Wednesday, July 11, 2018

Survival Of The Richest? Not So Much...


Billionaire bozos think they're going to "control" guys like this when things get frisky? Stop, you're killing me. They'll eat their boss for brunch, after they toy with his intestines. In front of him, while he watches.
















Back from a break, "Sam Culper" is back at it on Forward Observer.

Yesterday's thought-provoking piece concerned the tale of a futrurologist counseling billionaires about the pending Zompocalypse.

"Finally, the CEO of a brokerage house explained that he had nearly completed building his own underground bunker system and asked, “How do I maintain authority over my security force after the event?” 
The Event. That was their euphemism for the environmental collapse, social unrest, nuclear explosion, unstoppable virus, or Mr. Robot hack that takes everything down. 
This single question occupied us for the rest of the hour. They knew armed guards would be required to protect their compounds from the angry mobs. But how would they pay the guards once money was worthless? What would stop the guards from choosing their own leader? The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew."

"Hired security force"??
Idiot savants.
Money ╪ Brains.

The term for a hired security force after "The Event", is mercenaries.
Power at that point will flow from the barrel of a gun.
And if you're holding onto the combination to the food locker, they'll all be pointed at you.
Not at your head, though. They'll start about three feet lower.

Some billionaire bozo thinks he's going to "maintain control" by withholding the combination to the food locker will find out what "enhanced interrogation" does to jog his memory, one body part at a time.

They'll probably start with his family, just for S&G.

Either way, the suddenly-superfluous rich yokels will be sacrificed by their hired security, if they haven't got a band around them with much stronger bonds of loyalty than merely taking scraps from the billionaires' tables.
Those idiots are merrily marching into the land of Unknown Unknowns: they don't know what they don't know.
And the animals there are higher than billionaires on the food chain.

Hitchcock made a great movie called Lifeboat. It should be required viewing,  Along with films like The Wild Geese, The Grey,  and The Edge, with freewheeling discussion afterwards, to anyone who thinks they're ready for "The Event" just because they've stocked a distant shelter to which they hope to flee, and think they'll end up running their mercenaries like they do their boardrooms. Besides "because the writers wrote it that way", the reason Anthony Hopkins and Liam Neeson maintained leadership control over their respective groups was because they both brought knowledge and skills to the group that the group didn't have. If all you're bringing is stuff, somebody who can't see the need for you once that day arrives will get rid of you, and your stuff will become his stuff.

When Scrooge McDick arrives at his chosen ark of safety, he'll be made hostage by the exact security force he's put in place, five seconds after the gates close. The womenfolk in the party will be considered "entertainment". Once they've yielded what they each have to offer, they'll either be killed (if they're lucky), or else enslaved. Welcome to the real world since, oh, forever.

Bonds of common interest and blood will be what matters, and even those will be trumped by those with necessary and irreplaceable knowledge and skills, not who has the most toys. I believe Mosby's term is "frith".

Come "The Event", you're either the alpha wolf, a valued member of the pack, or dinner. The only part of The Revenant worth watching for two minutes is seeing the moment when Leo Decaprio plays the part of "bear's bitch", and that's what happens to you when you try to control predators above you on both the food chain, and the pecking order of intelligence. They won't work for peanuts when you withhold them; they'll simply eat you. As more than one Darwin Award-winning knucklehead has found out - fleetingly - when informing Mr. Bear that "there are no more marshmallows". That only ever turns out well for the bear.

"That guy was delicious! BUUURP!"















Thus endeth the lesson.

8 comments:

mtnforge said...

Not for nothing, how much real world smarts and critical thinking does it take T sneak up on a dollar bill in a financial fiat scheme set up to serve its oligarchy with rigged fixed price discovery and helicoptor welfare for the rich and ignorant?

Seriously. I'm not being snarky here. These mental midgets think because they got the toys and rule over us grunts now, because they get all the trophy whores because they are top dogs anon their peers, some how bestowed warrior spirit on them.

Talk about clueless. It makes me want the world to go total SHTF just to see the look on these idiots faces when they find out they are at the bottom of the food chain of survival of the fittest.

Talk about cognitive dissonance with a vengeance.

