What is keeping you in civ/Soc?

Visions of the Rewilding Renaissance Rewilding Mind & Heart
#41

Ha! :smiley:

Back to the topic of this thread (sorry to be a wet blanket) ā€¦

Hereā€™s my list:

ā€“no group to rewild with (i.e. most friendships/emotional ties being in civ)
ā€“debt
ā€“lack of survival skills/knowledge
ā€“lingering social/physiological conditioning (e.g. goddamn dirty thermostats)
ā€“nowhere to go (all land has become property, and I donā€™t own any >:()
ā€“hot showers (oh wait, thatā€™s just physiological conditioning)
ā€“creative cooking (my beloved hobby) using foods I can only obtain through the global economy
ā€“Jimi Hendrix (on vinyl ā€¦ Woot!)

#42

well, yeah, okay, thatā€™s probably more fair.

#43

Fuck yeah! ANTI-CIV METAL WILL BE THE SOUNDTRACK TO COLLAPSE.
Im down to keep a solar powered generator to play feral metal shows in the woods. AND CRUST.

but clubbin? I guess everyones got their thing. Wink Wink.

#44

what keeps me here is the realization that you canā€™t just leave civilization! sure, you can go out in the woods and start picking berries and hunting rabbits but civilizations surrounds you, and because of that i feel that i need to take the attack to civilization, not create some type of dream world where everything is alright. i donā€™t want to have to ā€œleave societyā€ to feel happy as if some Temporary Autonomous Zone solves my problems, i want to be able to live to my complete potential right here! right now! and that means that i have to be in complete struggle with the present social order. while i sympathize with the wants to run away/rewild it will only be a reaction to the present fucked up world, the only way to truly be free is to create your life in total opposition to the current social order. you canā€™t run away, it will find you. thereā€™s no such thing as outside, it encompasses us all. itā€™s the very nature of our relationships, to the alienation that i feel every morning when i wake up. itā€™s totality.

#45

Just wanted to bring this up, a quote from the last DUNE book I read; ā€œNever find yourself in the company of some one you would not want to die withā€. That would only be possible in a people that live the way nature demands, thats the only way people would have cosistant interests with those they are around. They would know if they are dying they were striving toward the same thing as those they died with. We were not raised by nature and thus have to contrive what is important to us instead of just knowing. We all have different values because we dont need to know the pertinent ones to live in a civilization. Thats why I remain hereā€¦ and debt and cheetos and popcorn and

#46

Jazz music. I love it so much, and I know the brass, electricity, copper wire and foreign wood is not long for this culture.

At least tribal music will have some of the same improvisational spirit.

#47

xjx has pretty much summed up why my spouse doesnā€™t want to leave Civilization, and so why I cannot leave Civilization, either.

Lately Iā€™ve had this strange kind of fantasy, though - where Iā€™ve got a small ā€œTribeā€ Iā€™m with, and weā€™re completely nomadic, moving from place to place, squatting national parks, etc. - roaming south during the winter (until we can accomplish thriving in cold climates), and meandering back up north in the summer. Maybe pulling off some ELF or EF! stuff as the mood or situation suits usā€¦ (everyone needs a hobby). But weā€™re always on the move. Sometimes it seems really possible, like all I have to do is walk outside and not go back - that if I take that first step, others will follow me out and weā€™ll begin just like that. Other times it seems like just a pipe-dream - like some romanticized cloud-9 crap thatā€™ll get me McCandleā€™d (not to be insensitive, but I genuinely fear that fate for myself). So I think thatā€™s probably the real thing keeping me enCivā€™ed more so than anything else. The last thing I want to do is externalize my own cowardice onto the person I love mostā€¦

But weā€™re working on it, both of us. Weā€™re constantly building steam, and working on our skill-sets, even if theyā€™re in extreme infancy at the momentā€¦

~ SW

PS: Iā€™m with you, Django. Iā€™m a big fan of all sorts of music that is pretty much incompatible with tribal lifeā€¦ but thatā€™s kind of the beauty of it, really - we get to make new music with new instruments that we invent that other people can feel the same way aboutā€¦

#48

lol prolly more true than I want to think.

#49

my love for other people around me.

#50

Scratch what I said, I like this better.

