**DISCLAIMER: I just purchased an earthquake kit on Amazon.com. You can never be too careful, guys.**
Have you thought about what you'd do if a movie like Armageddon or The Day After Tomorrow came to life? Do you have a "bug-out" vehicle? An underground bunker with at least 100 days worth of nonperishable food? C'mon, tell me you've at least got a self-sustaining aquaponics system to feed your family!
Whether by the hands of God, nature, or man himself ... 22 percent of Americans believe the world will end during their lifetime.
Seriously?
I was just watching a particularly cringe-worthy episode of National Geographic's Doomsday Preppers, where some dipstick from Boston informed his new mail-order bride from Columbia that he is a prepper. Her reaction? A very predictable, "¿Qué?"
I've never felt worse for someone. She came to America in search of a better life, and within a day of arriving he's got this poor woman learning to purify water using a plastic bag. Didn't she just marry this moron to escape that kind of life?
Every prepper I've seen on this show seems like they're not just prepping -- they're hoping.
They hate their lives and fantasize about a world where they could be a hero. Melvin from Accounting can't wait for catastrophe so he can become Melvin the Survivor! He's praying for a complete economic collapse so he can look his boss and say, "I made 40k a year, but now I'm the post-apocalyptic king! I have all the SpaghettiO's and I won't lower my drawbridge to give you any! Muhaha!"
Spending your whole life getting ready for an event that probably won't happen doesn't make a lot of sense, especially when there are only three outcomes for a doomsday prepper:
1. Nothing Happens, You Die
Okay, so you spent your whole life preparing for something that never happened. So what? You have more canned goods than anyone in your zip code! And if something would've happened ... everyone totally knows you would've been the last one standing!
Who cares if you spent your entire life savings on survival supplies instead of taking vacations with your family or sending your kids to college? They got a real education when you took them into the woods every weekend to teach them how to set booby traps for when the zombie neighbors invade! They can pass on that knowledge to their children! See, it wasn't a waste!
Your kids will still thrive, even in a world that doesn't fall apart. You've taught them fantastic social skills, so long as that social situation takes place in an underground bunker and the topic of conversation is about how honey is the only food that will never spoil. I smell future beekeepers!
2. Something Happens, You Die Anyway
Ugh, what a bummer! Your $250,000 underground compound was ready and rarin' to go, a nuclear bomb was detonated and caused an EMP just like you said it would, but you didn't get to say "I told you so," because you died along with all of the idiotic unprepared. Just bad luck you weren't near your EMP-safe bunker when this happened. You're there 22 hours of the day, what are the odds? Hey world, I'd like a mulligan please!
3. Something Happens, You Survive! (Until You Die)
Ding! Ding! Ding! You hit the lotto! Your dream scenario played out, and the world as we know it has been destroyed. That moat around your house is put to good use, as the unprepared pathetically attempt to gain access to your compound. Bodies float in your moat, and you and your family get to laugh (party because it rhymes).
Those who foolishly tried to enjoy their lives before the apocalypse slowly die off, while you and your family feast on the bounty of dehydrated food you put in the cellar years ago.
Slowly, you realize that you now live in a world where the entire population consists of Doomsday Preppers. It's terrible. You beg for a second apocalypse.