You're on Your Own

Are you avoiding the rush?

If you’re from the UK (or many other European nations or many parts of America) and want to know what collapse is like, look outside. It’s here, we’re fully collapsing. Now, before anyone says that this is alarmist doomsaying, let me state that I’m not making predictions about the future, I’m not standing in the street shouting “The end is nigh!” I’m looking at the data and personal experience that is staring me directly in the face. Now, I can’t outline every aspect of the collapse process, which, to spout the cliche line, is a long, slow process, but I can address a few key markers that at current are blindingly evident of our reality.

Nearly one in five council leaders in England now say they are likely to declare bankruptcy in the next 15 months. Which is to say what we all know full well, that the current tactic of trying to run the world off debt doesn’t work. Then there is the complete and utter failure of medical, dental, judicial, and emergency services. Or, in short, if you have to wait half a year to get something checked, wait over a year for a trial, wait 4+ hours for an ambulance, or consider going abroad for your dentistry then, for all practical purposes, your country is not supplying those services. Sure, they exist in some far-off vague sense, but if you can’t rely on them to mitigate disorder at its root then one can only expect entropy to outgrow negentropy. Or, put another way, if the abstract purpose of a state is to maintain order, then a state can considered collapsing at the point that disorder is notably overtaking order.

Beyond this one can look at further, more symptomatic answers relating to the collapse in the unconscious governmental response to such crises, which is to double-down on the very systems that are failing, as if to say that to return to normality all we need is more normal. According to the cybernetician Stafford Beer, the purpose of a system is what it does, and so, if what our system does is fail then it has been, at least in part, designed that way. Were the agents of this design human? I doubt it. Were they ‘historical forces’? Maybe. I don’t know. But, if over the course of 50 years, a system is seen clearing failing via quantifiable metrics and no one does anything about that who has the power to, one can only surmise that the failure has been (in part) designed. Personally, I think this is part of the truth, but the design is part of a far larger cycle.

If one searches something like ‘UK collapse’ on Google, they will find articles that state things like “We have never seen anything happen to a developed country like what’s happening to Britain.” (here) What this person really means is, within our current socio-historical frame of reference we have never seen anything like this, which is really to say, we never expected our nation to collapse. Because if one expands their horizons, even just a little bit to include say the past 200 years, one will notice that nations do collapse. In fact, societies and nations collapsing is very much part of what they do. Look around, are there any nations that exist in the same form from 1000 years ago? 500 years ago? 200 years ago? Not that I can see. History - as with everything - is a long process of cycles of growth and decay. Things grow and things die, and nations are not immune to this reality. It appears to suck to be born in the dying phase of a nation, but that’s how it is, get used to it. Because the fact of the matter is, not a single nation in the history of civilization has truly 'corrected course’ and mitigated a full-blown collapse and death of their country, not one. Does this mean that within a week the UK will suddenly fall into complete disarray and social chaos? Absolutely not. Collapse takes decades (if not centuries).

The title of this piece is regarding how to deal with this reality, and it’s not as pessimistic as it first seems. Firstly, if you’re truly concerned, go read John Michael Greer’s Collapse Now and Avoid the Rush, which is the one-stop shop for understanding how to gracefully live in a collapsing world. However, the truth of the matter is you’re on your own. Don’t take this literally. This isn’t some piece trying to defend lone wolf tactics of hunkering down in the woods (historically this, also, never works). You’re on your own with respect to your local network, local community, and personal skills. Sure, we all believed the time would never come when we had to think about going abroad for dental work (or even doing it ourselves), but here we are, so research it. We all unspokenly relied on an ambulance service we understood would be hear in minutes, yet here we are, so learn first aid. The list goes on. A lot of people worry about work, stability, or ‘the future’, and rightfully so. But the truth is, no one can specifically predict what, when, or where certain collapse processes might unfold (if they could they either be a billionaire or dead).

My estimate would be that the nation-state that goes under the name of the ‘United Kingdom’ has roughly 150-200 years until it’s literally no more, and there is no longer anything left that’s in any sense connected to the current centralized structures we have. As for people who are currently 50+, hell, just live it up. If you’re 20-40 however, the first, most practical thing to do isn’t all that empirically practical. The first step isn’t a matter of hoarding food, buying weapons, or making a bugout bag, it’s about reassessing your presumptions of what a ‘normal’ life is. If you can reframe your perception in such a way that just having running water, electricity, and food is a good thing, then by and large your remaining years will be fine and without too much anxiety. If, however, you continue to attend to the idea that the future will be much the same as it is now or, heaven forbid, better, then things will become mentally tough. Gone are the days of yearly (or biyearly) holidays, multiple cars per household, a universal education, immediately free and accessible healthcare, and protection from the state. Realign your preferences and understand that things will start to cost a tad more (as they are already) and you won’t be at all surprised. As for work, well, the world is still clinging to vestiges of globalism that’s already peaked. If you can get work from a country with a currency that’s more stable, go for it. Otherwise, think about what has historically always provided value to local communities (blogging, for instance) and start there.

For most of my long-time readers, this post has been little more than a repetition. But I wanted to write a little something whilst the rest of the country comes to terms with what was always around the corner. But it’s like taking a plaster off, just get it over with, accepting that the future just isn’t going to be as comfortable and, from that acceptance, becoming more comfortable.