Preparedness for when

GreyQueen

What we need to bear in mind is that, in the general popluation, as many as 1 in 150 people are psychopaths. People whose brain structure is missing the connections and functionality which cause them to have empathy and concscience. Most psychopaths do not become murderers and many are very successful in the ways which success is demominated, and their effect is limited to making the lives of their immediate circle miserable. It's an incurable condition.

Religion is an immensely powerful force for those who are susceptible to its blandishments. I'm unsusceptible, and I regard religion as something so dangerous that those whose brains haven't fully matured (the under-25s, biologically speaking) should be protected from it at all costs.

Religious brainwashing + latent psychopathy = potential murderer.

The proneness of a society to revolution is predicated on the number of unemployed university-educated males under 30 with no wives and children. Which should make the US very nervous........... if the masses lift their eyes from the i-phones long enough to notice that they've been thrown under the bus.

The insider trading was done on the options markets on AA and UA. Only a very small amount of people knew about the 9/11 strikes 4 trading days before it happened, but this was enough. They were putting in an abnormal amount of options that the AA and UA stocks would fall. There was no rational reason for that, as there was no news from either company to explain it, therefore it was obvious to the other dealers that Several Someones Knew Something Bad About Those Companies. From a small amount of informed insider trading snowballed a larger amount of follow-on non-insider trading,

On the first trading day after 9/11, UA stock fell 43% and AA stock fell 40%. Those who'd taken positions based on this happening made millions.

moneyistooshorttomention

Valid point - ie re the psychopaths. I guess most of us have a predisposition to think that others will function "normally".

......and yet....I was only thinking to myself recently (courtesy of someone I know obviously having very different private and public personae) that I can think back to the last job I had. Now - bear in mind that I had that job for many years and thus viewing many of the same people at close quarters so to say over that time. There were quite a few of us working there - fair-size place - and statistics indicate that there would be those amongst our male colleagues that were wife-beaters. Now - I could instantly tell you which men I had identified (in my own mind) as being those statistics, but I doubt many others would agree.....

Come to think of it - I had a male colleague - who is a very intelligent person (but seemed to be "missing a bit") and I came to see was a dangerous person to Society at large, before an incident happened that I am still wondering about.

thriftwizard

An acquaintance of mine has reason to believe that one of her former foster-sons has gone off to join the jihad. He's a very intelligent & caring lad, but very reactive, and he honestly & deeply believes that we are dooming the entire human race & others too, by our refusal to take on board & do something about the reality of climate change, nuclear waste, global poverty etc. In his eyes, he's saving the world, not for religious reasons, but just because it needs doing and we in the West are doing nothing about it. I can't help thinking that there'll be plenty of other young people whose minds are working down the same path...

GreyQueen

Well, he won't achieve anything positive for those goals by jihad. Since most of those ills can be traced back to having too many children (not having a dig at you as a mother-of-5 btw). And that the only effective way to control population growth has been shown to be female education and emanicapation, the very opposite of what IS stands for.

Unfortuntately for him, he may suffer irreparrable harm before he wakes up to reality. Or die out there.

MTSTM, my crew have training on any number of things as part of our work. It's reckoned that at any given time, one in four women and one in nine men are being subjected to physical violence by their partner. And outsiders mostly don't know about it. We all know wife-beaters, we just don't know that we know.

nuatha

Its all to easy to assume that terrorists are thick, stupid and mislead.
Its all to easy to assume that their cause is wrong and we're in the right.

The reality is that many people believe passionately that the are fighting for a just cause and trying their very best to combat evil. Warfare has always included an economic element, manipulating stock markets is just the modern version of that. Al Qaeda would see making millions out of the US stock market as every bit as striking a blow for their cause as the hijackings and subsequent horrors. In addition they'd see a "justice" in America funding AQ's continued operations.

Rewriting the world map is not a Western privilege, though a large part of what the West is dealing with is the result of centuries of Western powers doing exactly that and proof that no one learns the lessons of history is the continued attempts to rewrite those maps.

I see very little difference between someone spraying bullets at tourists, or walking into a mosque and blowing themselves and worshippers up or walking into a church and shooting the congregation. All are horrific and all inflict terror, all were supposedly done in the name of a cause.

As preppers we could minimise the risks to ourselves by avoiding such situations - however these attacks could occur anywhere at anytime and I for one am not prepared to lock myself away from all contact with humanity. So what else can we do? We can challenge the attitudes that foster division among humans, tackle casual and deliberate racism head on, and try to see the other person's point of view. Otherwise the brown stuff will be hitting the fan harder and faster than it might otherwise do.

Its all too easy to just do nothing, but the consequences won't be easy.

