Farm and Ranch folk are not to be trifled with.
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Another version: as I said a week or two ago, the city of Deal lies no more than a mile, more like half a mile, from Asbury Park. Deal is, or was in the 80s and 90s, a very upscale beach town. As in, mansions, lots of mansions or at least very large, well-kept houses. When AP blew up in the 70s, the locals couldn’t be bothered to travel half a mile to rape, pillage and burn their next-door neighbors. If they didn’t have the oomph to make it to Deal, they aren’t going to make it into the New Jersey countryside, such as it is.
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I do think the Right is being targeted with mind viruses, and not just the ones Sarah mentions. Seeing some people on the Right so distrustful of anything official that they’ve started questioning everything from the shape of the Earth to the Holocaust. I’m convinced that some of it comes from the same source as the various idiot ideologies which have driven the Left collectively insane. If both halves of society lose their minds . . . watch out.
Tell me I’m overreacting, because this has been bothering me all day.
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Unfortunately you’re not overreacting. People are believing loony toons things just because they’re the opposite of what the left says.
Yeah. We’re in trouble.
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Not to mention the sudden embrace of guys like Andrew Tate. I mean, really? The sex trafficker? The guy who thinks reading is a waste of time? What can this guy say that I should listen to?
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I agree that Tate is a bozo, and mostly not worth listening to. But on the sex trafficking charges, I’m suspicious – I’ve not seen a single bit of evidence to prove that.
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It always amazes me how ready people are to swallow any kind of accusation, usually made years after the fact when there’s no possibility of corroborating evidence, especially when it’s made against people they disapprove of. See Donald Trump.
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Well, he did move to a country where the age of consent is considerably lower than the West and made his money from a shady camgirl operation, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he were into worse stuff.
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Me neither —- but being a cad and a bounder isn’t a crime. What are the standards for cad-dom?
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I’ve seen commenters at various places suggest what amounts to, basically, “The government said that the sky is blue, and the government lies. So I know without even bothering to check that the sky must not be blue.”
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Actually. there’s nothing wrong with questioning everything official. Why would anyone still trust them after being burned by them so many times?
Isn’t it said that insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result?
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If we’re going on how often one has been burnt– the progs have been using the “flip to the exact opposite and use it to hurt people” for at least half a century.
Remember how we’re all supposed to think Putin is a great guy, now, because the Progs eventually said “hey, invading the neighbors is bad”?
Or look at something simple, like women’s appearance. They first push that women aren’t supposed to have any body fat, and then they zip waaaaay the heck over to land whales.
Skipping right over that healthy women do have curves, and soft bits, and body type matters and such. Don’t even get started on the actual science involved in what is an appropriate body weight.
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Aye and Oy vey. That BMI thing… utter bilge. I am in the admittedly peculiar position that the BMI scale as a rough guide works for me. No way do I believe it works for everyone. And even then where ‘underweight’ is…. look, I’m not getting there even if I tried. It’d take genuine starvation – and I’d likely blow away before getting close.
I figure actual science (not “Follow the” crappola) hasn’t had an effect on Official idea of health and weight in too many decades.
Take a look at pictures of Woodstock. Find the fat folks. And then Government Advice happened… other things also happened, but just why did some get encourages and others not? Government Advice (and Coercion) Happened.
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I figure actual science (not “Follow the” crappola) hasn’t had an effect on Official idea of health and weight in too many decades.
100%.
Some of the actually-fat folks is simply they didn’t die, some of it is fashion differences, some of it is that when film is expensive you don’t want to take ugly pictures….and some of it is going on three generations of really bad advice, including dieting — OH WAIT I mean never diet when pregnant, but magically don’t gain weight beyond this chart where over a set number for your height you gain less than the child’s birth weight, yeah that’s the ticket– which is going to ‘teach’ the unborn child’s system that they are in famine.
We’ve had a minor experiment with our kids.
I ignored the numbers on the scale.
