Worth Reading: The Gentlepersons Guide to Forum Spies
Selected passages:
One way to neutralize a potential activist is to get them to be in a group that does all the wrong things. Why?
1) The message doesn’t get out.
2) A lot of time is wasted
3) The activist is frustrated and discouraged
4) Nothing good is accomplished.
Some agents take on a pushy, arrogant, or defensive manner:
1) To disrupt the agenda
2) To side-track the discussion
3) To interrupt repeatedly
4) To feign ignorance
5) To make an unfounded accusation against a person.
Calling someone a racist, for example. This tactic is used to discredit a person in the eyes of all other group members.
Saboteurs
Some saboteurs pretend to be activists. She or he will ….
1) Write encyclopedic flyers (in the present day, websites)
2) Print flyers in English only.
3) Have demonstrations in places where no one cares.
4) Solicit funding from rich people instead of grass roots support
5) Display banners with too many words that are confusing.
6) Confuse issues.
7) Make the wrong demands.
Cool Compromise the goal.
9) Have endless discussions that waste everyone’s time. The agent may accompany the endless discussions with drinking, pot smoking or other amusement to slow down the activist’s work.
Provocateurs
1) Want to establish “leaders” to set them up for a fall in order to stop the movement.2) Suggest doing foolish, illegal things to get the activists in trouble.
3) Encourage militancy.
4) Want to taunt the authorities.
5) Attempt to make the activist compromise their values.
6) Attempt to instigate violence. Activisim ought to always be non-violent.
7) Attempt to provoke revolt among people who are ill-prepared to deal with the reaction of the authorities to such violence. (The emphasis is mine, Ryan)
1) Want everyone to sign up and sing in and sign everything.
2) Ask a lot of questions (gathering data).
3) Want to know what events the activist is planning to attend.
4) Attempt to make the activist defend him or herself to identify his or her beliefs, goals, and level of committment.
Recruiting
Legitimate activists do not subject people to hours of persuasive dialog. Their actions, beliefs, and goals speak for themselves.
Groups that DO recruit are missionaries, military, and fake political parties or movements set up by agents.
Surveillance
ALWAYS assume that you are under surveillance.
Paranoia, Paranoia, Everybody is Coming to Get Me
Look folks, there are no special secret hidden roads, train tracks, rail yards, ports and the like for the military. If a bunch of vehicles need to go someplace for whatever reasons the reasonable options are usually to drive our vehicles or put them on flat bed trucks/ trains. We travel in convoys so folks don’t get lost and so there is support if a vehicle has problems. Also these sort of things tend to deal with fairly large groups of dozens of vehicles anyway. Convoys will pull over at a rest stop to take a break or on the side of the road for a quick map check/ bathroom break/ whatever.
These sort of normal movements do not mean that the military is conducting recon operations to take over your neighborhood or whatever. Losen up the tin foil hat a little bit. I will let you in on a super special secret. Our Army is about as subtle as a sledge hammer between the eyes. Think shock and awe, or Desert Storm or for that matter the (Re) Invasion of Iraq. If the Army wanted you a few armored vehicles (or helo’s) would show up outside of your house at 3am and a dozen guys would storm the place to grab you. If they wanted to control your town dozens of vehicles and hundreds of armed men would show up and do just that.
Basically my point is that if you see some vehicles driving around or some soldiers in line at a store or doing basically anything except A) kicking in your door at 3AM or B) setting up traffic control points to shut an area down they are just going from one place to another for some boring reason and there is not a need to lose any sleep over it.
If I am missing something please tell me.
It Isn’t Useful For X
This is something that has bothered me in the past. I will be talking about how it is a good idea to have some cash around and someone will inevitably say “that cash would be worthless in a hyperinflationary economic collapse” or talking about PM’s and they would say “you can’t barter with PM’s during the Mad Max end of the world scenario I envision”. The implication is that since a given thing is not useful during that one specific event it isn’t useful at all. I am just coming to see this train of though clearly today.
