Book study group coming soon

[Atash Hagmahani]

I'm soliciting interest in a study group for the book "Patriots", by John Wesley Rawles.

ACHTUNG: no guarantee that his scenario is realistic. I doubt it. He wants a crisis that will be over and done with. I think we are in for a slow, long decline, but it could very well have crisis situations such as "bank holidays", high chronic inflation, high chronic unemployment, rationing, etc.

The point is actually more to go over our checklist of preparations, and think things through all the way to the end. For example, he points out that emergency blood transfusions are hard to accomplish, due to lack of availability of equipment, due to assumptions of hospitals always being available.

Fuel shortages are a scenario that scares me. 

Let me know if you are interested.

Here is a link to the book.

[opsec]

How about the book "The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse" instead? This book was written by FERfal. That's the guy who went through the Argentina currency collapse back in 1999. He has blogged and posted about it ever since. I like this better that Patriots because Patriots is a fictional account and I am leery of using somebody's imagination as a benchmark to guage my preparedness. FERfal's book is based on actual experience. Cost is $24.95 at lulu.com

http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/the-modern-survival-manual-surviving-the-economic-collapse/5289583

[oscar615]

I have read it, twice.  Once in its earlier form as "Triple Ought" and once as "Patriots".  I would be willing.  Triple ought was available for free on the net.  It may still be.  Really the only difference are that he added a little and updated the time frame from pre Y2K to basicallly today.

Opsec book sounds good too.  I might have to get that one.

[Atash Hagmahani]

Opsec, that's a valid concern. Fiction has both benefits and drawbacks. The benefits to the fictional approach include thinking about how things COULD be if one planned for them up-front, rather than what they were as an afterthought.

Some of the flaws in the book would make good discussion points. We want to get folks thinking.

Rawles' name and reputation will draw in some interested parties.

"How to prepare your finances so that you don’t suffer what millions in my country went through"

I'm curious what he has to say, but what most wealthy Argentinos did, was have a foreign bank account. They then bought up depreciated assets all over the country--apartment buildings (I could have been rich, had I been prepared to fly down there...) and businesses.

$24 is a bit pricey for some folks. Do you have it, Opsec? Maybe we could create some supplemental materials.

Oscar, he pulled Triple Ought so that he could promote Patriots.

[opsec]

I do have it. I haven't read it yet though. Right now I'm working my way through Nassim Taleb's "The Black Swan".

[oscar615]

I don't know where it is $24.00.  That would be too much. But on Amazon it is $10.17.  It has actually gone up in price with the newest version of Patriots.  Same book, I think he added a glossary or something like that.  It was 9 and change when I got mine.

http://www.amazon.com/Patriots-Novel-Survival-Coming-Collapse/dp/156975599X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1255395554&sr=8-2

[Ryder]

I read 000 back before Y2K. I also have bought and read patriots. Good read and there are other good books out there as well. The part I like about fiction is the author can include all sorts of stuff and blend it into a story. I would welcome a discussion group.

[opsec]

Rawles has another book entitled "How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It: Tactics, Techniques, and Technologies for Uncertain Times". If the title is any clue, that might be more blunt and to the point when it comes to survival know-how. I'm thinking he may have done a lot of this work for us and distilled all of his survival knowledge into a more concentrated form. That could save us some time.

[hancocs]

I have read both the "Patriots" and FERfal " The modern survival manual Surviving the economic collapse" . I have read about 100 pages of Rawles new book " How to Survive the end of the world as we know it. For discussions I think all three have good things to say. I do like FERfal because like Opsec it is base on real experience and may be more applicable to real life. FERfal would be my first choice and what I read of Rawles How to Survive it would be my second choice although he does alot of pugging for his vendors on his website.

I think this is a good idea. So I am in on any book we choose.

[Beeherder]

 

Great lively topic. I have read the Rawles 2007 version and half of the FERFal book. Both have good points both have short comings. Atash points out the most interesting advantage of fiction as a preparation tool, imagination!

My thoughts on Rawles, too easily wraped up into a nice final chapter with a cool good guy ending. NOT REAL! Too much emphasis on THE RETREAT. Hey its a real world and I live in a real neighborhood even if it is remote. I need more social action than can be achieved in the tribal religious groupings he suggests. Just one way of seeing it today, maybe different tommorrow. Teams are a good thing and he suggests some nice approaches to training and manuals, neighbors are also good he leaves them out.

Half way through FERFal's book, I like what he has done to my awareness of blades as defensive weapons and how I think a little differently now about self defense in general. His real point at the half way mark seems to be: AVOIDANCE. If you see a riot go the other way, if you see trouble be someplace else, if you plan ahead you won't need to riot for food. This fits the Mutual Survival idea in a broader sense than Rawles. hey its just an opinion, eye have more too.

[Atash Hagmahani]

Beeherder, this is part of the reason for the study group: to analyze other people's ideas critically, with a mind to what will work, what won't, what is realistic to expect, what is not, etc.

Even when the authors are wrong, it will provoke lively discussions. Indeed, controversy provokes more discussion than agreement!

I haven't gotten all the way through the book yet, but I have a bad feeling it's got too much ideology based on the synopsis on the back cover about "restoring constitutional law" or something like that. SNOWFLAKE'S CHANCE IN HELL. But it's all worth a discussion.

Maybe if enough of us have the Ferfal book, we can do a discussion even without everybody having a copy.

I'll follow up later in the week with some planning, and some more invitations. I can't start quite yet, and it will take a while for folks to acquire copies of the book. Maybe start in November, with some adjustments for major holidays when posting could get sparse.

[Beeherder]

Read them all. Patriots is a good eye opener, imo. Used it for some ideas about what to stockpile. Then How To Survive ... in last two weeks. Picked it up and could not put it down. Finished in three days, lots of dog eared pages and more ideas. I tend to get more anxious when reading his stuff and have always been uncomfortable with his basic premise that: what he thinks was, ever happened and that what he thinks was, is worth restoring. He is right we are in deep doodoo and its not going to get better until submission and death or revolt.

FerFal's book is another that is worth the read. Made me rethink edged weapons he did. Now i bristtle with pointy things with sharp edges and somehow feel better about life. His writing style is unique and personally enjoyed it but it took a few pages to appreciate that he is not a native speaker of english. He spells like eye do. 

Then eye read Boston' Gun Bible by Boston T. Party (2008 edition). Now this guy seems to know what he is talking about when it comes to weapons but he shares some of the same attitude that makes me uncomfortable with Rawles. Worth the read for excellent gun reference, try not to buy too much of his "patriotism" thing if you can. Then again he is the author of Molon Labe' which is now on my reading list. Wonder how they are doing up there in NH? Anyone know his book "You And The Police"?

[Atash Hagmahani]

OK, finally got the book discussion board up. Feel free to add titles. I suggest one topic per title.

[opsec]

Are we still going to do the "Patriots" study group?

[Atash Hagmahani]

Yes, although that reminds me...there were issues that I forgot to account for. I'll work on it tonight maybe.