….none of my kids have the kind of weight issues I did as a kid, although some of those weight issues were “adults with rats in heads.” To the point that I stunted my growth by dieting in high school, while being constantly informed that if I just ate less I wouldn’t be so fat. (Got in the Navy, started eating more than about 1.2k calories a day, lost a lot of chub.)
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Won’t work with every child because everyone is different. Things we did different with our (one) child: Did not force him to eat anything. We did not have a “clean plate” policy. No “kids are starving in China/India/Africa (pick one)” comments. Tailored, more or less, to what child would eat. (Heck did for us too, why not? I won’t touch liver, organ meat, creamed corn, and a few other stuff. Hubby won’t touch brussel sprouts, etc.) Did not limit sweats (now he will not eat most sweets, including cakes, pies, and most cookies and candies). Yes, we had some push back from parents, and extended family, on catering to a picky eater. All came to an end when, other than sweets, he hit the “see food” diet, at age 14. Taken until he was over 30 to start putting on excess weight. (Genes, gets it from both sides.)
I doubt my teen dieting affected my height, being tall on either side of my family is roll of the dice. But teen dieting just taught my system to hold on to every ounce, starvation diet means I can gain weight, at best not gain but not lose it. Exercise does help, but dang it is slow. Early dieting also triggered the Hypoglycemia Reactive Hypoglycemia, not that I can prove it. The HRH explains my sudden childhood dislike of both pancake/french toast, etc., and fried chicken/fish, I can’t eat either without triggering the RH.
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did bicycle work for a little lady. 5’1″ and BMI said she was morbidly obese.
She was a Nautilus competition champ and a reserve on the Nation Olympic bicycle track team.
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Trust but verify.
Question everything.
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At this point it’s more a matter of ‘Distrust and verify’
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Questioning is the opposite of trusting them, whether to be wrong or be right.
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When official sources like, obviously and unnecessarily, people trust less, listen to and promote rumor more, and formulate conspiracy theories.
Lies combined with a government censorship push first intuited, and then officially confirmed?
We are maybe actually fortunate that things are as sedate as they are.
Putin is basically what would have happened if the USA had already been crocked, then HRC obtained totalitarian control over it. USA still has life potential, /and/ our idiots are unskilled, and have not been able to obtain as much control as they think they did.
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when official sources /lie/
argh, typos
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C4C
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Your mileage may vary.
I’ve faced dangerous cancers 2x successfully (by the grace of God), about 40 months of unemployment between full-time and contract work since 2009, lost all my savings and been down to less than $50 total at least 4 times, lost parents, friends, loved ones, preachers, recruiters, and more.
But we were not put on earth for our pleasure nor our glory. We are far more than lower animals. Humans require a challenge to really live.
Find your purpose and follow it. Find the work God created for you to do and stick at it.
We are being built into something fit for eternity. Don’t skimp on your future.
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…where I am?
Blow up the Golden Gate Bridge (or, if you want a less permanent thing, barricades on the Marin end of the bridge).
Most of the urban poor don’t know how to use a boat and the water is difficult to swim for even trained swimmers without gear.
If you get past that…you can either swing through the rest of the East Bay and Contra Costa County (and their desperate, hungry urban poor)…to hit the Carquinez Bridge and as bad a water obstacle if you block that off.
Let’s say they can get on or past the Golden Gate Bridge. There’s at least six spots on 101 that my untrained eye can see a simple barricade of cargo containers, belt-fed machine guns, and IEDs can hold off anything short of actual soldiers with heavy weapons or armor. Even semi-auto rifles can turn those locations into abattoirs with decent IEDs. Light mortars? Not even a challenge. Heavy artillery or large-caliber machine guns? Brutal.
The mind viruses that the Powers That Be are sharing…are ones that are far too old for me to take seriously. If they ever could be taken seriously.
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People who think food comes from a grocery store, water from a tap, electric power from a plug, and gas from a pump aren’t going to get very far before they find out that if they don’t have those at home anymore, the neighbors probably don’t, either. And miles and miles of corn intended for cattle feed or ethanol, or unripe soybeans won’t directly support an urban livestyle. You get hungry, thirsty, too weak to move, and then you die. In only a few days.
So let’s not let it happen.