The issue is simple. That something is not useful for X scenario does not mean it isn’t useful overall which is the implication of the above mentioned paraphrased quotes. Look at it like this. A Glock 17 is a poor substitute for toilet paper but that doesn’t mean it is not useful. Does the ridiculousness of that sentence explain the foolishness of this train of thought? You get a thing or learn a skill not for what it doesn’t do, but what it does.
Part of the problem is folks getting tunnel vision on one scenario. For some reason it is usually a very specific one and unlikely one. The guy who is worried that $500 in small bills would lose their value if hyperinflation hit is so fixated on that one thing that he discounts numerous, far more likely, scenarios where having some cash would be useful. Also he fails to see that there is a far higher chance that he will be able to use that cash to buy goods and services in numerous other situations than that it will go up in proverbial hyperinflationary smoke.
My point isn’t that you need to think or do like I do. Different folks have different concerns and at the end of the day we all pays our money and takes our chances. My point is that you need to look at the big picture, not just one possible scenario.
Don’t get tunnel vision.
Invisible Friends
My Mother In Law is pretty active in an online community, which one doesn’t matter. She calls the people she knows there “Invisible friends”. I like the term. Invisible friends are a big part of the fun of being involved in an online community. Invisible friends are people who have a lot in common with you if in a narrow sense that can give advice and encouragement.
I have found that in places where people gather to discuss a specific range of interests (could be firearms, survivalism, fitness, a hobby or whatever) people are on the whole quite honest. I take folks at face value and their word until given a reason to do otherwise. Every once in awhile there is a troll or somebody who wants to push things in the direction of their alternate agenda. Only one time that I can recall have I stumbled into a total liar.
That being said I do take some precautions. I quite intentionally don’t go into detail about parts of my life, show pictures, etc. Giving anybody you hardly know actionable intelligence to rob or harm you is just not smart. Somebody I have been talking to for regularly for months could, given an iron trap memory or good data management, probably have pieced together a whole lot about me but I don’t worry about that too much. It is one of the risks of getting to know people and has been more than worth the payoff of some interesting and rewarding friendships.
There is one thing I am particularly careful about. I try very hard not to say anything on the computer (blog, email, etc) which I would not want read back to me in a court room. I am even more careful about what I say to folks I don’t know well.
In the Sopranos there is a young female FBI Agent who was tasked with going under cover to get close to the delightful Adrianna Laserva. This gal changed her appearance and her voice and happened to bump into Ade. They liked the exact same things and had the same hobbies and interests and totally clicked. Over time through idle conversations and observation the agent got some dirt on young Adriana. You get where this is going and it wasn’t pretty.
Now I am not saying this has happened or will happen to anybody like boring old you or me. First this is probably tin foil hat stuff. Secondly I seriously hope our government can manage its time and resources better. Third I don’t really do anything interesting.
That being said if an invisible friend ever once talked about committing a felony, especially if it involved illegal firearms or explosives I would run, not walk away. (I am excluding morbid but obvious jokes like, “and that makes me want to start burning down liquor stores.”) There is a saying that if you are at a group/ political type meeting and 3 people are advocating criminal behavior or violence they are all probably undercover agents for somebody or another has some truth to it. Some folks have different concepts of ‘conspiracy’ and ‘entrapment’ and I do not feel like having my life ruined. The best case is that my invisible friend has a couple of screws loose and is planning something bad. That is still really not a situation where I want to be involved.
Aside from a little bit of caution for the sake of OPSEC and being careful about what sort of conversations you get involved in there is no reason not to interact with and enjoy invisible friends.
Beside, you aren’t going to make any real friends sitting at your computer all day wearing a with a tin foil hat so you might as well make some invisible friends.
