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Potential SHTF scenarios & tinfoil hat thread (Please read post 1)

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  • Registered Users Posts: 2,645 ✭✭✭krissovo


    The bill also says that it is immaterial whether the householder had a "safe and practicable" opportunity to retreat from the dwelling before using the force.

    :D

    Sounds like its been thought through.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,078 ✭✭✭Hal Emmerich


    Doc Ruby wrote: »
    Probably, a couple of things though, they have a lot of unmarried men who will never get married due to their one child policy, with the ongoing recessions across the west their unemployment is rising (and economic growth is the only glue really holding China together), so they need a distraction, and international approval is becoming less important as domestic demand grows.
    20 million more young men than women to be exact. Theirs alot of unrest expected because of this.

    Boys are preferred as they have more chance of becoming something so parents abort/give up the girls.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,617 ✭✭✭kildare.17hmr


    Grizzly 45 wrote: »
    From todays Examiner.
    Pity they just wont allow us the proper tools for the job!!:D
    Bill to give homeowners right to kill intruders
    By Stephen Rogers
    Friday, December 09, 2011
    HOUSEHOLDERS will have a legal right to use force up to and including killing an intruder in defence of homes and families, as long as they can prove they honestly believed their actions were "reasonable".
    Justice Minister Alan Shatter brought the Criminal Law (Defence and the Dwelling) Bill 2010 before the Seanad, where he told senators the "harsh reality of crime and in particular the crime of burglary" had to be addressed.
    He said nobody could disagree with the proposition that people should feel safe in their own homes and that an intrusion was "an attack on our peace of mind that can destroy a person’s sense of personal security and cause disturbance for many years after it has occurred".
    "That is why the law has always seen an intrusion into the home as a particularly egregious offence," he said.
    Until now common law has provided that people can use force to protect themselves, others and to protect property. The bill proposed by the Government clarifies and strengthens the existing legislation when it comes to protecting the home.
    The bill also says that it is immaterial whether the householder had a "safe and practicable" opportunity to retreat from the dwelling before using the force.



    About bloody time, thats great news


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,635 ✭✭✭eth0


    About bloody time, thats great news

    It would quite often be reasonable because even if one mere wisp of a scumbag appears inside the house you don't know how many are waiting outside. This kind of scum rarely goes it alone, they are too cowardly for that


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,617 ✭✭✭kildare.17hmr


    very true. Fact is if you disturb an intruder and they dont immediately leg it there is your reason right there.

    This law is not going to change peoples attitudes i dont think. The people who would now go for an intruder more than likely would have still done it regardless of the law a year ago. Its not something that will go through your head in such an event but its still great to know the law is completely on your side


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  • Registered Users Posts: 14,932 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    All the more reason to LEARN how to defend you and yours properly,to avoid things going horribly wrong..Remember the law might be on your side,but it still doesnt give you 100% immunity either.

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 40,055 ✭✭✭✭Sparks


    krissovo wrote: »
    Sounds like its been thought through.
    You do realise that the bill doesn't change anything?
    You've been able to defend yourself in your home without fear of prosecution under our system of law since the 1300s. This isn't even close to the first time this has been discussed on boards.ie either.


  • Registered Users Posts: 4,111 ✭✭✭ShadowFox


    [QUOTE=Sparks;75934566]You do realise that the bill doesn't change anything?
    You've been able to defend yourself in your home without fear of prosecution under our system of law since the 1300s. This isn't even close to the first time this has been discussed on boards.ie either.[/QUOTE]

    My Rottie can't read so dont think she was pushed with what the law said she just sees a snack :D


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 10,271 ✭✭✭✭johngalway


    Not sure if this is the right forum for it or not but here goes...

    I had a big post written out, then highlighted it to copy into another forum and accidentally pasted something else in it's place and couldn't Undo :clapper:

    This comes from several threads I've been reading on several forums, and a chat I had with a friend today.

    One thing I would like to be left out of this is the politics of the Euro, the EU, the UK, the ROI and any other country, start another thread for them please :)

    The scenario is this. You have X amount of a currency which is in danger of collapse, let's say a few thousand. You want to convert that paper money into something tangible that after the **** hit's the fan that would have retained it's value through that messy transition.

    We first talked of Gold, but I think gold is in a bubble at the moment. Too many are investing in it, it's like property was 10 years ago, sure the value can only go up (until Italy or some other large country dumps it's thousands of tons of gold onto the market to raise cash). We did agree that smaller value gold coins would be easier to dispose of post currency collapse than large value coins, better odds on people having small sums of money to spend than large. So Gold was ruled out.