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I’m not sure what our nation or the world will be like 20-50 years from now. I’m not sure we’ll win in the end (Nor sure, nor do I even assume, of course, that we’d lose in the end.), I just don’t know.
I am quite sure I will defend me and mine. I am sure I, and mine, will do what we can to defend the Republic. I don’t and won’t look for trouble. If I can avoid it I will, but I try to assure I’m ready to deal with such if necessary.
For example; two gentlemen I know were out fishing, a ways back in the bush, a week or so ago. A group of around a dozen, with non local accents, all strapped, told them they would appreciate if my friends quickly left as they wanted to fish there, meanwhile kicking and stepping on their equipment. My friends took their fish and left.
In my opinion they did the right thing, as would I in that situation. I’m quite willing to walk ten blocks out of my way to avoid an unnecessary confrontation.
However in the bush I’ve always carried a minimum of, say, 6 or 8 projectiles of a size to discourage a bear or moose, should it be necessary. If I’m not hunting them I always, always, am willing to step aside and give them the right of way. None the less I try to assure I’m prepared for whatever if they strenuously object to my presence.
I’m planning from now on to carry a couple of dozen at a minimum in case I’m approached by a wolf pack and I can’t walk five miles out of my way to get around them.
Just to be clear, such confrontations as I noted above are extremely, quite extremely, almost unheard of, uncommon here on top of the world, but when you’re in the middle of miles and miles, surrounding by nothing but more miles and miles, *hit sometimes happens.
As Baden-Powell wrote in 1908; Be prepared.
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The US might not be recognizable in fifty years, but it almost certainly won’t be because the communists won. The worst option that’s at all likely is that we get our own version of Napoleon.
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Reblogged this on Starvin Larry.
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The horde most people are concerned with will never happen. Aside from rampaging through their local shopping center when the EBT cards fail, the majority will sit at home waiting for help to arrive until they’re too weak to do anything about it. When they realize help isn’t coming, they’ll burn their own neighborhoods in protest.
There is, in my opinion, a horde to be concerned about in the case of a total and abrupt breakdown. Not the evil power mongers or rampaging gangs, but people with cars who are desperate and have nowhere to go.
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And IMO such a “horde” couldn’t/wouldn’t work together against a foe trying to stop them or (trying to get them to go another direction).
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Not a horde. Refugees, maybe.
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Hrmm.. will the Big Problem not be Invaders as such, but (as the LEFTIST Nazis used) Displaced Persons?
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For that, just look at evacuations before a hurricane. Bumper to bumper. Where people are aware of the possibility, are somewhat prepared, and have several days warning.
Now imagine that without anybody even trying to manage the traffic, clear wrecks, or get vehicles out of fuel (or electric charge) out of the way.
Definitely much less than 100 miles for the vast majority of the “horde.” With many more miles and miles of nothing to survive on in front of them.
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Sing it.
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In the second part of my series, the hero is told by the villain that he should just give up, he’s going to lose anyway. “Then why do you want me to quit so badly?” the hero shoots back. “If it really is that easy, get it over with already!”
Think about it. If it really is that easy, why do they want people to quit at all? It shouldn’t MATTER if the power really does not belong to those who resist. So why do we keep hearing, “You might as well give up now, there’s nothing going to stop your loss…” Yeah? Then why are they sweating?
(For the curious, you can find the series here: https://carolinefurlong.wordpress.com/the-guardian-cycle/)
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Ding! Ding! Ding!
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Costs of fighting are annoying. Or perhaps borne by the innocent.
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A ragtag bunch of assorted 15th century peasants were able to fend off our military for years.
I believe the citizens of Minot, ND, Kearny NE, Bozeman MT, or Casper WY won’t have too much trouble. The citizens of smaller places would have even less trouble.
I’m not worried about my house being looted for food. I don’t have any here. I only have ingredients.
And of course they could go back to nature, steal our land, and grow their food. L O L I saw how that would go back when those protestors in California wrecked that university’s experimental gardens and ruined years of work. What they “planted” to grow food for themselves didn’t last a week before dying.
