the Handbook for Primitive Living

in the Twenty-First Century.

Imagine if tomorrow you had no hydro, no running water, no fuel, no phone. How could you survive? This site is a thought experiment designed to answer that question.

A Social Fabric Changed

Life without the FEW (fuel, electricity, and water) is difficult to imagine; some of us reading this may be a part of a family that has enjoyed those things for 3 generations or more. So if all that infrastructure dried up, and stayed dried up, what could we reasonably expect to happen? I’m going to paint in broad brush strokes what I expect to see. As supporting evidence, I’m going to cite two observations that most people wouldn’t have problems with, and that I’m using to create this story.

1. Studies with lab rats have revealed that if you create an environment for rats where overcrowding becomes a problem, even if in all other respects, those rats are well cared for, then at some point the rats will exhibit anti-social behaviour, to the point where they would even commit acts of aggression and violence not seen in lower density environments. Remarkable parallels in our world have also been observed in high-density areas. Yes, there are exceptions. It would be unusual if there weren’t. This is no denying that this is not a trend, however.
2. The story behind the 50 million person blackout and people’s reaction that happened August 14, 2003 in the United States and Canada.

The link to the people’s reaction is interesting because it discusses the difference between people’s reactions to other massive blackouts that have happened. For the sake of my discussion, I’m going to use the 2003 blackout as a template for my projections. Truly, the end result will be the same no matter how it starts.

The Timeline for City Dwellers

1. First, we’ll have fairly calm, orderly cities. People will be helpful and perhaps even jovial. New friendships may be kindled, many will enjoy the nighttime sky in it’s real splendour again. It won’t last long.
2. As current resources (like food and drinking water) shrink, small networks of people will form. The main goal of these groups is to figure out ways of acquiring food and drinking water. This is where things will get interesting. Some groups, especially if they count in their numbers those with survivalist training, will attempt to pool their resources, ration out what they can eat, and set to legally acquiring (by hunting or gardening) what food they can. Most of the rest will try to steal what they can from stores, and if all stores are looted, then from others.
3. It gets worse. With the electricity off, many refrigerated foods, particularly meats, will rot. Many people will first try to gorge themselves on what they have, then throw out what they have in their home. More desperate people will try to eat the foods that have gone bad. Still more foods will either be left to rot in the stores, or somehow, and likely improperly, disposed of. With most people never knowing how the garbage infrastructure works, there is a strong likelihood that disease will become a serious problem.
4. Medicines to treat the diseases will of course run out. Untreated diseases will start to take a toll on the population.
5. As food becomes scarcer, these groups will start to steal from other groups. Most people will probably object to that, and a rise in violence will quickly follow. Starvation becomes the number 1 cause of death.

The problem with the city is that there’s no room to live once the FEW runs out. It sounds funny to read that, but consider: city dwellers are so densely packed, that there’s no room to farm, or keep animals we consider to be a source of food. All of the food-generating industries have been moved out to the low density areas - farms.

There will be a lot of smart people who will flee to the country when they realize what’s about to happen. If they’re really smart, then they’ll have left early and travelled far. Why? The slightly less smart, starving, diseased, prone to violence people who reach the same conclusions can’t travel as far.

Hopefully there will be a lot of smart farmers willing to receive them. Without FEW, they’ve got some pretty serious problems of their own. For example, chickens these days are grown in an incredibly high-density self-contained environment. Without electricity (ergo, without air-conditioning) those birds will cook themselves to death in short order. Without fuel, many farmers can’t maintain the size of lots that they enjoy now with the tools they have (unless they’re of the Amish, Old Order Mennonites or similar cultures).

So what should a smart farmer do? They should plan to and welcome a good number of smart squatters. They should portion off their lands in expectation of these people. They should plan to build a community where everyone will do their part to grow food, and take care of each other. And they should plan to assume responsibility to ensure the well-being of those people. Our culture and lifestyle will take on a feudal quality.