Can societies around the world collapse in 24 hours

As we’ve seen in Afghan, yes. Can America collapse overnight. Well, going by anything is possible, then l’d have to say yes to the degree the big cities and suburbs would see mass confussion on a large scale. Sad part is that there be no place to run too.
I’ve mention the main concern would be who would maintain the nuclear power plants at this time.

a reply to: musicismagic

What do mean collapse? You mean no rule of law like on the US Mexican Border? All ready here.

Or do you mean there will always be an economy based on money or bartering to obtain / sale food, goods, and services?

I would think a total collapse would be based on if farms cannot truck food into cities.

I think a total collapse would require nothing short of a massive EMP (causing a total failure of all electronic devices and complete, instantaneous failure of power grids), an ELE catastrophy of enormous magnitude, or a massive nuclear exchange by countries with extensive nuclear arsenals.

A total collapse of society would depend on one's definition of society. Arguably we have already experienced a widescale collapse of society in western nations. Small communities which have taken steps to prepare for calamity will likely endure, at least for an extended period of time depending on the severity of the collapse. Humans are tenacious little buggers and they don't go down easy.

There are quite a few bunkers which have been built deep and are well stocked. Certain groups and individuals are equipped to survive for extended periods of time, if they make it to the bunkers on time. The average John and Jane Doe, however, do not have the option to flee to multi-million / multi-billion dollar bunkers.

The global economy is robust in some ways but is quite fragile in many regards. It's a chainlink system and many of those links have been stretched to the point of breaking. It won't take much for the whole system to go from SNAFU to FUBAR. It's a real Catch-22 even in the best of times. We could really use a Milo Minderbender to help sort things and a dozen Yossarians for comic relief.

Cheers.

a reply to: musicismagic

An illness can lay dormant for years, and slowly surface to recognition.

You often hear people say, "I was fine when I went to bed, but I woke up sick as a dog."

They were sick when they went to bed, the symptoms just had not yet presented aggressively enough for them to acknowledge their presence.

On close look, they usually can tell you of symptoms they had ignored, going back months, sometimes years.

Then one day they wake up, and the disease is so intense, painful, and deadly, that they can't ignore it any more.

a reply to: musicismagic

Can societies collapse in 24 hours?

I might stretch the timeline to a week…at most. That’s about all the food most folks have on hand—a weeks worth of food. Then too, it takes a while for reality to set in. Barring an event outlined by CircumstantialEvidence (ELE or EMP), the trigger wouldn’t need to be too huge; the U.S. is already divided and at each other’s throats over a ‘souped up’ Cold. The lines are drawn.

I’ve seen firsthand how fast a society can collapse when the central government (a hated one at that) evaporates: Iraq, in 2003. Or Yugoslavia for that matter. Both were fairly Western in political outlook [Socialist or Communist]. Their levels of education were high: Iraq had one of the highest educated populations in the Middle East. After they were hit with “Shock and Awe”, society collapsed into lawlessness and bartering. Sure, some of the regular police tried to keep some semblance of order—directing traffic, making arrests for petty crimes—even though they weren’t getting paid, but they were outnumbered. Others stepped into the vacuum to establish an order more to their liking.

In my opinion, the more authoritarian the regime, the quicker the collapse.

a reply to: musicismagic

Loosely knit society's were community is often weak can collapse in an instant if the right conditions are met but the same can be argued about even established community's were a natural disaster, volcanic disruption, terrifying invasion etc can lead to societal collapse.

History is a story of society's collapsing, there survivors trying to re-establish them or forming entirely new society's in the aftermath but war is the biggest disruptor, arguably more even than western intervention Afghanistan is now a society under occupation, however as that force shares there dominant religion and belief's just taking them to a more extreme view is it true that there society collapsed, they lost there freedom's yes but collapse may be too strong a word in that case though for many of those people it will indeed be like living in hell.

Arguably Society collapsed several times in the west with the great plagues that swept through Europe from Asia and before that the invasions that tool place led to societal collapse on many occasions, enough people survived the plagues however and they were spared an accompanying invasion that would have ended them so European society rebuilt and morphed into the medieval society's that were in many ways quite different to those that had existed prior to the plagues.

Byzantium suffered the ultimate societal collapse with the Turkish conquest of Constantinople and is a more classical recent example of how a society can be destroyed by invasion and replaced by something else.

Japan suffered it with the Ainu and Jomon being supplanted almost entirely (but NOT entirely) by invasion's from Asia, the Ainu and Jomon cultures were almost entirely destroyed in most of Japan with the Jomon vanishing perhaps entirely and with exception of the Kuril islands the fate of the Ainu was almost the same.

In Britain the ancient people's whom build Stonehenge and other huge stone monuments were almost or perhaps actually entirely supplanted by the ancestors of the Gaelic speaking peoples that invaded from Europe wiping them out.

The world is a tapestry of forgotten and lost cultures, perhaps tomorrow our own will vanish as well, indeed it already has with the culture of our great grandparent's not being anything like the culture we have today, there morals, there religious beliefs and there traditions having morphed to fit the artificiality of our modern throw away short lived society.

Though todays society is in many ways a global society linked together by communications that spread across the world like never before were even a poor man can access the global internet and speak to another like himself or a billionaire whom is so vastly different in culture and societal status that it would never have been possible in another period of time.

Yet one can only see this as being as delicate as a butterfly's wing, our society is also more fragile than ever before and all it takes is for a single EMP to collapse a society's communication's and collapsing it's infrastructure at least causing short term disruption but more likely having long lasting effects upon a society so shocked at it's own fragility.