Maybe they could get Bloomberg to show them how to dig a hole and put a seed in it to get them started.
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“I only have ingredients.”
Ignorance is starvation?
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Mind, I consider myself not-at-all a cook (oddly, I find baking easy…) but with “nothing but ingredients” I might not have GREAT meals, but I doubt I’d outright starve. But then, you aren’t needing defense from me, either. Worst case, I have stuff that can be had cold, but even heating it over a kerosene lantern would make it that much better. And I have the gear to do it. And.. Other Things.
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Florida occasionally evacuates cities, even whole areas. Sort-of.
It barely works with everyone cooperating, kind-of, half the folks syaying put, and the cops reversing flow on the other side of the interstates.
Barely works. Sort of.
Add a real panic, immediate bug out, and resultant chaos? No cooperation from folks controlling traffic? That barely working flow just stops. Jammed solid.
And most other places never even pretend to practice moving folks out of a city.
And if the evacuees show large-scale “locust”? Hoe Lea Sheet. A few folks with deer rifles can de-engine a handful of large vehicles and the roads are even more Frakked. No one is pushing that dead semi off the road.
The only way a sizeable locust mob relocates is with the active cooperation of, and logistical support by, the government. And in the face of any significant opposition, that would require military support. And prep for -that- would be kinds obvious.
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Odds of military, in that situation, actually cooperating? Not like the military can’t be told the goal and why. It’ll be obvious if they aren’t there for natural disaster relief.
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That the USA works with all those choke points shows that, overall, people DESIRE it to work. I can see how to mess things up without giving it much thought, but it would be local or regional. I’ve heard those In The Know figure it’d take a single-digit number of dedicated people to Mess Things Up nationally. I do NOT care to know how. And if I ever do discover such, I sincerely it is some joker bragging rather than historical experience. That said, if the alternative is worse…
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I can come up with two-three ways to Mess Things Up on a national scale, solo, without too much thought. And I’m not good with practical/engineering type stuff, either. Now, granted, if I were working purely solo, it’d take some work and time, and Not Getting Caught would be an issue after the first implementation. But I could do it to some extent, and again, I’m not good at this sort of thing.
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Can confirm; though after the mess that was the Hurricane Opal evacuation in 1995 Florida authorities eased back on mandatory evacuations and more toward “take your own chances”.
(Reports were from the number of people stuck unable to move off the highway at all they were looking at ordering thousands of body bags. I can’t confirm those reports, but I can definitely confirm traffic jams that took 14 hours to get less than 100 miles, I was in one.)
For subsequent hurricanes I just don’t evacuate. I’m above the tidal surge, I have food and water – it’s safer to stay put than go on the road.
If we ever do have large-scale “evacuate the cities!” It’s going to be less Mad Max and more a lot of people dying on the highways.
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Florida in 2004 was certainly interesting.
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It was indeed. Vaporized a house next door, pretty much….
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@ Sarah > “we’ll be okay in the end”
Or in the words of The Book of the Refrigerator Magnet:
Everything will be alright in the end.
If it’s not alright, it’s not the end.
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https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1719/1719-h/1719-h.htm#link2H_4_0002
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Some encouraging news.
https://notthebee.com/article/montana-state-library-commission-breaks-ties-with-american-library-association-after-national-organization-appoints-marxist-lesbian-as-president
The librarians’ letter says that their “oath of office and resulting duty to the Constitution association with an organization led by a Marxist.”
NTB: “Marxists gonna Marx, but you don’t have to play the game.”
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Preparedness is NOT just stocking food, water, fuel, ammo, arms (note: not all weapons are firearms – and desperate or PO-ed people can do amazingly nasty things with ‘not a real weapon’ or ‘not really a weapon’). It is ALSO a mind-set.
STEP ONE: Realize that, as crap as it might be, there WILL be a tomorrow.
STEP TWO: Decide to MAKE IT to that tomorrow.
STEP THREE: Work to make that tomorrow be less crap.