    Then we moved onto foreign currency. But, paper money is all about confidence, if a major world currency were to collapse that collapse would have major repercussions for economies all around the world, from those economies that make things like China, to consumer/service economies like the EU/USA. There is also the question of what type of limits, charges and taxes would be applied to foreign currency conversion post currency collapse, which could be punitive. I don't think foreign currency is as good a bet as is made out. So that was ruled out.

    Farm land was mentioned, and I think there is some merit to that idea. Food can be grown, animals raised, allotments leased out, there are options there. But, there is a large problem in that land isn't always sold quickly if one needed to liquidate that asset and turn it into new currency paper money for any reason.

    Two other suggestions were whiskey and ammunition. I don't believe whiskey would run short :D but it may retain it's value, I'm just not sure, it doesn't feel certain to me. Ammunition has the big problem of legality, one can only hold so many rounds in this jurisdiction, BUT, even with things going well importers are sometimes slow and there have been ammo shortages. I'd not like to have a house fire storing either!

    We didn't settle on any item or items being a good idea to date. What we did agree was that lower to medium value items, which keep in good/perfect condition over time and are easily converted back into currency would be a good idea.

    What would you think those items to be? That is the question :confused:


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,617 ✭✭✭kildare.17hmr


    a few cheap cartons of cigarettes would be a good investment if your ever in Poland or the likes where you can get a box of smokes for a euro or so. The whisky is a good one 2 i think or any spirit for that matter. People will always want these things.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 4,111 ✭✭✭ShadowFox


    a few cheap cartons of cigarettes would be a good investment if your ever in Poland or the likes where you can get a box of smokes for a euro or so. The whisky is a good one 2 i think or any spirit for that matter. People will always want these things.

    And pouchs of tabacco


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,617 ✭✭✭kildare.17hmr


    grapeape wrote: »
    And pouchs of tabacco

    yes defo tobacco pouchs. Small enough to keep loads in a small place and go alot further than a box of smokes


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,956 ✭✭✭Doc Ruby


    yes defo tobacco pouchs. Small enough to keep loads in a small place and go alot further than a box of smokes
    Plus you can break them up into any denominations you like.


  • Registered Users Posts: 4,111 ✭✭✭ShadowFox


    Doc Ruby wrote: »
    Plus you can break them up into any denominations you like.

    Most important DON'T FORGET THE ROLLING PAPERS :D


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,617 ✭✭✭kildare.17hmr


    true that doc. Big currency in prison for that very reason. A mate of mine who smokes about 20 a day went onto tobacco when he lost his job, 2 pouchs last him about a week and a bit now and Thats just over a tenner!


  • Registered Users Posts: 40,055 ✭✭✭✭Sparks


    johngalway wrote: »
    What would you think those items to be? That is the question :confused:
    For savings (ie. funds I don't want to touch for a few years anyway), I'm going with blue chip stocks (specifically a tracker fund that has several stocks contained within it). Things like Coca-cola aren't going to fall over tomorrow if the eurozone collapses, and I'm more worried about an enforced currency change than I am about speculating on short-term stock fluctuations.

    And for the short-term, we keep a fair amount of nonperishable food in the house, as well as spare light bulbs, fuses, DIY repair kit, tools, household stuff, etc. It has the dual advantage of being useful if things go to pot for a month or so (whether because of currency change or because of bad weather snowing you in, or because of the car breaking down!); and not looking like you're actively planning for the end of the world. I mean, it's lasagne and beans and tinned coconut milk and squashes and jam and honey and so on; and if I buy a primal from keypack's factory shop and put it in the chest freezer, it's not just making sure you have an oh-crap stash, but it's just good household management (you're saving money doing this).

    For the medium-term (ie. what do you do with the few thousand you have in your bank accounts over the course of a month from when the pay packet comes in to when the rent/mortgage/utilities/other bills go out) - a currency change would cause havoc there until it settled down and even then, you have questions like "What will my mortgage be in after, euros or punts?", "Will my tracker mortgage follow the ECB interest rate or the Central Banks now?", and so on.

    I did ask an economist about this once - the old "In the event of the EU going nuclear (ie. breaking up the eurozone), how do you do whatever cockroaches do to survive that?". The answer was that it's pretty impossible to mutate into a cockroach on demand, and that if it happens, everyone's getting a slice of a most unpleasant sandwich anyways, so at best you can ameliorate it a bit, but you can't duck all of it.