In reality however all society's barring a major disruptor have inertia and it can take time or a societal shock to disrupt this inertia sufficiently for a society to grind to a halt completely.

But on the smaller scale society collapses all the time, a bread winner in a family dies, a loved member of the family passes and the survivors feel like they have nothing left to go on for as grief takes over.

So YES all society's can collapse and it often does not even require 24 hours, larger society's however such as the US would take longer to collapse entirely and it is not inconceivable that fragments of them could continue even after the main part of them vanished for decades or even century's afterwards.

a reply to: musicismagic

I don't see the US collapsing overnight short of a major natural disaster that cripples the infrastructure nationwide. Maybe a nuclear exchange.

An EMP that took down grid would probably take a week or so for the sh!t to hit the fan. It takes time for people to realize help ain't coming before they decend into chaos and lose the veneer of civility.

Economic collapses are usually slow.

originally posted by: musicismagic
As we’ve seen in Afghan, yes. Can America collapse overnight. Well, going by anything is possible, then l’d have to say yes to the degree the big cities and suburbs would see mass confussion on a large scale. Sad part is that there be no place to run too.
I’ve mention the main concern would be who would maintain the nuclear power plants at this time.

Agree. Excellent series on how it has gone down:

www.youtube.com...

I served during Katrina during the Hurricane in the Guard. Society was destroyed in less than 24 hrs. No police, no food, no water. Total chaos.

I also served during Super Storm Sandy. Within a few days of power outage people were fighting over charging stations for their phones.

During the TX power outage last year it started manifesting in about 3 days. The poor or just ignorant did not have food and water despite being warned to stock up or leave (same thing happened during Katrina).

It really depends what caused it from my experience and what resources were lost. Food is not a big deal. Most people are overweight in the US. Their bodies can feed off itself for a while. The real kicker is water. If city water is out all hell will break lose in the city. Massive looting of stores.

I can't stress this enough. Everyone should have a couple weeks of water but the more the better. You should know where to get water from if your supply runs out. River, rain, even a home pool.

originally posted by: Stupidsecrets

originally posted by: musicismagic


I can't stress this enough. Everyone should have a couple weeks of water but the more the better. You should know where to get water from if your supply runs out. River, rain, even a home pool.

Does wine, beer and liquor count? If so, I'm set!

originally posted by: peter_kandra

originally posted by: Stupidsecrets

originally posted by: musicismagic


I can't stress this enough. Everyone should have a couple weeks of water but the more the better. You should know where to get water from if your supply runs out. River, rain, even a home pool.

Does wine, beer and liquor count? If so, I'm set!

It does to barter with down the road. Up front no. I thought about stocking up on cases of whiskey or vodka but decided against it. I don't want people knowing what I have in that situation. Best to keep a very low profile and defend your castle until things smooth out.

When Rome fell, they begged retired military to comeback and help. They refused and for good reason. The Senate would not have been in that situation if they would have honored the importance of their own border and physical security (look familar?).

Once the dust settles though alcohol is an superb trading item.

originally posted by: musicismagic
As we’ve seen in Afghan, yes. Can America collapse overnight. Well, going by anything is possible, then l’d have to say yes to the degree the big cities and suburbs would see mass confussion on a large scale. Sad part is that there be no place to run too.
I’ve mention the main concern would be who would maintain the nuclear power plants at this time.

So Afghanistan collapsed overnight , which is wrong, and because of that America can also?

1. Afghanistan is roughly 15 times smaller then the CONUS
2. Afghanistan is "6.63% the size of United States. "
3. "The population of United States is ~332.6 million people (296.0 million fewer people live in Afghanistan)."

www.mylifeelsewhere.com...

This thread to me is like people who think a successful invasion of the CONUS is a real thing because it happened in Red Dawn meanwhile they forget the geographic scope of the US. Is it possible that specific major cities could collapse quickly, yes because its already happened but to think the whole US could simply isn't realistic.

a reply to: musicismagic


Can america collapse? Not if the rest of the world isn't collapsing with us. Believe it or not we would have help. Other counties would send us supplies as we build back.
As far as nuke plants go I once had the same thought. But there was a thread here on ats that gave a lot of good info about the massive fail safes that nuke plants have. They shut themselves down pretty safely even without human hands.

I honestly don't think it's possible for the entire global society to collapse.

Not without a super natural disaster taking out 80% of humanity over a few days. Something like a large meteor or everyone launching all the nukes.

But even then with our level of tech and the underground cities that already exist. It would be damn near impossible to wipe us all out. And no matter how many are left we can always breed back the rest.

a reply to: musicismagic

Has any society truly “collapsed”???

We hear tales that even the mythical Atlantis survived its tribulation and went on to influence many other societies that we still hold in reverence today.

About the only “erasure” seems linguistic rather than societal. Heck, even Captain Kirk was doing NA Indian shenanigans in Star Trek so we know that that social reference (right or wrong) will never die.

Maybe that is what the Freemasons are doing with all their symbolism and morality plays… continuing a social tale from time immemorial for “those with eyes who see” and understand a ecosystem of symbols reinforcing an ideal? Is science or religion or even politics any different???

Are you wearing Nike shoes?? Jockey underwear? Christian Dior eyeware???

Society continues!

a reply to: musicismagic



The U.S cant colapse overnight. It HAD stsbility asnd it still has )for now) the constitution. They are however working on removing the constitution which we can see in a lot of democratic actions. It took a decade or 2 but they are close to collapsing it at this very moment.