Now, ox slow, and maybe the steps are a bit askew, but you get the idea. Funny thing, even if you cannot work The Big Miracle, simple getting by – and helping others, when deserving or at least not actively anti-deserving – with the tiny miracles works wonders. Do that… and… strangely enough, the Big Miracles somehow take care of themselves.
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This. One step at a time. Keep it up, and you cover a lot of ground.
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If I can throw in one more point to consider.
We already know that the Left’s infosphere is contaminated. The separation between what they see on their screens vs reality is growing larger. Including things like diversity statements, company mission statements, ESG, and so on.
Yes, all these things exist and are doing damage. BUT. They don’t know to what extent they DO NOT affect the physical world. They have no way of knowing. There are no metrics to measure people who just aren’t there to be measured, who don’t sign up to things, don’t make their opinions known.
And their best efforts at predicting these people ends up with things like Bud Light, which honestly, nobody really understands (other companies have gone woke without suffering for it nearly as much, why this company, now?)
There is a disconnect between reality and their worldview. And they are desperately trying to overcome / control that disconnect by collecting more information, making better decisions, using bigger tech to gain more control. And yet even the big tech giants are losing customers, don’t know how to serve their clients, etc etc.
I think we will see a big push for more censorship (Australia is currently trying to ram a bill through to make all communications online subject to a ‘media regulatory board’ that determines ‘misinformation’ and punishes people for it), and all the while things will continue to spiral more and more out of control for them.
France’s riots are now being described as being ‘used by the Ultra-right parties to push their anti-immigrant narratives’ . . .
They are worried. And they will keep scrabbling for control harder and harder as it slips out from between their fingers.
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In France, Marine LePen’s biggest handicap has always been that too many French voters reflexively hate her more than they care about anything else. IIRC, she always gets a strong plurality in the first round of elections. But then she loses when the field is reduced to just her and one other candidate. Too many French won’t vote for her even if you were to hold a gun to their head.
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The French version of Never-Trumpers?
Are we seeing the genesis of a second French Revolution?
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NeverTrumpers and their French counterparts seem determined to prove Poor Richard right.
“Experience keeps a Dear School, but Fools will learn at no other.”
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“And scarce in that.”
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Bud Light and Target had a few things that most if the others didn’t have. Broad name recognition among Middle class America (those who are invested in the stock market) and company promoted publicity. Most of the others were “found out” on some level, but these two celebrated and made a big deal of their wokeness.
In other words, they didn’t just piss off John Q Public, they slapped the faces of their investors and customers. Then they went all confused/butt hurt and doubled down. Or the media did it for them.
Never turn your back on a liberal ally, right?
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Worse, Bud Light in particular revealed that it holds its customers in total contempt. And the reason every step they have made since the initial cock-up has made things worse is that they refuse to acknowledge that and apologize for it. Meaning that the contempt holds, and they think they can fool those they hold in contempt.
That’s the reason for the death spiral. They could have weathered the storm and come out battered, but now they’re just going to die.
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They’ve been running scared since the right didn’t disavow Trump or for that matter Kyle Rittenhouse.
Terrified. Because the right always disowned on command before.
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More from Not the Bee (after a prologue about recent get-woke-go-broke events):
https://notthebee.com/article/the-lefts-ongoing-culture-war-is-starting-to-meet-an-emboldened-resistance
“That has occurred because perhaps for the first time, conservatives and Christians took a page from the Left’s playbook and boycotted vocally, financially, thoroughly, and completely.
Now, don’t get me wrong. The culture warriors are emboldened and angry. They are slavishly devoted to their ideology and have every intent to continue launching broadsides against society’s most sacred traditions and beneficial beliefs.
But I have to admit that it seems like a new day has dawned. One where the Right says, “you picked the fight, so if it’s a culture war you want, that’s what you’re gonna get.” — “
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It’s not smart to start a culture war when you don’t have any… :-P
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It’s very much like something going viral. There’s more than a bit of chance involved. Beer companies have been sponsoring Gay Pride events for ages and no one much cared.
The Bud Light thing could have been turned around but, SJWs always double-down. (Whose book is that from?) No one will ever know why this particular event became a thing.