Tribal Thoughts
The concept of intentional survivalist groups has always kind of bothered me. First it makes me wonder about people. Why is this person’s primary plan to abandon everyone they know to go live with strangers? Also furthermore I am paranoid and distrustful. The idea to have your plans for a worst case scenario be to come together with a bunch of people who supposedly have stuff in common with you that you met on the internet does not sit well with me. Some folks have end of the world plans with people that are not, to me, sufficient to let them watch the cats over a long weekend. Personally I find trust way more important than skills or whatnot. My father or friend might not be the perfect end of the world survivalist type but I’m not going to wake up to my throat being slit.
In any case I find the concept of a tribe a lot more natural. A tribe is, in this context as coined (IIRC) by the good folks at Western Rifle shooters a sort of clumping of people based upon family, pre existing friendships and maybe some intentional choices. It is more a selection of people already in your life than a group of random strangers. The downside of tribes is that they are, on average, probably a lot less paranoid than you are. This means they are less likely to take preparedness seriously and put in serious energy and resources. Not a big deal if there is a Doomer Daddy Warbucks but that scenario is few and far between and does not apply in my case.
Here are some effective ways I have influenced my tribe:
-Positive modeling has worked well. It works well especially when it comes to people who look up to you and or respect you. Showing a way other than living on credit, getting your financial house in order, using food storage as a way to take advantage of sales and decrease your food costs as well as for emergencies, etc. I have done surprisingly well with this one.
-Teachable moments. When it comes up naturally you can give some advice or share experiences you have had/ techniques you use that are relevant. My folks went to pick up a few things (primarily a ham I believe) at the store during one of our annual PNW ice storms. They were not taking cards and luckily somebody had a checkbook. I mentioned that it is prudent to keep a couple of hundred bucks in small bills on hand for these eventualities. Also that lead naturally into talking about how wonderful a well stocked pantry is.
-Teach/ expose people to things. Take someone shooting. Teach someone how to use hand tools or do auto maintenance. Whatever it is that you know and they want to know teach them. This is also a very effective one because it helps build relationships and credibility in that area and others. It is also a good way to lead to new teachable moments.
What does not work:
-Paranoid ramblings or rants. These just do not work. Best case you are preaching to the converted and worst case you look like a loon and lose credibility.
-Being pushy. Nobody likes being told what to do. If somebody asks your thoughts on how to survive the zombie apocalypse then tell them, otherwise stick to the topic being discussed.
How have you been successful (or not successful) in influencing your tribe?
Conspiracy Busters Military Patrols
Like a lot of folks I read the Drudge Report. When I saw a link to “Military Patrols in Columbus, GA” http://www2.wrbl.com/news/2011/apr/22/military-patrols-start-friday-night-ar-1752061/ I had to check it out. I am sure some conspiracy hounds are sure this is the start of a military occupation of some kind. However that just does not mesh with reality. I can speak from a bit of experience as I have lived in Columbus, GA and also done Courtesy Patrol albeit in a different location. The way CP (as it is so affectionately called) actually works is as follows. Senior NCO’s and sometimes junior Officers walk around busy bar/ club areas and try to keep soldiers from doing stupid stuff and getting into trouble. Typically it consists of getting soldiers who have had too much (even by a Charlie Sheen definition, like puking, falling over and passing out) to drink home and breaking up dangerous situations. With the totalitarian nature of the military and our laws orders to “get in the van” are in fact lawful. Nobody gets into any trouble for that sort of stuff, just a safe ride back to the Barracks or on post housing. Breaking up fights is pretty common and keeping bouncers from stomping some dumb poorly behaved soldier is not unheard of. Really it is just us looking out for our own. Other than making a phone call (which anybody can do) these folks have no authority and will not bother civilians and yes we can tell the difference. Hint, the group of skinny bald 21-23 year old guys wearing t shirts and dog tags are in the military. If anything CP is a stabilizing influence that can remind soldiers that they will be held accountable for ridiculously stupid actions (breaking stuff and hurting people, etc).
