# Serious Questions About the Collapse of Civilization **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 2, 2024, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512 "2024-01-02T19:43:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/121 "2024-01-24T06:08:07Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Just because I didn’t use ‘we’ doesn’t mean I’m not also in the SCA, and ‘we’ know _nothing_ about living without electricity. ‘We’ know how to _camp_ for a bit without it, but most SCA folk wouldn’t last a week without ice for their drinks (or insulin, come to that). I beleive we do. Mind you- not about living in a world without electricity. But put some experienced SCAer (I am a Pelican) in a nice cabin with lanterns, candles, a cool cellar with stuff, a woodburning stove, and an outhouse- and we could adapt fine. > [@MrDibble](#): > > The mountain men/trapper reenactors are a way better bet - lots of lifestylers there. They could well be better. But there is a difference between living without electricity and living in a post apocalyptic world without it. I claim many of us SCA would be fine without electricity- we do fine in power outages- I often lend my neighbors gear- etc. And I grew up working on the family farm in the summer, and having my own home garden and fruit trees. But yeah, if civilization ended I’d be fucked too- just maybe not in that first rush of panicked deaths. But pretty much no civilized human is gonna be happy in that post apocalyptic world. Some natives out in the boonies will be okay, and a few “off the griders” will be okay until some nasty medical or dental thing happens. So, we are talking about different things- put me in that cabin with some nice books, and a regular supply of food, and I’d be fine until I got very sick. I dont need electricity- but I do need a USA with it. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 6:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/122 "2024-01-24T06:28:39Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Mind you- not about living in a world without electricity. If society collapses, there is no electricity. > [@DrDeth](#): > > But put some experienced SCAer (I am a Pelican) in a nice cabin with lanterns, candles, a cool cellar with stuff, a woodburning stove, and an outhouse- and we could adapt fine. Until the food runs out or you (generic you) need your insulin or other meds. SCAdians skew older than general society and don’t live the healthiest lifestyle, IME (very hard-drinking, for one). I’m an experienced SCAdian too - 26 years now, although I’ve successfully avoided tin hats. If I did care to put in the effort for one, it’d be Laurel, as my GoA-level award is for A&S. I’ve attended events on 3 continents, with people from every Kingdom - I think I have a broad enough experience of what the general SCAdian is like. > [@DrDeth](#): > > But there is a difference between living without electricity and living in a post apocalyptic world without it. There’s also a difference between a few hours (or even a day or two) without electricity and there being no electricity at all, ever. I grew up in a neighbourhood where half of it wasn’t electrified yet. Some of my childhood friends still had outhouses. And even then, there were honey trucks and a network of paraffin and gas suppliers for their fuel and lighting, and stores where they bought fresh food. > [@DrDeth](#): > > And I grew up working on the family farm in the summer, and having my own home garden and fruit trees That’s you, specifically, not the general SCAdian. > [@DrDeth](#): > > I dont need electricity- but I do need a USA with it. Then how does that relate to what Dewey said? He specified " **in the aftermath of a collapse of civilization**" ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/123 "2024-01-24T06:46:48Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > If society collapses, there is no electricity. More or less, that is correct. > [@MrDibble](#): > > There’s also a difference between a few hours (or even a day or two) without electricity and there being no electricity at all, ever. Which is what I just said. Except I could live many years without me- personally - having electricity. Not in a world without it. > [@MrDibble](#): > > Then how does that relate to what Dewey said? I was not replying to Dewey. Nor were you. So, Too many posts back. You do know that threads around here don’t always stay precisely on the OP, right? In any case, your everage SCAer would do better than the average couch potato. But again- if civilization is fucked - every civilized person is fucked. Even the Amish. Even survivalists/preppers. Modern medicine will end. Sure some tribes in the outback will be not much more fucked than they are now. Now, if the grid goes only out for a week or a month- some of us will be better off than many. But in the end it wont matter who you are or how you prepped- you are fucked. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 7:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/124 "2024-01-24T07:23:11Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I was not replying to Dewey. You were taking a particular stance in a conversation that was in reply to Dewey, so yes, you were. Or at least, you were implicitly within the bounds of Dewey’s premise. > [@DrDeth](#): > > You do know that threads around here don’t always stay precisely on the OP, right? Dewey wasn’t the OP. But he was who the whole SCA side conversation was started in reply to, by **nwh**. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/125 "2024-01-24T13:22:46Z")
Moderating: I think we’ve heard enough about the SCA and this branch of the conversation is becoming a hijack. Please drop it. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/126 "2024-01-24T13:34:48Z")