    If the college fund type of savings are safe, and we won't starve this month, I figure you're ahead of the game enough to figure out what comes next when you have actual data to work with.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,645 ✭✭✭krissovo


    If I had a limit of €5k right now to spare this is how I would spend my bob's:

    €1500 - Non perishable foodstuff, minimum 3 months of basic (nutritional) food for family but as proved on the other thread this could feed two people for a year!

    €400 - Van hire/ferry tickets & fuel to mainland europe to buy cheap products. Poland would be a good choice of desintation and then buy:

    €1500 - Tobacco, varrious brands and mix of rolling/ready made

    €600 - HIGH RISK Wholesale products (from Germany) similar to a €2 store but items like multi tools, kids toys, seeds, home products...blah, blah.....

    €1000 - Your choice of safe currency, dollars, sterling, Singapore dollar, gold....Personally I would go sterling.


    If I had €10k - As above with 1 acre of arable land

    If I had €15k - As above with 2 acres ;)


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,617 ✭✭✭kildare.17hmr


    save the van hire and ill drive ya lad! When are we goin? Where are ya gettin an acre of land for 5k tho??


  • Registered Users Posts: 14,932 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    johngalway wrote: »
    Not sure if this is the right forum for it or not but here goes...

    I had a big post written out, then highlighted it to copy into another forum and accidentally pasted something else in it's place and couldn't Undo :clapper:

    This comes from several threads I've been reading on several forums, and a chat I had with a friend today.

    One thing I would like to be left out of this is the politics of the Euro, the EU, the UK, the ROI and any other country, start another thread for them please :)

    The scenario is this. You have X amount of a currency which is in danger of collapse, let's say a few thousand. You want to convert that paper money into something tangible that after the **** hit's the fan that would have retained it's value through that messy transition.

    We first talked of Gold, but I think gold is in a bubble at the moment. Too many are investing in it, it's like property was 10 years ago, sure the value can only go up (until Italy or some other large country dumps it's thousands of tons of gold onto the market to raise cash). We did agree that smaller value gold coins would be easier to dispose of post currency collapse than large value coins, better odds on people having small sums of money to spend than large. So Gold was ruled out.

    Then we moved onto foreign currency. But, paper money is all about confidence, if a major world currency were to collapse that collapse would have major repercussions for economies all around the world, from those economies that make things like China, to consumer/service economies like the EU/USA. There is also the question of what type of limits, charges and taxes would be applied to foreign currency conversion post currency collapse, which could be punitive. I don't think foreign currency is as good a bet as is made out. So that was ruled out.

    Farm land was mentioned, and I think there is some merit to that idea. Food can be grown, animals raised, allotments leased out, there are options there. But, there is a large problem in that land isn't always sold quickly if one needed to liquidate that asset and turn it into new currency paper money for any reason.

    Two other suggestions were whiskey and ammunition. I don't believe whiskey would run short :D but it may retain it's value, I'm just not sure, it doesn't feel certain to me. Ammunition has the big problem of legality, one can only hold so many rounds in this jurisdiction, BUT, even with things going well importers are sometimes slow and there have been ammo shortages. I'd not like to have a house fire storing either!

    We didn't settle on any item or items being a good idea to date. What we did agree was that lower to medium value items, which keep in good/perfect condition over time and are easily converted back into currency would be a good idea.

    What would you think those items to be? That is the question :confused:

    Hi John.Welcome!;)
    Just wanted to point out a few things.
    1] The Gold and Italy or whomever dumping their thousands[tens of tons] of tons...:D
    NOT going to happen! The EU membership stipulated that any country with a gold reserve had to give it up on joining the Euro...Guess where it is??Yup Frankfurt!!!Only currency that still has its reserves is our neighbours the British,safley locked in the bank of England.:p Thousands of tons,maybe the US in Fort Knox,but thats even questionable.:eek:

    2] Farm land,while becoming cheaper,and not likely to be picked up and carried away,is more than likely to be "stolen" off you in taxes and upkeep,not to mind some Govt type saying that anyone with a holding over a certain hecterage is an "absntee landlord" or some such rubbish and it should be distributed to the masses[whoever the Hell the masses are!]Also,how are you going to do a transaction when the banks arent lending,the revenue/CAB is on the prowl for large cash transactions and so on?