Someone’s Got a Case of the Mondays
As a blogger every now and then I have the idea for my next post fully formed and the thing practically written in my head when I see a post elsewhere that says exactly what I was going to say better than I could. This morning was sort of one of those days. SHTF Blog’s post Prepper Burnout- Identify and combat it really struck a cord with me.
I’ve been feeling sort of burned out recently. Since I got back last Friday it has been evident enough that people I talk to are noticing it during conversation. I got to really thinking about why this was last night. I laid there for about 3 hours just thinking.
A bit of it is just life. Work has recently (last 2-3 months or so) been busy, not particularly rewarding and more stressful than in the past. That is definitely a factor. I am pretty ready to take a break for the holidays.
I got to thinking that a lot of it however is what SHTF Blog keenly identified as Prepper Burnout. Right now our big push is to become debt free by paying off my school loan. We are putting an almost rediculous percentage of our income toward that goal. Things are working but it isn’t fun. While we have decent reserves our general operating budget is tight. This is creating a lot of stress in our finances that would not otherwise exist. The payoff date is pretty darn close so it isn’t really worth tweeking things. However if we had it to do over again a slightly less aggressive (about 10-15% less a month) repayment plan would have given us most of the benefit with a lot less stress.
Also not being colocated with a lot of my preps stresses me. Not so much in a worring about if things happen and I am not there sort of way as I am comfortable with our situation here. More that I got a lot of joy in seeing my stocks and watching stuff accumulate. It makes the work and effort I put into stuff worthwhile and also has a real calming effect on me. The work is still there but the calming effects are not.
It probably doesn’t help that we are currently living through a preparedness scenario. Just because it isn’t a fun, quick or sexy scenario doesn’t make it any less real. Employment is bad, the economy is at best uncertain, crime is up, there is inflation in normal purchases and all kinds of other bad stuff. That you can’t carry a rifle everywhere and there is still electricity doesn’t mean real stuff isn’t going down.
Anyway enough with the pitty party. The real question is what am I going to do about it. Today I started making a couple conscious efforts and made a bit of progress. The day sucked especially bad and my mood is, at least relatively speaking pretty good. The first thing I decided was to do at least a couple things in a day just because I enjoy them. Today I had a doughnut for breakfast on a work day. Also I had a little time with no TV/ computer or other noise just hanging out with Walker. That was nice and took my mind off things.
Really wanted to get back into the gym today but it just didn’t work with my schedule. Tomorrow I think it will. Lifting once in a blue moon or a couple times in a row randomly won’t do much for my body but I enjoy it and it gets those good endorphins going. Lastly I am just trying to enjoy the little things and force myself to be happier. Remember, fake it until you make it. Going home, seeing friends and family, shooting my own guns, repacking all my new awesome stuff and just plain taking a break will hopefully help a lot.
See you all tomorrow
When Are You Done Preparing?
FerFAL was recently asked the interesting question “When Are You Done Preparing?”. I found the question interesting and it sort of stuck in my head. I don’t disagree with FerFAL’s answer but I do see it from a different perspective. Here is how I see it.
It is worth discussing the difference between maintenance and growth (though not strictly money, also time, energy, etc) of your preps. Maintenance of your preps would be stuff like rotating foodstuffs, practicing to keep your skills fresh, etc. Growth would be stuff like increasing your food storage, learning a new skill, taking a class, buying guns, gear, etc.
I think a certain amount of maintenance is necessary lest your food goes bad, your equipment degrades and your skills atrophy. You’ve got to rotate food and clean weapons. Car kits and GHB’s need to be periodically inventoried and have perishable contents rotated. Even the best shot will get rusty if he doesn’t touch a handgun for a year. Personally I wouldn’t classify this kind of maintenance as continual preparations. Now that we have that covered.
