SubscribeWe live, day to day, in a very fragile ecosystem of rules and agreements. For the most part, we agree to believe that a solid white line on the road means “Do not change lanes”. We agree to pay for items from stores with locally accepted currency. We agree to respect the sanctity of each others homes and space. For the most part this is all true.
When individuals step outside the agreed upon “norms” the police step in and “restore order”. If larger groups step outside the norm, there’s the military. I propose, however, that, especially in larger centres like Toronto, that any major challenge to the status quo would quickly result in chaos as large quantities of people abandoned our shared agreements to provide for themselves.
For example, lets look at the big power outage that whiped out the Eastern Seaboard. Sure there were individual hardships, but in general people helped each other out. There were many stories of grocers giving away icecream rather than have it spoil in the (now defunct) freezers. There were even humourous stories of people seeing the Northern Lights for the 1st time and thinking it was some kind of strange gas leak. But let’s imagine that this poweroutage was days or weeks long, rather than hours.
After about 24 hours the produce in grocery stores would be getting pretty nasty, as would most of the dairy and meat products. Water pressure would be pretty much gone and so people would be dependent on bottled water from wherever it can be found. People would start to realize that food and water are going to become a scarce commodity. More and more cars would be abandonded where they ran out of fuel. Bank machines and banks would be closed so money is also scarce. We’re only 24 hours into “the crisis” and people will already be starting to get nervous.
I expect that by the end of 48 hours, chaos will start to assert itself. People’s good spirits and neighbourly approach to the problem will be replaced with a “fend for yourself” attitude. People who live in apartment buildings will be looking for alternate accomodations. Water, sewage, food, fuel, etc. are all things that people are very worried about and are now figuring out how to cope with much less than they’re used to having. I expect that by the end of 48 hours rioting and looting have escalated beyond the ability of the police or military to keep control of it.
Outside of the big centres people maybe a little more fortunate. People in the country frequently have more food on hand, more fuel in their gas tanks, and are typically able to handle power outages (as they happen more frequently). People in the country also typically know each other more than urbanites and so barter or promisary notes may be more readily accepted.
_They_ say that another big power outage is coming. That the grid isn’t able to keep up with the demands that are being placed upon it. That power isn’t being generated in the quantities sufficient to keep up with demand. Have you thought about how you’ll cope if the next outage is a week long rather than a 1/2 day? Should you?
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