#51

habit, comfort, security the enemies of liberty

#52

the fear of fear itself? Oh yeah, and dyingā€¦ from 5-oh, starvation or exposure. I can quell the fear of the latter two by learning, but the first will always demand my attention. That one Iā€™ll just have to bite the bullet on (so to speak, ahem.)

and I would just die without my espresso :wink: (kidding. I do love it, but not that much)

#53

My pretensions of financial success keep me going ā€œto workā€, that and kind of a deep distrust of the collapse coming quickly enough for my kids not to resent being street urchins (not that my mate would let that happen without fighting). The addiction to the comforts of domestication and fear of ā€œthe manā€ are psychological barriers. If I went feral alone today, I would have to deal with the pain but only for myself. If the time comes for me to leave society with my mate and children it would probably be to avoid prison or relocation camp, because going on the ā€œpermanent camping tripā€ would have to appear more comfortable than the alternative.

#54

A few things:

  1. ā€œIndustrial collapse is not a retirement strategy.ā€ While Iā€™d love to go squat land, until this shit comes down I want a method, even if it is a legal fiction, to protect the landbase I live on. That means, unfortunately, purchasing it. Which means work.

  2. I work in muckity muck hi-tech land. Youā€™d be surprised how fragile this all is from this stand point. Staying within civilization allows me the ability to wedge myself into a place where ā€œohā€¦ did I push that button. Whoops. coughā€ is a reality. It also gives me access to lots of information and peopleā€¦ placing oneself in the technocratic corps of the machine, learning where all the cogs are, how this all runs, is actually a somewhat novel strategy for me. Weā€™ll see how long it lasts.

#55

Iā€™m apathetic and spend huge amounts of time being depressed.

I know people who are into living in the woods - but nobody SERIOUS about taking off to do it right now.

There are many fun things about civilization. I donā€™t appreciate industrial society as a whole, but I am really attached to my bicycle and I enjoy hi-tech music a lot. I really appreciate being able to get huge amounts of food from grocery store dumpsters every single day whenever I want to.

I have lots of problems with social interaction and am a hermit - and for all of the ills of civilization, it makes survival as a loner a lot easier than as a loner in the wilderness.

#56
I know people who are into living in the woods - but nobody SERIOUS about taking off to do it right now.

There are still plenty of tribal people who live in the woods right now who still practice subsistence hunting and gathering (with a few nods to modernity, as is the case everywhere). In places like Borneo, New Guinea, Brazil/Ecuador/Venezuela/Peru/Colombia, Laos, and others. I imagine that if you were committed to finding such ā€œtribal peopleā€ who hunt in the forest, it wouldnā€™t be too difficult to find them and connect with them, wouldnā€™t hurt to try anyways if you canā€™t find any suitable social group to live among in your own country.

Also in many other countries certain groups among the local people can be found living a good deal of their lives ā€œout in the countryā€ camping and living in tents/huts/etc, while hunting and sharing food, feasting with each other, sharing living space, etc.

There are many people who are doing it right now.

#57

At the same time, why should anybody expect to be welcomed into a tribe that is already self-sufficient? Are they really going to say, ā€œSure, stranger, be a permanent guest here, even if your primitive skill level matches that of one of our 9-year-old children.ā€ It seems a little arrogant if you ask me.

#58

I really donā€™t see what is arrogant about wanting to connect with indigenous or tribal peoples. Whether or not any certain social group allows an outsider to interact with the members of that social group is up to them, according to their rules, customs and so on. If a person is respectful of those rules, customs and so on, I see no problem with it, maybe others do but that is their opinion, and since itā€™s an outsiderā€™s opinion, it tends not to reflect the wishes or opinion of the social group in question.

I donā€™t think people should expect to be welcomed into every indigenous group, part of the way most modern tribal people preserve what independence they have is by excluding outsiders, yet they also adopt outsiders into their tribe in certain cases, depending on the group and the circumstances. You canā€™t say that this one does and that one doesnā€™t , because itā€™s up to those people to decide for themselves who they will accept and how they will conduct their relations.

Yet, what is wrong with talking to and learning from and spending time with those who are willing to share what they know, their life and so on?

In fact, how are people supposed to form tribes and ā€œre-wildā€ without interacting with any sort of indigenous peoples? No offense, but I donā€™t think that many people in the re-wilding community (myself included) have enough experience and social skills to connect to each other in the manner of extended family relations. We certainly canā€™t learn that much from books regarding on how to live as extended family members, we have to see it being done here and now.

#59

Sandwalker, very well said. I have found what you say to generally be the way it works. Relating as one human being to another is where itā€™s at. We have a lot in common

#60

While thereā€™s nothing arrogant about wanting to connect with a tribal group, there is something arrogant about expecting it to happen, at least in a way that makes you a permanent member of the group. I guess it depends on what you mean by ā€œconnectā€ - I think most people/groups would have no problem with talking with you or accommodating you for short periods, at least initially. But you really canā€™t expect to just be able to move on in.