To the fundamental question “when are you done preparing?” I would reply “preparing for what?” Everyone has different concerns and worst case scenarios they are preparing for. If we imagine white being a very limited power outage and black being a full on genuine One Second After/ Mad Max/ Jericho TEOTWAWKI scenario there are almost infinite shades of grey in between. What you are preparing for has a lot to do with when/ if you can ever be done.
Lets say you are an average guy who lives on the Gulf or southern Atlantic coast. You are justifiably concerned about a hurricane. You know it can be difficult to get fuel in the run up to evacuation time so you keep a half dozen 5 gallon cans in the shed and make sure your vehicle is topped off during hurricane season. You know that the smart thing to do is to leave and you’ve got a plan with your Uncle who lives a few hundred miles inland to come crash there. You have maps and alternate routes planned out just in case.
Since Katrina showed you that it can be weeks before help can arrive and services are restored you keep 90 days of shelf stable, easy to cook foodstuffs around. A couple extra propane cans will let you cook just about forever on the Coleman stove you use for camping. Keeping a few extra big boxes of batteries will let you run the various flashlights in your house for some time. For water you picked up a filter at the local camping store. After seeing the madness of Katrina you ordered 500 rounds of buckshot for your 12 gauge in addition to whatever hunting loads you have lying around. You also purchased a handgun with a few spare mags and a couple extra 100 rd white boxes from Walmart. Last year you stashed a few hundred dollars in the gun cabinet just in case. Could this guy say that he is done preparing? I think so. Of course there might be a small hole here or there but the broad strokes are covered and he is in a decent spot for the scenario he is concerned with.
Someone worried about a genuine full on Jericho style collapse is probably never going to be done. They will just move from more likely and immediate concerns such as ‘how will we eat next winter’ to the more obscure and unlikely ‘how will my grandchildren make metal tools to replace those which wear out’. A person worried about this kind of scenario is always going to be thinking of something new and trying to deal with progressively more unlikely scenarios.
Personally I do not think I am every going to be done preparing. I am going to have times where the growth slows or stops until I get to another stage (buying a home, having more space, getting some land, etc) over time. However in the big picture over time I am going to progressively work from likely situations to more unlikely ones. It is more likely that we will have to ride out a short to mid term disaster then that we will suffer an EMP or a super aids bird flu pandemic. Assuming the world doesn’t end in a few more years I will likely be focused almost exclusively on relatively unlikely scenarios. It is just my nature to want to improve my situation.
It is the very last day to enter our Awesome Ammo Giveaway Contest. Hurry up and enter now so you can get a whole bunch of free ammo.
When are YOU going to be done preparing?
Getting Real, Thinking Basic and Realistic 2
This sort of flows from a post I did awhile back. I read some more of FerFal’s book yesterday. It has gotten me thinking. In particular folks so often think that by preparing for a super end of the world fit for a survivalist novel they are prepared for far more mundane and likely stuff. I hate to say it but one doesn’t totally cover the other.
Case in point. Having a super whiz banger rifle with a 27 power scope and armor piercing bullets is great if the Illuminati/ Bildenberg/ NWO Army of foreign troops invades. However instead of working on hitting an evil invading foreign soldier in the face at 500 meters it might be better to work with your concealed carry pistol. Most interesting to me are people who have racks of rifles and cases of ammo sufficient to arm an Infantry Platoon but don’t see fit to carry a handgun during the course of their normal affairs.
Also it amazes me that people skip over very likely financial problems or the need for an emergency fund in favor of some fishing hooks, sewing needles and such to barter if the world ends. Sorry but you can’t pay next months electricity or insurance bill in fish hooks or sewing needles so you better save some damn money.
