"Survivalism" to me covers many different related and unrelated groups of 

people.

    A. Monetary disaster type - people that have read lots of Gary North, 

Ludvig Von Mises, Franz Pick, Ayn Rand and understand how evil the Federal 

Reserve system is. Current hero Ron Paul. Newsletter any of several hard asset 

gold and silver boulion coin oriented investments. Preparing for paper money to 

become worthless, have a good burglar alarm system, enough food and supplies to 

last the couple months or perhaps a year until a new monetary system (formal or 

informal) is re-established.

    B. Natural disaster type, brief - people that live in a tornado, hurricane, 

earthquake, heavy snow fall area and like the idea of not dying or continueing 

present life style.  Heavy investment in tools for rebuilding or temporary 

shelter, perhaps have a below ground hiwind shelter, food, water, medicine, etc 

enough to get buy till contact with the rest of the world resumes.

    C. Natural disaster type, longterm - people that are concerned with long  

term weather cycles in terms of the 2-10 year unusually cold or warm periods 

that have happened on and off over the last thousand years.  Might stock  

several tons of food per family member and have a heavy duty greenhouse with 

packed in nitrogen non-hybrid seeds.

    D. Medical emergency type - takes paramedic courses.  Has very complete 

medical pack in house and car, donates blood, active in Red Cross, has taken 

CPR, Multi-Media course, vital signs, stocks medicines, etc.

    E. General social decline type - concerned about growing cultural 

immorality - very into anti-crime measures, both passive (alarms) and active 

(neighborhood watch).  Probably invloved in MADD, Rape prevention groups, 

Project IDENT, etc.

    F. Political delcine type - concerned about the slow destruction of the 

constitution and the bill of rights.  Involved in CCRKBA, CATO, CRC and other 

groups that advocate personal freedoms.

    G. Nuclear war preparedness - is aware that if you avoid the heavy blast 

region of a nuclear bomb (1-6 miles depending on type and whethered sheltered 

or not, or even ground zero if in elaborate shelter) and keep away from the 

fallout which reduces in activity by 90% in 7 hours, by 99% in 2 days, by 99.9% 

in 2 weeks, by 99.99% in 14 weeks and decays even faster after 14 weeks, that 

there is no reason to allow yourself to be killed.  Many survivalist prepare 

for nuclear war as an exercise in that if you are prepared for nuke war, your 

are prepared for all of the above.

    H. Religious type - Christ is going to return VERY soon, the final battle 

with the devil will occur in their lifetime, the rapture is eminant.  Very wide 

range of beliefs and attitudes in this group. Pacifist to armed-camp, no food 

(leave that to God) to decades for food, etc.

    I. Wacko nuts - very small percentage of the survivalist movement, though 

they get 99% of all the mass media publicity.  Morally the equivalent of 

canibals.  Few in this group would survive anything long term.  Lots of guns, 

not enough medical supplies or food.  These types are dispised by main stream 

survivalists due to 1. their lack of morals which are the source of man-made 

disasters 2. they get all of the free pulicity which the main stream people 

wish that they could get 3. they fear them for the same reason that everybody 

else should fear them.  Many of the Wacko Nuts types are rejects from the 

Religious types since the ability to put trust in faith rather than logic and 

rationality are essential to both.  Both groups usually follow one very 

charismatic leader typically.

   My impression is that the vast majority are interested in the economic,  

short term natural disaster and nuclear aspects. This is based on 6 years of 

reading, 5 years of being active in the movement by joining the world's oldest 

and largest survivalist organization, attending survivalist meetings in 

Missouri, Indiana, Alabama, and North Carolina, reading all of the posts in the 

National SURVIVE! Echonet BBS link, running a survivalist BBS since 1986, and 

being a survival lecturer. 



Ken Seger 1-7-88