I side with @thorny_locust in observing very little correlation between how religious a person is and how moral they are. And I’m another atheist who knows highly moral people who are also highly religious. (And aren’t in the news for their religion.) But i don’t think religion will help (or hurt) in the apocalypse, either. What WILL help is community. (Which is correlated with religion, but not perfectly.) Groups of people who care about each other and will care for each other are more likely to survive. Or more likely to have more survivors, anyway. For that matter, how does the billionaire keep his guards from eating him? By being a good leader, and being respected by those guards. By taking in their loved ones to the extent possible, and making hard decisions that are respected by the group. If they know that he will shepherd their resources and help maintain their community, there’s a good chance he keeps his position. If he’s a despot who assumes his money will keep their respect then his prospects don’t look good. (Unless he’s a successful and manipulative despot…) Wealth and management skills are correlated, but only loosely. So i think some of the billionaires make it and others don’t. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/127 "2024-01-24T15:08:14Z")
Civilizations _have_ collapsed. What follows is of course chaos in the short term, following by one of two kinds of “order”: rebuilding society, or serving the whims of some tyrant ruler. And of course these things are not necessarily mutually exclusive: tyrannical rule can become a more-or-less free and productive state eventually (and the opposite…peace and order tends to win over time though, hence how the world has managed to get to where it is). I would agree with the OP though, that “rich people protected by armed security” is not actually a very stable state, absent government or currency. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/128 "2024-01-24T15:20:37Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > What follows is of course chaos in the short term, following by one of two kinds of “order”: rebuilding society, or serving the whims of some tyrant ruler. And even if central authority isn’t restored, so what? Classical Greece had no central authority; neither did Renaissance Italy. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/129 "2024-01-24T15:22:00Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > rebuilding society, or serving the whims of some tyrant ruler. “The whims of some tyrant ruler” **is** rebuilding society. For most of human history, most people have lived under what we would all consider to be some sort of “tyrant ruler”. The key to “society” is having enough people with the right mix of skills working together to make things run as smoothly as possible. The trick is to find a tyrant ruler who understands that he needs the general populace as much as they need him, so that he’ll keep the whims relatively under control. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Wiggler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/red_wiggler/32/13190_2.png) [@Red\_Wiggler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Wiggler)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/130 "2024-01-24T15:56:10Z")
In the absence of democratic communities it would seem that the personal qualities of leadership indeed would matter most. People will gravitate to the person who can best help them acquire the things they value most and I’m not sure that having “ownership” by a definition no longer applicable is one of those traits of leadership. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/131 "2024-01-24T17:08:39Z")
I think that, putting this in the context of the OP, some of it may come down also to the particular qualities of the people who get hired as bodyguards. Some people seem to have a really strong sense of what Pratchett I think phrased as “Kings! What a good idea!” (Pratchett clearly didn’t think so.) If people take the job as bodyguard because they want to serve a king, then so long as they perceive the billionaire as being in that position, they’ll do so, and be loyal to them. But if they take the job as bodyguard because they’re thinking of getting themselves into the position of being an armed guy with access to the bunker, then they’re probably likely to rapidly dispose of Billionaire, or at least start ignoring orders. And if they just took the job because they’re broke, they’d probably be so freaked out by having the collapse actually happen that they might be influenced either way, depending on what category the other bodyguards fall into. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/132 "2024-01-24T17:31:03Z")
Of course, even someone whose motivation for being a bodyguard is wanting “to serve a king” (i.e., work for a billionaire) may change their mind after a collapse of civilization. And even if they’re still willing to serve, one of their fellow bodyguards might be tempted to take over. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/133 "2024-01-24T17:39:30Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > And even if they’re still willing to serve, one of their fellow bodyguards might be tempted to take over. Yes, this. Who looks more like a King? Some perfumed billionaire with soft hands who whines about the water in the poll being the wrong shade of pink, or the former Navy SEAL who leads the guard team, who commands the personal loyalty of a lot of the guards? ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Wiggler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/red_wiggler/32/13190_2.png) [@Red\_Wiggler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Wiggler)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/134 "2024-01-24T17:53:47Z")
I think thorny nevertheless has a point about some people like the thought of simply being power _adjacent_. Witness Stephen Miller, he loves manipulating dumb Donald and inflicting pain on others from his post (not saying that post-apocalyptic bodyguards would wish to hurt those lower in the power structure). _Lucifer’s Hammer_ addressed this issue somewhat, though kinda tangentially, when the Senator died. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/135 "2024-01-24T17:54:21Z")