There are many more of these “out of nowhere” events in our future. Things appear stable until they’re not. Predicting that it will happen is easy. Predicting which particular event will cascade into something significant is impossible.
It may be even theoretically impossible. Predicating rain is easy; predicting the exact boundary of a rainstorm is impossible. Complex systems be complex.
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Off Topic: My dad got approval and started his radiation treatments for lymphoma last week. Fingers crossed.
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BEST WISHES.
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Yeah! That’s great news. I’ll add him (and y’all) to my prayer list.
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Prayers up.
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An issue I have with almost every zombie story are the residual niceties. Despite no one manning the operations, potable water is easy to find and antibiotics left in an un-climate controlled pharmacy never expire. Heck, the protagonist lugging the necessary gear for every event – let alone finding proper seasonal clothing and equipment in abandoned stores – is hilarious. (And reality check: loving couples will rediscover why their ancestors invented separate beds when pregnancy became life-threatening).
The mythical Horde imagines that urbanites could take over farms and ranches. In my hometown, they might take over Amish farms, but then they’d quickly find out that everyone on those farms works – from the little ones to the elderly – because they HAVE TO. And they have to work with neighbors, including “English” who aren’t pacifists.
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You can take down an interstate bridge with a tanker truck, see Atlanta and Philly. The masses wouldn’t make it very far. That mass is also made of tribes/gangs that hate each other, it wouldn’t be hard to turn them against each other. Then there is the fact that disease will start to take its toll, dysentery from polluted water, starving people eating bad food, bad sanitation. Addicts going nuts from withdrawal, both drug and alcohol. Brutes and gangs raping women, people would abandon the mob rather quickly, a lot will die before they even get started.
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Surprisingly little looting in Florida after hurricanes. Some, yes, but sparse.
Of course, the state motto of Florida is
“You loot, we shoot.”
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The reason ‘the true communism has never been tried’ is that where ever you have communists, the ones who have obtained control over the group will later be classified as ‘fascists’ who ‘betrayed the revolution’.
Communists minimize the conservative individual behaviors that would limit the takeover strategies of, and damage inflicted by, people who are driven by a disordered appetite for harming others.
This was one reason the Nazis bragged about their communist converts. The converts already had exactly the behaviors and thought processes they valued most in followers.
Rabid dogs led by rabid dogs.
With different types of rabid dogs pretending to be more wholesome than the other rabid dogs. Any collectivist and power focused ‘ideology’ (religion) is going to trample on individual rights, religious dissenters, and eventually set everything on fire and try to destroy it.
Their inner sense of the magic of the world leads them to predict results from the destructive nonsense that they do. When the results do not show, they are angry. Then they care less about costs of further sacrifice, and think that doubling down will bear results. They want to hurt everyone for failing them, and maybe that will be the sacrifice that pleases the spirits.
Communism now is a form of degenerate gambling.
Anyway, so two types of communist, rabid dogs, and theory obsessives. Theory obsessives in other areas can be harmless, or they can be unable to see reality through the haze of theory.
There are not that many theory obsessives. There are also not that many rabid dogs.
We can strongly infer both of these facts of small numbers from the absence of events. Commie theory predicts changes in behavior following certain sorts of societal events or situations. There have been many of these events or situations, and few changes in behavior. Commie theory obsessives, behaved as they did before, because they thought the change in behavior should have happened long before. Rapid dogs are kinda always rabid dogs. Both groups tend to continue existing behavior, and non-communists continue to not behave or think exactly like communists.
One of the places where we get exposed to rabid dogs is in mandatory HR training. This is a situation, like many historical situations, where being exposed to awful people had lead us to coarsen and become slightly more awful ourselves in response.
The rabid dog HR speakers maybe expect to inspire by polarizing waves of more rabid dogs. Not becoming a rabid dog is a step by which we thwart them, and are successful in weakening their power.
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I think Jordan Peterson had the right of it, actually. “Real communism has never been tried” is a confession of narcissism, meaning “it didn’t work because I wasn’t put in charge.”
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“They failed, because we know better, and we’ll get it right this time!”
