I mentioned in a previous diary that I was thinking about becoming a “prepper”.
While most people might find prepping to be an odd outlet for a Progressive, for me it makes perfect sense. I grew up in fundamentalist Christian church that had an End-Of-The-World fetish. Imaging what I would do if I was “Left Behind” was on my mind all the time as a child. Even though I’ve long since left that church and even that religion, when I’m stressed out, my brain goes to doomsday thinking. And this political climate is definitely stressing me out. Writing letters, phoning my Representatives and marching are not doing much for my nerves, even though I know they are useful. Keeping abreast of the latest Trumpian travesty to make my thrice-weekly calls to Jim Jordan is actually heightening my worry. Each GOP action keeps my tension at DefCon 4.
My journey so far has been to read some prepper sites, watch some Youtube videos, and join a Facebook page for liberal preppers. I quickly found that most prepper websites are not Progressive friendly. Most felt that Obama was a dictator, they think paying taxes is a form of slavery, that the US is or should be a Christian Nation, and that people with brown skin are lazy/dangerous. Many of the posts were concerned with weapons that had letters and numbers as names, mocked non-prepper snowflakes, and praised Trump. I found it to be largely a Really Far Right White Guy world.
The Youtube videos are more of the same. There is a lot of talk about pulling your own weight or GTFO (get the F%$# out). Acronyms fly fast and loose. You need a BOB (Bug Out Bag) to GOOD (get out of dodge) if SHTF (shit hits the fan). Guns get compared and contrasted, and there is usually a gratuitous shot of stockpiled ammunition. Many of the videos are demonstrations of how that person will kill the people that they believe will come to take their loot if the economy collapses. On some is an undercurrent of hope that the world actually will fall apart, because they, with their bunkers and dried food, would be on top after the apocalypse, and it would be their only chance to have some personal power. Once you catch onto that, those videos become too sad to watch.
It wasn’t until I looked for groups on Facebook that I found folks I could relate to. First, I found a group called “Rebel Canners”. It is a big group of men and women who live to preserve food in jars, and, goshdarnit, they don’t mind breaking some rules to do it. Many of them are preppers of some stripe, but on that page they pretty much leave politics and religion at the door, and just encourage each other to can the food they grow or buy to put by for a rainy day. I have learned quite a bit about food preservation from the members of that group, and they make me feel like putting a decent amount of food away for a couple of years is a doable goal, and not an ‘out-there’ way of life. The posts are kindly, informative, and sprinkled liberally with good natured humblebrags about sharing jars of food with those who need it.
The other Facebook page I joined is called “Liberal Preppers”. There are folks there who have been prepping for a long time, and a whole lot of newbies. When I joined a couple weeks ago, there were a few hundred members- maybe 300. Now I think we are up to 1600 or more. We got a big membership bump the day that Stephen Miller did the Sunday shows doing his Hitler Youth impersonation. It actually made me feel good that other people were scared by his rhetoric too. While there are plenty of discussions about guns, there are also talks about the best essential oils to put in your preps, whether a Diva cup is a good idea for a post-apocalyptic life, and if pepper spray as a weapon can fit within the morals of a pacifist vegan prepper. It seems like a lot of people who are like me are worried about the future and trying to get some comfort by tucking things away. Some there are more like the Doomsday Preppers you see on TV, with bunkers, and guns, and freeze dried food. More are like me: ambivalent about guns that aren’t for hunting, and more likely to brandish an iron skillet than an assault rifle. We share the daily horrors of the Trump administration, while we tell what we did that day to resist, and prepare. We are the liberals who prep because we worry about ourselves, our families and our neighbors. We want to be able to take food to a family in need if the economy goes to hell. We want to not have to run to the store often if gas is unavailable. We want to feel some small bit of control in a world that is very quickly spiraling into unknown and frightening territory.