Survival vs Wilderness living vs Apocalypse fantasizers

[stabman]

I've noticed people get into arguments over what constitutes survival and whatnot, and it led to me having these thoughts.

Survival: You are lost and need to survive until rescued, or make your way out. Duration: 3-7 days generally.
or: you have experienced a disaster and must survive until rescued, or make your way to a non-affected zone. Same duration. 2 weeks about the absolute maximum duration limit.

Wilderness living: You have decided to make the wilderness your home, for some length of time. Duration: variable, but over 2 weeks at the minimum. No fancy equipment, or it's just a long camping trip.

Apocalypse Fantasizers: You aren't liked by the people at work/school/mom's basement, but boy howdy are the girls going to jump you because you own all those guns and bug out bags once the inevitable apocalypse hits. Duration: how long can ridiculous fantasies last?

For survival, I could do fine. I could do it just by finding a way to get enough water to not die.
For wilderness living, I'd straight up die. I'd likely eat something poisonous and die, or starve to death eventually, or find some other dumb way to die.
For apocalypse fantasies, why bother? I can relate to people well enough that I found a wife and have some friends.

Thoughts?

 

[Triq]

I can relate to people well enough that I found a wife and have some friends.

Thoughts?

LMAO I love this! I also agree for the most part, though the line between camping and wilderness living is awfully blurry to me.

 

[stabman]

LMAO I love this! I also agree for the most part, though the line between camping and wilderness living is awfully blurry to me.

Thanks.
I think the difference between camping and wilderness living lies in how much/what sort of gear one has with them. If they can replace things as they go with natural stuff, and continue to procure food, it becomes more a case of wilderness living, especially once it exceeds a month or so.
If one stayed out for an entire year, it'd probably cross into wilderness living no matter how much gear they started out with, as they'd have to continually resupply food, find reliable sources of water, and likely deal with some form of illness as well at some point.

 

[cramsey3006]

Survival-- I think a short term situation is much more about being mentally prepared than anything else. Having the right gear would help, but humans improvised for centuries and managed to make do just fine.

Wilderness Living-- Having some basic stuff would definitely help out. Knowledge, again, is key. Just a little studying on wild edibles, etc, could make all the difference. As for dying in some stupid way, there are plenty of ways to do that in the city too.

The way I see it, if the Apocalypse actually ever happens, it's either going to be a total nuclear destruction thing or a giant asteriod hitting the planet. Not much that I can do about it either way, so I'd rather spend my time LIVING a good life now instead of planning/hoarding/worrying about something that may never happen.

 

[meismjg]

Probably another distinction to make is camping vs surviving. A lot of people list a ton of "survival gear" they are going to use on a PLANNED event. My opinion is that if you are taking special gear for a planned event then you are camping. Surviving involves uncertainty and unplanned events. Camping could turn into surviving if you were to get lost / stuck in a bad storm / injured.

 

[stabman]

My opinion is that if you are taking special gear for a planned event then you are camping. Surviving involves uncertainty and unplanned events. Camping could turn into surviving if you were to get lost / stuck in a bad storm / injured.

Totally agreed.

 

[CoyotePhysics]

Probably another distinction to make is camping vs surviving. A lot of people list a ton of "survival gear" they are going to use on a PLANNED event. ...

Let me add to this the Ironic situation when people are toting this gear in a taped together jalopy, going 20 over the speed limit and not wearing their seatbelt... A lot of people prepare for the unlikely catastrophes while risking death in some mundane preventable way.

For the record, I wouldn't do well in any of the situations listed... but I wear sunscreen.

 

[JCavSD]

Put me at the lower end of the time frames for survival and wilderness living and I think I'd do half way okay (assuming available water). After all, I'm an SPF 50 kinda guy.

As far as surviving an apocalypse....no way....I'd OWN an apocalypse! I have enough firearms and ammo to shoot the hell out of all my survival needs. Even though I'm getting old and I'm pretty weak I'm sure I could fall back to hand-to-hand combat and clean house if needed (There's no place like home, there's no place like home...). Oh yea!

 

[Guildknives&tools]

I think of John Muir when I think of survival and wilderness living. He used to leave home with a small bag with tinder, flint and steel, a knife and some tea bags. And a walking stick. He frequently had a journal and a pencil. That was it. Months on end wandering around in the wilderness.

Now as for Apocalyptic survival....I think it does has its place. It gets you thinking and preparing for things that could happen going with the adage: hope for the best, plan for the worst.

Incidentally it won't be a nuclear apocalypse or an asteroid, it will be people rioting in the streets in conjunction with shortages of essentials. Putting up a few supplies that you rotate throughout the year is never a bad idea. What if you lost your job today and didn't find work for a couple months? Could you make it without welfare? I can. Being self sufficient is never wrong.

 

[Myal]

Let me add to this the Ironic situation when people are toting this gear in a taped together jalopy, going 20 over the speed limit and not wearing their seatbelt... A lot of people prepare for the unlikely catastrophes while risking death in some mundane preventable way.

For the record, I wouldn't do well in any of the situations listed... but I wear sunscreen.