There is an interesting workout theory that says the less you like something the more you should focus on it. People like a certain workout for whatever reason so they do it more often and with greater enthusiasm. Then they get better at it so it makes them more fulfilled so they do it more, sort of a self fulfilling prophecy. Often for guys it is what I call “the bar workout”. This workout is a sound scientific plan based entirely around working your chest and biceps, usually by doing lots of bench press and bicep curls. The entire point is to look muscular in that $50 Affliction T Shirt while flexing and drinking light beer at the bar. Men will be intimidated and women will swoon or at least that is their theory. The point is that if you hate running it is probably what you should focus on. If you hate doing body weight stuff then do it more.
Anyway in terms of preparedness I would say that there is an inverse relationship between how “sexy” and fantasy inspiring an item/ idea is and how much you should focus on it. For example soap is boring and not cool at all. The hero never saves the day in the survival novel with a bar of dial soap. However you definitely want some soap. There are numerous legitimate and likely worst case scenarios where you won’t need to fire a single shot or even have a gun but a spare bar of soap (or 200) are sure good to have. There isn’t such a thing as a tactical can opener employment course but having a couple hand operated can openers lying around is sure smart.
Getting real will let you better allocate your limited resources and otherwise focus your efforts.
Diversification
One repeating comment that drives me nuts is when I talk about savings or cash on hand and somebody says “but when hyperinflation happens those savings will become worthless…. and that is why I only buy X instead”. The reason this repeat comment has slowly started to drive me nuts is that the person centers their plans on ONE SCENARIO and ONE SCENARIO ONLY.
They are worried about hyperinflation or a full on One Second After collapse or whatever. It is not so significant to me that they are worried about a given scenario but that they are seemingly worried only about that scenario. I do not know what is going to happen.
Essentially the entire basis for my paranoia is that I do not know what is going to happen. If I knew exactly and with total confidence what was going to happen preparedness would be easy. The point is that we do not know what is going to happen.
Maybe (it seems to be getting more likely) we will face serious or even hyperinflation. In that scenario having put almost every dime you have into silver and gold would make sense. Then again maybe we won’t. Maybe things will go all One Second After. In that case having a basement full of 5 years worth of food and hundreds of gallons of fuel would be real nice. Then again maybe they won’t. Maybe foreign mercenaries will invade to put America under the Bildenberg/ Trilateral Commission/ Illuminati rule once and for all. In that scenario having several military pattern rifles and cases upon cases of ammo would be nice. Then again maybe they won’t invade.
When it comes to dividing up our limited resources looking at the financial principle of diversification makes sense. I can not see any financial adviser worth their business cards suggesting a person put all of their money into one single stock or instrument. The reason that mutual funds are so popular is that they let people manage risk in a fairly easy way. Instead of having 5 grand (or 50 or 500 or whatever) in one stock (or bond or whatever) you have a hundred bucks worth of that one and two hundred bucks of another and fifty of a third, etc. While all of these stocks can take a downturn at once (a la 2007-2008); it is quite unlikely that they will all completely fail simultaneously. This way you will of course still have risk the odds of being totally wiped out are greatly decreased.
I sort of take that principle and expand it into my preparedness efforts. I have money set away for an emergency and invested so if the world doesn’t end (odds are it won’t) I can hopefully retire with dignity. In case things go pretty crazy I put some of my resources into silver and gold. I store and rotate food in case of prolonged interruptions of normal commerce. Heck I also have guns which could fight off the evil Bildenberg/ Trilateral Commission/ Illuminati thugs.
It does make sense to put more time/ energy/ resources into what seem to be more likely scenarios. I put more into saving than I do into ammunition (though I am in a fairly ok place there too). This is because the odds are far higher that I will find myself needing quick access to several thousand dollars than the equivalent in ammo. Just don’t get too carried away with this because the world changes very rapidly and we don’t know what is going to happen.
If a certain scenario happens will I wish that I had put more time/ energy/ resources into preparing for it, yes. However I hope that whatever happens I will not be caught entirely unprepared. Since I do not know what is going to happen this seems like the best plan to me. I am truly putting my money (and time and energy) where my mouth is on this one.
Thoughts?
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