“We’ll get it right this time,” when referring to Socialism/Communism is one of the scariest phrases known to mankind.
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I seem to remember Antifa going to some small town, and being run off by a quickly organized militia in the neighborhood, in this instance there was a guy in a wheelchair on the homeowners association militia side?
And as much as they are trying to martyr Rittenhouse, Hispanic boy defends himself from white pedophiles, seemed to stop all attempts to exit urban areas for suburban areas by the paid thugs.
It’s going to get rough, they are going to try to stop people from defending themselves through law fare but they erode their authority every time they abuse it. The lefty’s don’t really understand where authority comes from, they mistake the throne and the crown for the source of authority, not consistent wise use of power. They think offices, and titles, and thrones are magic talismans that confer power. Not gifts given by the people to people who wisely used power to achieve something good for the community.
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Not sure if it was fear of getting Rittenhoused that put a damper on the “mostly peaceful” social gatherings or just timing, as that was fairly late in the riot season (iirc). Could have been both.
One thing the Summer of Riotous Love illustrated for me was that intimidation and violence really do work — not necessarily on you or me, but it seems to have done a number on the institutions & authorities we’d normally count on in case of (for instance) massive voting fraud. “Don’t run afoul of the leftist machine, no matter what,” seems to have been the operating philosophy in 2020/21.
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“Don’t make them riot at you!”
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They think offices, and titles, and thrones are magic talismans that confer power.
This is one reason I love this blog: Perspective. I’d never thought of it that way – because it’s idiotic. However, that is exactly the case, isn’t it?
It’s another aspect of the “gut it and wear its skin” approach. I can has title! You must obey!
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They only understand surfaces, not principles.
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They are thinking like European governments, where everything is top down. The government “allows” people freedom of speech, and can curtail that if the people “abuse the privilege,” to cite an all-too-common example. They have the title, they have the rank, so therefore They should be able to do the same thing.
Alas, reality bites. And will bite hard. The US isn’t Europe or Great Britain or Ireland. And a talisman and name-plate are not real power. They are substituting their reality, but REALITY is lurking around the corner, wielding the clue-bat. And a broadsword. For their sake and ours, I hope the clue-bat works.
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Not only that, they can’t distinguish between symbols and substance. Money is a symbol of value, so they believe they can create value by printing money. That’s like trying to bake bread by printing empty bread wrappers.
Like I always say: “Governments can only print money; they can’t make it worth anything. They can make it worth nothing.”
“The Workers must Own the Means Of Production!!” they screech. Well, fine. Go ahead and build your own factory; nobody’s stopping you. What’s that? You don’t know how to build a factory, you can’t afford the land to build it on, or the necessary materials and machinery? That sounds like your problem.
Oh, you want somebody else to build a factory and then just give it to you. Why should anybody do that? If I spent all the time, labor and money to build a factory I would hire people to work in it, but there’s no way I’d just give it to them.
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how very true. And for a long time
G. K. Chesterton, “The Great Shipwreck as Analogy”
That wreck being the Titanic.
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It occurs to me that there is another reason the left is petrified.
They have “always” been “on the right side of history” (never mind the truth, they believe it), but they also worship Malcolm Gladwell (who is smart, but not half the genius he or his adorers think he is), and so the ones among them who read are very well-acquainted with his notion of “the tipping point” — that is, when a cultural “thing” suddenly becomes accepted by a large number of people, more or less spontaneously.
One memorable example he gave in his book is the Keds brand of shoes. The company was about to go bankrupt and shut down forever, when suddenly, for no reason anybody in the company could determine, sales blew up. What had happened was that Keds had suddenly become cool to club-going kids in a certain age range. Nobody caused it, it just happened.
And that’s baked in. You can’t force a tipping point, or spontaneous mass adoption. It just happens. (Gladwell gives another example, though I think this one is in Blink, of a musician whom other musicians know should be a huge star, because his talent is Just That Obvious to them, who never hits the tipping point, for reasons nobody can quite figure out.)