    Whiskey and ammo.True,local rotgut might be available in some shape or form.More likely moonshine ..But Remy Martin brandy,Jack Daniels,and a whole host of imported whiskies and others will disapper pretty quickly off the shelves as it will become a high end luxury item.
    ammo,despite the restrictions of how much can be held,a 1000 rounds isnt that hard to aquire on your FAC.As well as that I am looking at that extreme post SHTF,not just a currency crash when there still is law and order hopefully.House fire,contray to Hollywood,it just cooks off and makes intresting bangs or Phuts as the case maybe.No bulletts whizzing all over the place.:P

    Would agree with a lot of folks here Ciggeretts and rollybaccy as currency,as well as most of the more common items in a Euro shop.
    Especially normal brand name ciggs,post war germany,Lucky Strikes and Camels post Soviet Russia the Malboro packet became almost the offical currency for citizen transactions.

    Have a couple of friends who grew up in Communist Germany and their perspectives on what to stock is quite intresting.The most common items like razors,toothpaste,toothbrushes,disposable pens and lighters were of immnse scarity in the East blocs.All the ques werent just for bread and food but everyone decending on the one shop that had the current shortage item in stock.which was just about everything we take for granted now in the consumer society.

    They knew one old bloke who kept a store of parts for the Trabant car,even after the wall came down and everyone thought he was daft,and werre using their old Trabants as stock cars and demolition derby wrecks.
    By and by the Trabant has become a collectors piece,but find a good one and parts for it.That old coot is now a millionare,selling spare Trabant parts:D.What might be ****e today might be valueable tomrrow.

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,645 ✭✭✭krissovo


    Where are ya gettin an acre of land for 5k tho??

    5k is the going rate for remote arable land in North Cork at the moment. Its listed as 8k but locals are accepting 5k cash.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,617 ✭✭✭kildare.17hmr


    krissovo wrote: »
    5k is the going rate for remote arable land in North Cork at the moment. Its listed as 8k but locals are accepting 5k cash.
    nice did not know that, buy a couple of acres and build a 'temporary' building, log cabin or the likes! How remote are you talking?


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,645 ✭✭✭krissovo


    nice did not know that, buy a couple of acres and build a 'temporary' building, log cabin or the likes! How remote are you talking?

    In this general area, 10 mins from nearest spar shop at a fair pace
    http://maps.google.ie/maps?q=tooreen+cork&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=0x4844a32f66578b15:0x2600c7a819bae061,Tooreen,+Co.+Cork&gl=ie&ei=S93lTsmhM82GhQfIvdjUBA&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CB0Q8gEwAA


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,645 ✭✭✭krissovo


    Doc Ruby wrote: »
    What are the green areas on the map, forests?

    They are, its a lovely area and almost perfect for a retreat with pockets of forest all over. Only down side is that its exposed to the elements being elevated. Some of the area's to the east are Christmas trees.


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,956 ✭✭✭Doc Ruby


    Here's something that might rock the boat, or at least put everybody into one...
    Dramatic and unprecedented plumes of methane - a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide - have been seen bubbling to the surface of the Arctic Ocean by scientists undertaking an extensive survey of the region.
    The scale and volume of the methane release has astonished the head of the Russian research team who has been surveying the seabed of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf off northern Russia for nearly 20 years.
    In an exclusive interview with The Independent, Igor Semiletov of the International Arctic Research Centre at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, who led the 8th joint US-Russia cruise of the East Siberian Arctic seas, said that he has never before witnessed the scale and force of the methane being released from beneath the Arctic seabed.
    "Earlier we found torch-like structures like this but they were only tens of metres in diameter. This is the first time that we've found continuous, powerful and impressive seeping structures more than 1,000 metres in diameter. It's amazing," Dr Semiletov said.
    "I was most impressed by the shear scale and the high density of the plumes. Over a relatively small area we found more than 100, but over a wider area there should be thousands of them," he said.
    Scientists estimate that there are hundreds of millions of tons of methane gas locked away beneath the Arctic permafrost, which extends from the mainland into the seabed of the relatively shallow sea of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf.
    If that lot goes off like a planet sized champagne bottle, scientists reckon we could immediately be in a runaway global warming scenario.


  • Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 15,676 Mod ✭✭✭✭Tabnabs


    Doc Ruby wrote: »
    If that lot goes off like a planet sized champagne bottle, scientists reckon we could immediately be in a runaway global warming scenario.

