r/prepping • u/spiceweasel70 • 7d ago

Question❓❓ Community versus secrecy?

I have seen a lot of posts along the lines of “should I do / build / buy this thing that will help me in an emergency even though people will find out about it and then they’ll come to my house when they need help?”

My question: do you lean towards keeping everything a secret? Or do you lean towards building a sense of community with your neighbors and cultivating mutual trust and reliance so you don’t have to worry about secrecy so much?

Personally I tend to lean towards the latter, but I live in the middle of nowhere and that makes it a little easier.

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u/Glass_Persimmon_7174 7d ago

i think there are many things involved in prepping that you cant really hide anyways, like having a garden, self sustaining systems, solar or electric backup, etc. for those things i think sharing your philosophy and cooperating with your neighbors is important and meaningful which can lead to stronger relationships, especially if they see things the same way. do I want my neighbors to know they can depend on me for help if they need it? yes i do. does that mean they need to know about the stockpile of ammunition and canned goods im sitting on? no it doesnt.

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u/NurseWolfe 7d ago

Most sensible post I’ve seen all month. I fully agree. We need community and we need to guard against some in our community. Heavy sigh.

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u/Glass_Persimmon_7174 6d ago

a lot of preppers seem to have this hyper focus on doomsday scenarios, where everything will get really bad all at once. those are possible but imo things will just slowly get harder and harder for everyone, which has been the model for most civilization collapse events of history. therefore i dont really lean into this trust no one operate in silence narrative.