This is a study of the people of North Korea during the famine of the 1990's. In other words, a peek into the mindset of the most closed society in the world, combined with the psychology of starvation.
North Koreans are indoctrinated from birth to believe that their political leader Kim Il sung was a god, whose birth on a mountain under a double rainbow was announced by a swallow, and who rules in spirit for eternity. His son - the son of a god, obviously - Kim Jong Il , represented him on earth until his own recent death. It sounds silly to us, and of course it is, but then many Americans believe that a talking snake convinced the world's first woman to eat a magic apple.
So, how do people behave as the infrastructure of their society collapses? Hint: you are most likely to survive if you are chubby, selfish, young, female, and willing to lie and steal. The young, the old and the men perished, in roughly that order. When it got down to women, the sharing, the honest and the slender starved first.
Some of the lessons they learned the hard way may be valuable to us as our own government inexorably approaches defaults on its welfare programs.
The most valuable commodity becomes food, of course. Clothes, books, firewood, medicines, and wheels for making carts are also much sought after.
When the electricity goes out for good and fuel becomes unavailable, it's better to live in the country than the city, the warmer south rather than the colder north, the coast rather than inland.
Foraging for wild edibles becomes an essential skill. Small animals not normally considered food are trapped to geographical extinction. Thieves, gangs and street urchins must be guarded against. If one can't remain below the government's radar, then authorities must be deceived, eluded or bribed. Gardens are planted anywhere space can be made. Human excrement becomes the main fertilizer once animals and synthetics are unavailable.
3 comments:
I live in Minnesota. The state population is about five million. About 10% if the population purchases hunting licenses each year so there are half a million hunters. If food became scarce I believe it would only take a couple of weeks until every whitetail deer in the state was consumed. The moose, rabbits, waterfowl, crows, groundhogs, etc. would only last a couple more weeks. Thus the idea of “living off the wild animals” is way over stated. Even in the most sparsely populated parts of the state the game would be quickly consumed. Fish may last a little longer but hunger would encourage meat fishing, forget sport. I suspect all the wild critters could sustain the population for a few weeks. Even if it were only the half million hunters doing the eating the game would be gone in a month.
Yes, living off big game is a Walter Mitty fantasy unless you live in remote Alaska or British Columbia. Pets, rats and bugs is more like it.
During the Depression, my dad hunted for a lot of the family's food. This was in North Alabama.
Rabbits, Squirrels, Bobwhite quail, and coons were the mainstay of his bag. There were NO deer to speak of, and turkeys were scarce. Grandaddy took catfish and drum from the Tennesee River. Most of their meat came from hogs, which are effective meat producers.
The woods and fields were an important component of the diet, but the garden,chicken pen,milk cow, and hog lot were more more valueable.
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