I resemble that remark ...
well with the exception of the seatbelt tho ... if there is one in the vehicle I currently own I wear it , but on the 14000km return trip to my brothers house for a coffee and each year ..... with roughly 400km between service stations , and nothing else but trees roos and long straight roads .... its easy to let the speed creep up some . The daily goal when we travel is a bit over 1000km a day ,with a couple lay days for just kicking back .

I regard camping as the beginnings of bush living . .. bush living as the beginnings of apocalypse survival .... 0ne of the things we do when we camp is find the bush food , make shelter from whats at hand if there is time to spend on it , talking to the kids about this is how our people used to do it , and how we can still do it again if we need or want to .

Bugging out to me is just heading over to a mates place for a few days because of a flood or fire or chemical problem going on at home .

 

[Triq]

Being self sufficient is never wrong.

I agree, I think the op was refering to the mall ninja types.

 

[mtwarden]

I can't believe no one is going to defend the Apocalypse view- where are the Zombie fighters when you need them!

I will say they are good for an ailing economy however- even Walmart can't keep the ammo shelves full

 

[sodak]

I can't believe no one is going to defend the Apocalypse view- where are the Zombie fighters when you need them!

I will say they are good for an ailing economy however- even Walmart can't keep the ammo shelves full

Like this?

 

[mtwarden]

^ there you go

 

[Chris Pierce]

Being self sufficient is never wrong.

I may not agree with everything in this thread 100%, but I agree 100% with this.

I see Survival as there has been a disaster, and you need to get rescued or get to civilization etc. This may take hours, days weeks...

I see "wilderness living" as living in the wilderness off the "grid" As in no electricity, limited outside supplies etc. This is a long term living situation.

Apocalypse Fantasizers I'm guilty of this. Lately I've been hanging around the in-laws quite a bit and they keep talking about the "end times". So I've been stocking up on ammo, food and water. I even bought some gear so I can actually carry a pistol and a long gun, ammo etc.

While I've been fantasizing about the Apocalypse, I'd really enjoy living a more self sufficient life style. Growing a big garden, raising chickens and rabbits etc.

 

[DrivebyTrucker]

For the record, I wouldn't do well in any of the situations listed... but I wear sunscreen.

My clothes have built in SPF50 protection.

 

[Wharn]

I've noticed people get into arguments over what constitutes survival and whatnot, and it led to me having these thoughts.

Survival: You are lost and need to survive until rescued, or make your way out. Duration: 3-7 days generally.
or: you have experienced a disaster and must survive until rescued, or make your way to a non-affected zone. Same duration. 2 weeks about the absolute maximum duration limit.

Wilderness living: You have decided to make the wilderness your home, for some length of time. Duration: variable, but over 2 weeks at the minimum. No fancy equipment, or it's just a long camping trip.

Apocalypse Fantasizers: You aren't liked by the people at work/school/mom's basement, but boy howdy are the girls going to jump you because you own all those guns and bug out bags once the inevitable apocalypse hits. Duration: how long can ridiculous fantasies last?

For survival, I could do fine. I could do it just by finding a way to get enough water to not die.
For wilderness living, I'd straight up die. I'd likely eat something poisonous and die, or starve to death eventually, or find some other dumb way to die.
For apocalypse fantasies, why bother? I can relate to people well enough that I found a wife and have some friends.

Thoughts?

I cracked up reading this, great job. Although, the dinosaurs laughed off the apocalypse as well and their is a direct correlation between them lacking guns and samurai swords and them dying off.

 

[CoyotePhysics]

I can't believe no one is going to defend the Apocalypse view- where are the Zombie fighters when you need them!

I will say they are good for an ailing economy however- even Walmart can't keep the ammo shelves full

Anyone who has ever seen a horror movie knows this simple fact. The more prepared you are, the less likely you are to survive. A fully briefed, armed, and supported Navy Seal team will last only moments against zombies. The 17-year-old 95-lb cheerleader, and the friendless, but remarkably likable nerd will construct an inferior weapon out of a beanie baby collection and blow the "un" out of the undead.

 

[dogstar]

Have you seen this video?

He is definitely living in the wilderness, but he is not self sufficient as he trades furs for supplies. I still consider this wilderness living because I will never get close to doing it.
[video=youtube;WIzrw0jsAJw]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIzrw0jsAJw[/video]

 

[The Logical One]

I agree, I think the op was refering to the mall ninja types.

But then again a lot of the "emergency preparedness advocates" aka the SHTF crowd are pretty much a hairline of a step away from being mall ninja status. IMO it's more of a militaristic fantasy where they can wear all the tacticool gear/tote a gun around out in the open (something they can't do in their everyday mundane lives) that drives people to the whole SHTF fantasies.

Same goes for the home defense crowd where people sleep with guns under their beds/pillows and next to their beds. People hate hearing this, but the fact is they are "preparing" and being overly paranoid for things that are just very very unlikely to happen. One of my close friends is one of those people, and by hearing him talking about all these imaginary HD and SHTF scenarios I can see it's all just one major fantasy.