    Can I claim my carbon tax payments back then? Told you it wasn't my fault innocent-innocent-male-smiley-smiley-emoticon-000633-medium.gif


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,956 ✭✭✭Doc Ruby


    Tabnabs wrote: »
    Can I claim my carbon tax payments back then? Told you it wasn't my fault innocent-innocent-male-smiley-smiley-emoticon-000633-medium.gif
    You might be more right than you know, it seems the plumes are coming from a greater depth than has been touched yet by climate change. And its not like nobody noticed before, this team has been working on the area for twenty years. What we have here is possibly the embodiment of the clathrate gun hypothesis, I did up a scenario for a roleplaying game on that a while back, pm me if anyone wants the link.

    So how serious is this? Some theories postulate that the Permian extinction, killing around 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrates, was caused by a sudden release of methane, and its popping out of the same place now as then.

    Hows that for a SHTF scenario.

    Pretty much anything could happen though, up to and including nothing at all...
    The consequences of a methane-driven oceanic eruption for marine and terrestrial life are likely to be catastrophic. Figuratively speaking, the erupting region "boils over," ejecting a large amount of methane and other gases (e.g., CO2, H2S) into the atmosphere, and flooding large areas of land.

    Whereas pure methane is lighter than air, methane loaded with water droplets is much heavier, and thus spreads over the land, mixing with air in the process (and losing water as rain). The air-methane mixture is explosive at methane concentrations between 5% and 15%; as such mixtures form in different locations near the ground and are ignited by lightning, explosions and conflagrations destroy most of the terrestrial life, and also produce great amounts of smoke and of carbon dioxide.

    Firestorms carry smoke and dust into the upper atmosphere, where they may remain for several years; the resulting darkness and global cooling may provide an additional kill mechanism. Conversely, carbon dioxide and the remaining methane create the greenhouse effect, which may lead to global warming. The outcome of the competition between the cooling and the warming tendencies is difficult to predict.
    596px-Gashydrat_mit_Struktur.jpg

    Burning ice around 1:20


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,956 ✭✭✭Doc Ruby


    My guesstimate for the effects of the methane cork popping would be, 5% of the population gone in immediate primary effects, burned to death, drowned, or asphyxiated by great walloping clouds of CO2, as used to happen near that African lake periodically, name escapes me at the moment.

    Secondary effects like population displacement from the coasts, civil disorder, tropical disease migration, water supply fouling, and interim food shortages would probably put paid to another 5%. Only 10% so far you say, not too bad? Thats 700 million dead right there.

    Tertiary effects are where things get really interesting, in the Chinese sense of the word. After the first year without much sunlight you're looking at the collapse of entire ecosystems, farms and livestock wiped out in most places en masse. I have a healthy respect for the ability of governments to co-ordinate in the event of major catastrophe, so what edible foodstuffs remain will be distributed, albeit not without a few wars. Still, after 12 months, another third of the global population would be gone. You can tack on another 20% for each continuing year without sunlight thereafter. After four years, the only thing left will be mushrooms, barring miracles and five year food supplies. If there's anything to the last extinction connection, it would probably last 2-3 years.

    Naturally it might last ten years in some locations and only a few months in others.

    The effects even in the best case scenario go far beyond just numbers, naturally. Power generation in many cases will shut down entirely, distribution of supplies likewise, if not from environmental damage then from the risk of blowing up if you use anything too hot, which as people who like to prepare raises a few questions - how do you stay warm without a campfire? Will you risk firing a gun if you might blow yourself to bits in the process? A year's food supply won't do you much good if you aren't going to be able to find any more for 13 months, assuming it doesn't just get seized.

    Governmental collapse would obviously ensue as communications go down without power, communities become isolated, and emergency services basically vanish, overwhelmed - the only way they could cope would be if every second person was a paramedic, fireman, police officer, and generally as well able to look after themselves as a nuclear submarine commander. I mean imagine it - years of darkness, and you don't even dare light a candle for fear of an inferno...

    And of course all the Methane when it finally burns off or disperses, it turns right back into CO2 and water, which lasts for epochs rather than years.

    A miserable end to modern civilisation, drowned in primordial muck, burned, and choked.

    So lets hope it doesn't happen.


  • Registered Users Posts: 14,932 ✭✭✭✭Grizzly 45


    http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/great-global-warming-swindle/

    Intresting and a good refute on the cult of climate change/global warming.

    "If you want to keep someone away from your house, Just fire the shotgun through the door."

    Vice President [and former lawyer] Joe Biden Field& Stream Magazine interview Feb 2013 "



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  • Registered Users Posts: 1,835 ✭✭✭CamperMan


    save the van hire and ill drive ya lad! When are we goin? Where are ya gettin an acre of land for 5k tho??

    some about if you ask


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