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Monday, July 29, 2019

Brutal Truth of What Happens When Society Collapses


Poor Man Survival

Self Reliance tools for independent minded people…


 

ISSN 2161-5543

A Digest of Urban Survival Resources

 


The Brutal Truth About What Really Happens When a Society Collapses He Was Just an Ordinary Family Man, Living His Life… and Then the Unimaginable Happened

It doesn’t matter how prepared you are. In a true sh*t-hits-the-fan (SHTF) scenario — where there’s been, say, a catastrophic attack on the power grid or where a massively destructive and disruptive civil war has broken out — being thrust into a life of rugged self-sufficiency would not be fun or romantic. Fending for yourself and your loved ones would be a living hell. If you doubt this, I would encourage you to pick up Selco Begovic’s 2019 book, The Dark Secrets of SHTF Survival: The Brutal Truth About Violence, Death and Mayhem You Must Know to Survive.

 I’ve just finished it. It’s a quick read. As you can probably tell from the title, it’s not exactly a “nice” book. But in it, you’ll learn what life is really like when society completely falls apart. You see, Selco was just an ordinary guy living with his family in “a regular city in a nice country in Europe” when, in the early 1990s, civil war erupted around him. This, we know today, as the war in the Balkans that eventually led to the breakup of Yugoslavia. As Selco tells it, his city quickly came under siege. There was no escape. And so began a horrific ordeal in which he and others were forced to survive in the harshest conditions imaginable — for over a year. His story is the stuff of nightmares. And it’s all true.

Tremors Before the Collapse In the months leading up to SHTF, Selco writes how the media fanned the flames of discord in his country. Differences amongst antagonistic groups were stressed. Tensions were escalated. Conflict seemed all but unavoidable. “The media manipulated people,” he recalls. “[The media] increased the fear and hate.” In his own city, things began to deteriorate. There was scattered violence. All kinds of rumors. Then tanks and military units appeared.

Selco describes being “mesmerized” by what he was seeing unfold. “It was like being in a movie,” he writes. He even described this part as “exciting.” That quickly changed. “Pretty soon we all were like, ‘F**k, people are getting killed for real here’” — but by then they’d lost their chance to escape. Calling it his “big mistake,” Selco says that “one day it was simply too late to leave.” “It is important to believe that [this kind of an event] can actually happen,” Selco cautions. “Because after I saw all the signs, I just said to myself, ‘Oh, it cannot happen here. Somebody somehow is gonna solve everything.’” Supplies and Safety in Numbers As panic set in, goods flew off the shelf. Then the looting began. Yet most people were still unaware of what was taking place. Selco observes: I have seen people running from a mall with items that, in a few days, would become the most ridiculous items to possess... in the middle of a collapse.

 Things like a TV or a laundry machine… The majority of people could not imagine what was coming, so they couldn’t fathom that a bag full of AA batteries was gonna be worth more than 50 laundry machines. With his city under siege and rampant violence, destruction and looting underway, several of Selco’s friends and a handful of relatives moved in with him and his family for safety in numbers. From this point on, it was everyone for themselves. What Daily Life Is Like When SHTF Their sole objective became survival. “Just start to imagine every ‘supply’ you take for granted (fuel, electricity, water, stores, emergency services, etc.) being taken away and not knowing when it will ever come back,” writes Selco. Their days and nights became a desperate, ongoing struggle to obtain the necessities of life. They scavenged from wherever they could. “People do not understand how much hard work is needed [to do all this],” says Selco.

 He describes how everything in your life changes. Nothing is normal anymore. From when and where you sleep to your schedule, your bathroom habits, having to adjust to constant fatigue, thirst and concern about where your next meal will come from — everything. On the topic of food, Selco writes that “we ate when we had the chance… [including] things that most people wouldn’t think of as food. All that being said, Selco notes that: Even in a survival situation, you need to still care about a few little things to keep your dignity, to keep your spirits up, to not lose yourself. If you stop caring about everything, it is like a disease that eats you.” But as bad as all this is, there’s still one more key part to the story. The part that makes it truly terrifying — the ever-present threat of violence and death. Why You Need to Own a Weapon Selco writes about how when the SHTF, it didn’t take long for gangs to form. Some joined a gang for safety and to obtain resources.

But others came together for far darker, more sinister reasons. This lawless, chaotic environment, simply put, gave people the opportunity to be evil. Targeted killings, torture, terror, rape — this all took place. Selco doesn’t linger on this stuff any more than he has to. He says he’s not trying to be shocking by talking about it. Rather, he wants to educate people about the realities of urban warfare and what a societywide collapse is actually like. “It is a needed but depressing realization that people, even regular folks, can become so cruel, so fast,” laments Selco. The Dark Secrets of SHTF Survival is an instructive and practical book. You will learn a lot of specific advice that can only come from someone who’s experienced such an event firsthand. But the book is also a disturbing account of human nature when the paper-thin veneer of civilization is stripped away.

 Luke McGrath is managing editor of The Laissez Faire Letter.

SIDEBAR

 



   The socialists infecting our Congress remind me of the 1930s

This fall of the mainstream and rise of fringe elements is straight out of 1930s Germany.  That period saw the stunning rise of extreme parties both on the right and the left.  In 1928 elections, the Nazi Party came in 9th with only 2.6% of the vote.  The Communists did four times better, with 10.6%.  Just two years later, after the 1929 stock market collapse, the Nazis won 18.3% and became Germany’s second most popular party.

The Communists were third, with 13.1%.  In 1932, the Nazis won nearly 40% of the vote. 

The move to the extreme Left by Democrats reminds me of how little people seem to learn from history-no one in the Democratic Party seems willing or able to halt the rise of so-called Progressives in their party [they’re now dominated by extreme ideas which will create an even bigger Nanny State while eroding more of our rights, especially gun ownership.

This domestic terror group might be termed the ‘Brown Shirts’ of the Democrat-Socialist Party…those were the criminal goons the Nazis used to impose their will on its enemies.
 

Antifa goons threw chemical weapons at Ng, a conservative journalist, by mixing quick-drying cement with milkshakes which causes chemical burns if it makes contact with the skin. Seattle cops just stood by, doing nothing.

 

 


Here are my ideas for new bill [s] to improve government

 

>Since term limits never seems to gain any traction perhaps we should entertain the idea of zero pay for elected officials after their third term in office…give them their office, expenses, health insurance while in office and a living allowance only=much like our Founding Fathers and see how many decide to remain in office.

 
>Perhaps we need to resurrect a new version of ‘war’ bonds, perhaps calling them “government bailout bonds” to help pay off our national debt and/or to help pay for our massive deficits and proposed new spending projects since fewer foreign nations are buying our debt!

>An idea I've suggested before:  Eliminate ALL city/state & Federal taxes on the 1st $25K of income for all people. 41% of citizens pay no Federal tax, many city/state taxes are killers for many. Tax laws that encourage more US manufacturing/jobs & elimination of red tape would help too.
 
 
 
 

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3 comments:

Ron said...

This article & its resources are spot-on!

Bob said...

Excellent piece. The bit about antifa thugs is perfect; they need to be labeled for what they are: domestic terrorists.

Danielle said...

Always a useful/pleasure to read!