Trump was a tipping point, and they accidentally invited it to happen to them. And he was a sign that things might not go their way, and soon. Thus, the megafraud and the censorship and the wuflu lockdowns and everything else. They can’t control it, they even know at some level that they cannot control it, but they are by gods going to try to stop the next tipping point from going against them.
Which will only ensure that the gods of the copybook headings with terror and slaughter will return even worse than they fear.
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Malcolm Gladwell is rather brilliant…in a very narrow field.
(His analogy on spaghetti sauce and how marketing needs to look outside the box when competition seems impossible is one I’ve quoted on many occasions.)
Which is why I’m confused when people like him don’t see tipping points in other places. Like you said, Trump was a tipping point. He shouldn’t have won the first time, yet he did. And it took some very blatant dirty tricks to get him to lose the second time.
Yet, how did he get elected in the first place? And this is the thing I’ve tried to explain to people-there was a huge amorphous blob of massive dislike of the Powers That Be and everything they had been doing the last eight to sixteen years prior to his election. But there was no “lightning strike” person that could cause it to form and go further.
Trump was the lightning bolt.
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Let me be clear: Gladwell is definitely smart, and a pretty good writer to boot, able to take complex things and explain them in ways that feel simple and intuitive, which is no small thing.
But.
When he has an actual insight, he doesn’t go much of anywhere with it other than to illustrate examples of it. (This would be The Tipping Point and Blink.)
And he has “insights” that feel intuitively right or reasonable, but don’t stand up to counter-examples very well, like his “do something for ten thousand hours and you will automatically be the best of the best at it”. (Which, granting that it’s not his fault, the NPR set and midwits everywhere have taken as holy writ, rather than the rough guideline it really should be.)
Even leaving aside the realms of prodigy (chess, math, music), you and I can both point to examples of people who commanded a field with nothing like 10k hours of practice. Robert A. Heinlein wrote a novel before his first short story sale, but that’s about all. And once he got into Astounding, he blew the doors off the genre, beating out writers who absolutely had their 10k hours behind them with ease. (Ray Cummings had been a pro pulp writer since the 1910s, Murray Leinster for about the same time, Edmond Hamilton since 1926. Much as I will defend at least two of those three, none of them hold a candle to RAH even in his early stories.)
Carl Menger was 31 years old when he published Principles of Economics, which introduced what is now know as the theory of marginal utility, an absolutely indispensable tool for economics. (It was independently arrived at by two other men in two other countries at roughly the same time.) He had studied law and jurisprudence at university, and worked as a journalist in the 1860s, only taking up economics when he noticed that people who were in trade that he reported on believed things that did not match the classical economic theories in force at the time. He revolutionized economics without having had the time to put in ten thousand hours.
Again, Gladwell is no dummy. All I meant is that he’s not nearly the genius that he is held up to be.
For example, in The Tipping Point, why did he not explore the phenomenon he documented (again, documented very well) and its connection to the broader economic idea of spontaneous order? Either he didn’t know about spontaneous order, because it’s from a branch of economics that says capitalism is good, and therefore he never got taught it or explored it; or he did know it, but didn’t want to cross the NPR red diaper crowd and tell them hurty things (arguably a canny move to help increase his sales and coverge by Very Important Media); or he did know it, saw the connection, but couldn’t figure out a way to get it across to his core audience in a way that wouldn’t send them to their fainting couches. Whatever the reason, it’s a fairly obvious related idea, and one that could have given the book more heft and depth.
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One of the scariest post-apocalyptic books IMO is David Brin’s “The Postman, ” because the events unfolded in such a natural, plausible way.
The thugs and mobs might eventually be defeated, but things get really ugly along the way.
Especially since we can now see that the equivalent of Brin’s Holnists really do exist, although with a somewhat different ideology.
“Another message of the plot deals with the backstory of the post-apocalyptic world: specifically, that it was not the electronics-destroying EMPs, the destruction of major cities, or the release of various bio-engineered plagues that completely destroyed society, but rather it was the Holnists, who preyed on humanitarian workers and attacked communities during this difficult period.”
Sounds like our Leftists to me.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Postman
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