How much outlaw is in you, really?

I was never raped by Josey Wales, not to my knowledge anyway.
Given the scenario you paint i’m going to do everything in my power to look out for myself & my family, dog eat dog, as they say in Korea.

I appreciate your honesty. I would like to believe I wouldn’t do anything cruel, but I would certainly take what I need, go where I must, and keep my daughter safe from whatever.
I would try to avoid eating dogs though.

Not even a humble hot dog? Surely thou jests…

I would eat you before I would starve.

I’m not think I could hurt anyone. Steal, sure.

I woud follow the law. I always have in natural disasters. I’ve never been in a disaster where I was near starving, but I would hope people would work together so everyone is as safe as possible and fed. If there was massive total destructions for hundreds of miles and there was desparation I might steal food, but I hope it would not be necessary. Directly, physically, harming someone I can’t imagine doing except in self defense, but who knows, if I had children I probably would feel differently and do anythng to help them survive.

I think it is awful when people loot and vandalize after a disaster. The chaos just breeds additional feelings of unsafety and encourages more lawlessness.

Hate that editing widow.

I think I would pretty much follow general laws. Stealing to get food, water, or a necessary supply is different from looting to get things for “after” the disaster is over. Violence only if threatened, and then only to a point of defending and ending the threat, not beyond what is necessary.

I think it depends… I like to think I would still be a moral person, but I don’t think it’s looting, for example, if I took food from a destroyed store in order to survive. And if said disaster turns out to be worldwide, all bets are off. I would not want to kill anyone, but I think I would be capable of it if necessary, like for self defense.

I’ve often said I can adapt to any situation as long as someone wasn’t trying to kill me. In a size able catastrophe I’d probably be one of the first to be killed while I’m just sizing up the situation.

As I think about this more, it isn’t even about the law is it? I don’t steal and I don’t kill because I don’t. My own moral compass and logical reasoning on how to survive. My reaction would be to work with others to help each other and ourselves.

The laws like curfews that are imposed, those I follow also when disasters have hit for my own safety and the safety of others.

I will follow arbitrary laws as long as I don’t perceive them to be unjust. I don’t do it out of blind compliance, but because there’s a good chance others are basing their behavior on the fact that I will follow those arbitrary laws, like driving on the correct side of the road, etc.

@JLeslie OK, you have a nice little hovel with some of your surviving family members and a few neighbors who have decided community effort is better than wanton abandon.

A group is approaching with makeshift weapons intending on raiding your stash.

Do you let them or do you fight, knowing that if you don’t hold them off, your rations are gone, and you’ll likely lose a few members of the community to violence anyway?

@Seek_Kolinahr I realize my plan is for shit if other people are pilaging. I hope there are some strong, combat ready people in my group. :)

Hm.

OK, you’re not allowed in my commune.

Can’t have people cowering in the corner when there’s a battle on, you understand.

@Seek_Kolinahr I’m not sure I am cowering, but I think I won’t be very effective in battle. I can serve some other purposes though. Tend to the minor wounds (my medical knowledge is pretty good) cook, care for the children, and I am a good manager, strategist, and good at seeing where ideas might have pitfalls to protect against them. But, I do understand.

I wonder when they look at the aftermath of disasters what works better objectively? It seems to me cooperation helps the most people survive and survive with fewer injuries. But, maybe that isn’t true?

Well, we haven’t exactly had a post-apocalypse scenario yet, so I don’t know what you’d compare it to.

If an asteroid hits Earth, and 3 billion people are dead and society has collapsed, I think that changes the meaning of “moral”.

Conscientious Objectors are the first to die in Zombie films.

@JLeslie would you strategize a raid against a nearby community if yours did not have enough food to survive the coming winter? Would your thinking change if, between the two communities, there was only enough food for one to survive. If both hold on to half rations they will both be wiped out?

@drhat77 I doubt it. I don’t think I have it in me. What about you?

I have already given up on the law. I do what I must, and if it is illegal then so be it. Not that I go out of my way to break the law, but I have no regard for any law made by these so called governments. Only obey the laws you agree with.

As for the zombie disasters and looting scenarios, I would mainly keep to myself. Try to avoid others, and kill them if they come too close.

I think I could become totally wild and uncivilized in the protection of my family, if I had to. I would do what ever it took.
It wouldn’t take much to become re-civilized again, because I think I much prefer it.

I believe I would try to choose the path of least resistance in my own case. With others aboard, there might be extenuating circumstances but keeping a low profile and being very wary would be foremost in my mind.
Gathering together a group that would bond well together would also be of primary importance. Taking each moment as it comes and living hand to mouth would certainly tend to be difficult though not impossible.
Disaster tends to bring out the best in most of us but the worst in a few in my experience. I would be most wary of outliers in any case.

I don’t think we’re very good at knowing how we’ll respond in extreme situations (at least I’m not, and I don’t think I’m exceptionally lacking in self-awareness). In extreme circumstances, very different mental and endocrinal systems take over; that’s quite a different “you” than the one who entertains apocalyptic scenarios from the comfort of your armchair.

My suspicion is that civility doesn’t have very deep roots in most of us. Civility is like the economy: it only works when the majority agree that it has value and is worthy of confidence. When that confidence breaks down, the operative rules can change very quickly and unpredictably.

First I’d hole up in a local cave with fresh water and live off the earth’s blessings, which in my rural area are plentiful. Just don’t approach my cave or there’ll be trouble..lol, this is the home of Jesse James ya know, so we’re all outlaws to a degree!

….We don’t got no caves ‘round here. :(

Secret government missile site?

