The idea of what constitutes a "prepper" in the US has interested me for decades. There's the stereotype that you probably thought of when you read that of a right-wing, 2nd amendment dude stockpiling ammo in the woods. But the thought's occurred to me on more than one occasion over the last decade or so that "preparing" for major changes, scientifically predicted, doesn't really fit under the traditional "prepper" model. I'd never tell anyone that I'm a "prepper" not because I don't think the label necessarily fits, but, because people will automatically get one idea in their minds about it.
Anyway, after posting recently that someone, literally, whispered to me wondering if I thought long COVID was real, because they couldn't say it out loud around people at work for fear of being labeled or singled out, the same thing happened to me today about our impending move to our homestead. I guess leaving work instead of RTO really got people talking, and now I'm the COVID cautious, prepper dude?
"I wouldn't talk about this with anybody else I know, but, are you guys preppers?"
"Well, I guess you could say that. I'm not stockpiling ammo off in the woods or anything, but, years ago my wife and I spent a long time finding a property that we eventually wanted to move to that fit pretty specific criteria. For example, we have multiple fresh water springs from which we've tested the water. One of those is gravity fed to our cabin. There's water flowing through the entire property. We don't have any close neighbors. We have a greenhouse. We have all the power we need from our own property."
"I'm really worried about a lot of what's going on in the world. How do you prepare for it all?"
"Well, I don't think you really do. You can't prepare for EVERYTHING."
"COVID was your thing, then?"
"Kind of. I mean, we bought it before COVID, so it was more climate change at the time. We're moving 1000 miles north and 2000 feet up in elevation, but, lack of fresh water and other things have all had a part in it. COVID just allowed us to move while keeping our jobs. Haha. You know how that worked out for me, but, my wife's keeping her job, and yes, we can be away from the virus-laden masses."
"I want to do the same."
People keep telling me that I'm right about COVID, or climate change and they want to do what we're doing, but, it's obvious they can't even say it out loud to anyone except me. They know me, I hired most of them, and I'm no longer in a position of authority, so I guess I'm the person they whisper about at the office?
I don't know what my point is here in the end. I just wanted to document another interaction that has me wondering about things, but, what a weird societal place we're in?
Yes, climate change is real. Yes, COVID is real. Things change, and they're changing at a pace that I guess people are uncomfortable with?
Why do we still have to tiptoe around these things instead of preparing ourselves and others for changes?
@BE I think that most people have an instinctive fear of standing out (maybe they remember 'the nail that sticks up gets hammered down'?) and are really reluctant to break with social norms.
And let's be clear, your actions declare that you don't feel our current version of western civilization is going to continue. And that's a pretty big break with social norms.
I wish there was a less perjorative term than preppers for those of us who think the world is changing and therefore we must too.
It might also be sometimes a fear of appearing inconsistent (either on short or long timescales) or of misinterpretations. In my, potentially atypical, experience it is very easy to break social norms when one does so in a way that conspicuously and consistently helps others, without discriminating who gets helped.