> [@cjackson](#): > > Whenever society collapses and money no longer means anything, what will happen to all the former billionaires hiding in their bunkers? First, it’s worth noting that society is unlikely to collapse and money to become meaningless. Even during a time of catastrophe, it’s useful to be able to trade IOUs. Maybe I’m good at skinning animals and maybe you’re good at fixing equipment. I can skin the rabbit that you caught but what can you do for me, if I don’t have anything that’s broken for you to fix? If you give me money, then I can go look up the guy who’s good at growing potatoes, and he can use my money to hire you to fix his windmill. Money is useful for society to encourage people to help each other, and that’s even **more** necessary during hard times, not less. Secondly, your average billionaire doesn’t have a bunker. If you’re afraid of catastrophe, you’re unlikely to be the sort of person who is willing to take the risks needed to get rich. The sort of person who dreams of owning a bunker is generally the sort of person who’s also afraid that if they put their money in the bank that the lizard people are going to take it. A billionaire doesn’t put their money in a bank because they believe that they’ll make more money on it in a brokerage than a savings account. > [@](#): > > Since money would have no value, what is to stop the security guards of the former rich from just eating them since they would no longer be getting paid anything worth a damn? In a sufficiently dire situation, maybe people would turn to cannibalism. But, even when you look at cases like the Donner Party, most people don’t. Humans have lived in everything from the sand-strewn desert to ice and snow wastelands, successfully, for thousands of years. A healthy, physically fit human being is generally going to do better moving around to find a source of food than sitting around in a bunker, thinking that food will just magically appear out of the concrete. In both the Donner Party and the Andes plane crash survivors, the young healthy men were able to successfully walk to safety and probably would have done better to have immediately done so rather than hang out dealing with women, children, and old folks. If the bodyguards like the family that they’re guarding then they’d probably like normal humans and try to help the people. If the family was populated with horrible people then, at the most, I’d expect the guards to take some food and start walking. Cannibalism isn’t likely to be on the table unless they’re literally trapped in a room. And then, we’d expect that they’d eat people who died naturally, rather than some sort of murder-fest. That’s not how humans behave in these sorts of situations. > [@](#): > > Are the bodyguards just dumb, psychopathic slabs of meat that just like violence and don’t think that far ahead? No, they’re people. Mr. T was a bodyguard. He was just a guy who was physically imposing and turned that into a career. Some of them are nice, some are assholes. The assholes probably don’t last long as employees since who wants to hang out around them? ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/136 "2024-01-24T18:12:46Z")
I assumed “eat the billionaire” was meant metaphorically. I agree that i would not expect much cannibalism. I would expect an increase in murder and theft, though. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/137 "2024-01-24T18:22:35Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > but they wouldn’t panic; they’d say “it must be God’s will”, and they’d figure it out. I know this is incredibly cynical, faithless and despairing of me, but I’ve never been able to figure out what to do if God’s will turns out to be “you die in slow torment now”. Or even if belief in God is an observer effect- we’re all descended from the people who lucked out just long enough have children. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/138 "2024-01-24T18:30:42Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I wouldnt be surprised if Hinduism and other religions also had an extremist fringe. Hindu fundies have been in the news lately for their recent election victories and for their militant policy of tearing down mosques and restoring the temples that had been on those sites centuries ago. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/139 "2024-01-24T18:48:04Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > Who looks more like a King? Some perfumed billionaire with soft hands who whines about the water in the poll being the wrong shade of pink, or the former Navy SEAL who leads the guard team, who commands the personal loyalty of a lot of the guards? Not really wanting to bring current politics into this thread – but the person currently IMO eliciting this reaction way too strongly in the USA looks a whole lot like the first type to me. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2024, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512/140 "2024-01-24T18:56:39Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > but the person currently IMO eliciting this reaction way too strongly in the USA looks a whole lot like the first type to me Yeah, but that’s looking at him from afar, on TVs and the like, and when you’re drinking beer and eating nachos. A lot of the people who’ve seen him up close aren’t nearly so enamored of him, and that would only get worse if you had to deal with him post-apocalypse, when _he’s_ demanding instantaneous Diet Coke delivery, and _you’re_ trying to figure out how to keep the radroaches and ghouls at bay. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serious-questions-about-the-collapse-of-civilization/995512.md?page=8)