@Dutchess_III You get over here since you’re close and you can hole up with us, I’ll bring the moonshine & hubs will feed us..lol

I’m all over it! It better be a big cave though, cuz I have to bring my kids and grandkids. They will gather firewood. :)

@Dutchess_III No problem there, I’m bringing my dogs & birds, dogs for protection, birds to test air quality for us. :)

LOL! So, if all the birds die, what do we do then? Grandkids?

@Dutchess_III If they’re in the air, we can catch them…lol

I could probably strategize. as long as my role in any combat involved cowering and urinating on myself.

@drhat77 You are forgetting you ar an ER doctor! That would be a useful skill.

@JLeslie I would probaly be limited to first aide with sticks for splints and clean(ish) rags for dressings. Pretty much stuff anybody could do. I wouldn’t have the tools to do what I was trained to do, so all my education wouldn’t be worth licking to top of a can of beans

Wow! What fabulous answers! I love LOVE the participation here! I’ve thought about how I would react to different giant disasters when I watch these movies, and I started wondering if I was alone, or if others felt like me. I was stuck in a tornado once, with my newborn. I know what my terror was like then, but in a disaster which affects millions, I wonder. I think there is a good sampling here.
@drhat77, I think you would suprise yourself at what you could rig.
@Seek_Kolinahr, in regards to your very first response here, no you wouldn’t, you’re not my type! LOL
Chickens, if you find the weapons, I’ll put ‘em to use, just stay behind me. Between my military training, country upbringing, and maternal instincts, you’ll be safe. @Seek_Kolinahr won’t be eating any of US. She’ll just have to play nice and help us get our grub somewhere else.

@drhat77 Why? Did all the scapels and suture needles get blown up? Won’t women still be having babies? Don’t they need someone to recognize measles and polio and quarantine them? Someone to ration the antibiotics that survived the blast. Someone to stop the mom who wraps her infant in heavy blankets to sweat out a fever. You will be very useful.

@Jonesn4burgers Oh, you’re brand new aren’t you? I hadn’t realized at first. Welcome to fluther.

@JLeslie, thankyou. :) I’m enjoying myself here. Thankyou also for participating with my little question. I am very happy to see the honesty. I am even more happy to see the discussion evolve and the community pull together before my eyes. I have renewed hope.

@Jonesn4burgers Renewed hope? Why was your hope waning?

I’m a good person because I believe it’s the right thing to do, not because laws tell me to do such. So no, I wouldn’t start stealing, murdering and such.

Really, what I’d want to do, is just isolate myself as far away from the rest of people and try and get by living off the land. It seems easier than dealing with humans in high stress situations…

@uberbatman , sounds like the postman to me. another good movie. Thankyou for your honesty.
@JLeslie, since being disabled, I can’t afford to live anywhere but bad neighborhoods. I moved from one to another. The people who helped me pack also helped themselves, to a bunch of my stuff. They even stole my daughter’s xbox. HARSH. Our new neighborhood has more attributes, and some of my neighbors are very nice, but there are shootings here all the time, and lately, home invasions are on the rise. A man just kidnapped a girl from a nearby school recently. She’s back home, but needs quite a bit of recovery. People with dark souls commit crimes against others and then blame it on poverty. Heavy sigh, my faith in human kindness has been suffering some blows.

@Jonesn4burgers There is a lot of both here, I empathize with you.

Interesting question. That, it seems to me so far (halfway through), is what the novel The Day of the Triffids is about: how people survive and societies re-form in the face of mortal threat, when the former order has been destroyed at a single stroke. Law is gone, system is gone, authority is gone, recourse is gone. A new morality is born when what no longer works is cast aside and ordinary people must fend for themselves.

As for me, I don’t know. I generally avoid speculative questions because I don’t think I really have any idea what I would do in an all-but-unimaginable situation.

I agree with @thorninmud. Whatever I think I would do, it might totally be different if it happened. But if zombie movies taught me anything, is that normal people within a crisis are usually a much bigger threat than what caused the crisis to begin with. My plan during any kind of apocalypse, I don’t know; run or fight, one or the other. But whatever I’m doing, I’m doing it alone. That theater shooting a while back, you guys remember, right? Apparently, a boyfriend left his girlfriend and his kid there as he was running away…so if I’m alone and mess up, least I’d only have myself to blame.

On the other hand, I’ve been told that when a real crisis happens, at least some that might come as close as possible to a small scale apocalypse, people are actually very good at working together and getting through shit; much more so than within law and order. I’d observe from afar, like some kind of epic samurai. I’d observe before I’d get involved. My guess is that I would want to assess the situation before deciding what to do, although I imagine that if some severe business went down up in da hood yo, it’s probably easier said than done. But for now, my answer stands; I wanna survive, away from people. I certainly wouldn’t go out looking to hurt others; my aim is to get away from people. But if someone fucks with me, they better not fuck up haha.

@Jonesn4burgers So, you are surrounded by your own disaster with people doing some things outside the law. I hope things take a turn for the better for you regarding your living situation. I hate knowing people live in unsafe neighborhoods. It’s just awful.

I agree with everything @Jeruba says, including I generally avoid speculative questions because I don’t think I really have any idea what I would do in an all-but-unimaginable situation. But if pressed to imagine, I suspect I would do what I do in Austin traffic, which is to try to keep as much distance between myself and others as possible.

I have no idea. Certain things can set me off, but I don’t know how far I’d go with this one.

I would kill if I or my family were threatened. I would steal if we were starving.
Overall, I think I’d try to organize my own close society, including neighbors and strangers, so that we could all contribute.