New York Times shows off its snobbery on the issue of Doomsday Preppers
I saw a piece today in the New York Times on the TV show Doomsday Preppers. Now I get that some of the folks they feature on the show are more than a bit out there. There are folks who are fully prepping for something they are sure is imminent which in fact is very, very unlikely. Ok, but not all preppers are living in fear of the Yellowstone Volcano erupting or a massive coronal mass from the sun wiping out life as we know it. The thing is there is typically at least a little science behind what these people fear. Someday there will be another eruption of the Yellowstone Volcano and solar storms can be problematic and in rare cases could actually cause significant disruptions to the electronic grid. So yes I get that the people featured might be pushing the edge of the rainbow a bit, but hell, really rational folks don’t make for great TV, if they did the Kardashians, well, you wouldn’t know who they are.
The second thing the author of the piece really harped on and I think completely unfairly, was that basically all preppers are a bunch of gun nuts that can’t wait for the apocalypse so they can start shooting people. I’m going to go out on a limb here and bet the author has never met anyone in the prepper community. Like all communities preppers come in all shapes and sizes and philosophical bents. The fact is, having weapons for defense is a really good idea if society melts down, regardless of the cause for the meltdown. Of course the show takes an opportunity to show the people they feature shooting their guns and playing a little Rambo for the cameras, it’s TV, they need the ratings. Apparently the good folks at the New York Times think that watching folks assemble first-aid kits, canning fruit and making pemmican would make for enthralling television.
Being someone who talks about the apocalypse and people’s response to it quite a bit I’ve discovered something. There are two basic types of people, those who don’t want to survive doomsday and those who do. The NY Times author admitted to being someone who wouldn’t want to survive the dissolution of society because he couldn’t imagine living in the world shown in McCarthy’s book, The Road. I think that shows he has a limited imagination and that’s fine, and it’s even fine that he’s wants to die in the apocalypse, but some of us would like to live as long and as full a life as possible regardless of what happens in the world. The author unfortunately talks down to the rest of us and writes us all off as gun-toting maniacs with homicidal tendencies just for not sharing his beliefs, that’s a bit snobbish to me.
Regardless of what your philosophical beliefs might be about where society is headed, disasters happen and it is only prudent to be prepared. Having three days worth of food and water on-hand, a good first-aid kit and a basic survival plan for your family is just plain smart. So if a show like Doomsday Preppers does anything beyond entertain you, hopefully it will make you think about having a basic preparedness plan and the appropriate resources available.