GreyQueen

Well said, nuatha. There is no difference; it;s just the arrogance of people who think that killing people on grounds of creed or colour is an acceptable outlet for their frustrations or bigotry.

Years ago, a random conversation with a thoughtful friend after one of the mass random shootings revealed that she and I had very different views. She could accept (in theory) being murdered randomly by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. What was unacceptable to her is that an individual could know her and hate her enough to kill her.

I was of the reverse opinion, in that if you're prepared to kill me, it'd better the hell be personal, and you better have the b***s to look me in the face whilst doing it. Being cut down in a hail of bullets/ blown up as part of someone else's conflict isn't acceptable to me. Not that anyone gets asked, of course.

But like nuatha, I won't change how I live my life because of a possible terrorist threat. Most of us will die of cardiovascular disease or cancer, anyway.

[Deleted User]

There is enough to be worried about in everyday life here that we have some chance of coping with and sorting out without living our lives in constant anxiety about the potential events that 'might' happen over which we have no control whatsoever. Bad stuff happens, it happens everywhere there are human beings, it happens in all parts of the world, it happens to important people and insignificant people, the rich and the poor alike and will happen even if every step is taken to prevent it from happening if the perpetrators are determined and ruthless enough to carry it through.


I'm NOT prepared to stop living my life as fully as I can because I'm scared of living, I WILL take every precaution to keep myself and mine safe but I WILL live and do the things I need to do. I won't put myself needlessly at risk by going to places that are a potential target we all must realise that the world has changed and that just because we can travel and go to exotic places doesn't mean it's sensible to do so, there must be common sense and discretion in choosing trips abroad and also venues to visit here in the UK where we are not exempt from extremism and terrorist actions but I WILL NOT live my life in fear, if I do I will NOT be truly living and then the villans will have won and I will have lost everything!

Karmacat

I'm thankful for the discussion on here this morning ... as far as precautions go, this bit from MrsLucherwalker in the previous post as I write, sums up my attitude: "the world has changed and that just because we can travel and go to exotic places doesn't mean it's sensible to do so, there must be common sense and discretion in choosing trips abroad and also venues to visit here in the UK".

I do that now, and I did it at the height of the IRA bombing campaign - I'd still go to my favourite shops on Oxford Street, for example, but I'd go to them through the back/side doors (the number of flying glass injuries was very, very high, comparatively speaking).

Very, very interesting about intelligence/psychopathy in relation to terrorists - I hadn't quite thought that through ... thanks all.

mardatha

Human nature is a bu**er isn't it lol - the world would be fine without us!

nuatha

GreyQueen wrote: »

I was of the reverse opinion, in that if you're prepared to kill me, it'd better the hell be personal, and you better have the b***s to look me in the face whilst doing it. Being cut down in a hail of bullets/ blown up as part of someone else's conflict isn't acceptable to me. Not that anyone gets asked, of course.

But like nuatha, I won't change how I live my life because of a possible terrorist threat. Most of us will die of cardiovascular disease or cancer, anyway.

Frankly, If you are going to kill me, do the job right (and quickly - not as in soon) I don't and won't care if its personal or wrong time wrong place. I do care if you're so incompetent that you aren't effective and I endure permanent life changing damage.

I have plans that have been put on hold partly due to political instabilities. The Hermitage in St Petersburg and a number of sites in Istanbul, however the large proportion of the reasons are family health issues.

MrsLurcherwalker wrote: »

There is enough to be worried about in everyday life here that we have some chance of coping with and sorting out without living our lives in constant anxiety about the potential events that 'might' happen over which we have no control whatsoever. Bad stuff happens, it happens everywhere there are human beings, it happens in all parts of the world, it happens to important people and insignificant people, the rich and the poor alike and will happen even if every step is taken to prevent it from happening if the perpetrators are determined and ruthless enough to carry it through.


I'm NOT prepared to stop living my life as fully as I can because I'm scared of living, I WILL take every precaution to keep myself and mine safe but I WILL live and do the things I need to do. I won't put myself needlessly at risk by going to places that are a potential target we all must realise that the world has changed and that just because we can travel and go to exotic places doesn't mean it's sensible to do so, there must be common sense and discretion in choosing trips abroad and also venues to visit here in the UK where we are not exempt from extremism and terrorist actions but I WILL NOT live my life in fear, if I do I will NOT be truly living and then the villans will have won and I will have lost everything!

Very Well Said.
In the 80's and 90's work and other matters regularly had me in London, I was fortunate enough to avoid the bombs, despite being at various of the sites within days of the attacks. Fear didn't stop me then, its not going to stop me now.
I will minimise risks where possible, but fully intend to continue living the life I choose and accepting that I can't eliminate (nor would I wish to) risk and that I will make mistakes.