Another thing too while im pounding out my rant here.
Being as I reside in about as remote rural area possible was of the Mississipi, in a 4th Gen war mountain G's dream come true, me and my fellow hillbillies are dug in like ticks on a hound. We know our AO like we know our wives, most intimate. Most of us are born with a rifle in one hand and a mining or logging equipment joystick in the other. There's those who have a neo-bolshevik fantasy they are going to come to our back yard and take everything we love. Whoever it is, they be putting their dicks in a fucking meat grinder. Be a trick I'll tell anyone, you want to fuck with us mountain dirt people, better bring everything you got, then double it. Your gonna need it.

Aesop said...

I was just gobsmacked by the breathtaking ignorance and arrogance involved, as these captains of industry a priori assumed that they would just naturally continue to tell the people with guns what to do, by virtue of their suddenly worthless 1s and 0s, and their possession, under Marquis of Queensbury rules, of the provisions suddenly dear to everyone. This is exactly the sort of idiocy mocked co mercilessly in Jurassic Park by the soliloquys of Ian Malcolm, in deriding billionaire Hammond for asking whether he could bring back T. rex, instead of asking whether he should.

"So, dude, you've invested $1M or so on your doomsday bunker complex, and your security plan is to hire it done, and these trained, bloodthirsty killers with whom you've contracted, in a world where food and shelter are life itself, are going to repel all boarders, stick their necks out, and be your loyal samurai retainers for you because...you used to be rich, back when dollars were worth something...?!? Sh'yeah, go with that plan, genius. What could possibly go wrong?!?"

John the River said...

John Ringo's Zombie Apocalypse novel had a high point for me; the (renamed) Billionaire owner of Facebook wasn't just ripped off by his "guards", they turn him into a zombie and then amuse themselves with the supermodels he invited to party on his Mega-yacht.

Papa said...

Sounds like a return to castles, dukes, lords, fifedom, peasants, etc but with a modern twist.
Ref post-Roman empire, mid 400 AD and on.
Prepare ye to enter yonder modern Medival ages.

Anonymous said...

Maineprepper's audio-book talked about this situation. It did not work out good for the rich guy.

Anonymous said...

He should have suggested that the billionaires read Machiavelli:

"An armed republic submits less easily to the rule of one of its citizens than a republic armed by foreign forces. Rome and Sparta were for many centuries well armed and free. The Swiss are well armed and enjoy great freedom. Among other evils caused by being disarmed, it renders you contemptible. It is not reasonable to suppose that one who is armed will obey willingly one who is unarmed; or that any unarmed man will remain safe among armed servants." - Niccolo Machiavelli, "The Prince" (1532)

tweell said...

Lucifer's Hammer, an apocalyptic story by Niven and Pournelle published in 1977, has wealthy protagonist Tim Hamner, an amateur astronomer who discovers the comet heading for Earth. He has a retreat, but when he goes there, the people he had taking care of it drive him away. Oops.

A gaming webcomic makes the same point, in a roundabout way:
http://ffn.nodwick.com/

RSR said...

I think you over-estimate the desire of private security to be BMoC. So long as the person they're paying/protecting isn't being a complete yahoo and/or doing things to put them in jeopardy, I would question the need/desire for a coup. Especially if the families of the private security were able to attend and a general comfort with following orders.

Some good reads in the survival genre discussing this leadership, or lack thereof, dynamic are the American Apocalypse series (terrible editing but good story); EMP: Equipping Modern Patriots series; Lights Out; One Second After series; and I think one these ended at Raven Rock near Gettysburg where a fairly developed character with an interest in history was killed (IRRC) I don't recall the exact book however -- The Remaining series, Max Velocity's series, Brushfire Plague series, Angry American's Home series, or possibly one of Matt Bracken's Enemies series or one of the Rawles books.
Point being, that people always look for leaders, concepts of honor don't disappear just b/c money is worthless, and hope for a return to "normal" will likely keep folks on the straight and narrow, especially if not starving and relatively comfortable, longer than if they know that the current situation was forever. How it plays is very situationally-dependent.

Lights out in particular has a good chapter or two on what can happen when wealthy and prepared folks sit behind their fences rather than extending patrols beyond them. Resonates as terrain aligns with own in central tx.