When I graduated from college, New York City was THE place for someone in my chosen career to work. That’s where I got my first job and then started my way up the career path. It was also a fun place to live for a young guy with a little pocket change and no family responsibilities. I think NYC has the highest number of bars per capita of anywhere in the country. There’s always a party or club you can go to, and the young women were out there looking to meet the guy of their dreams.
It was also expensive, dangerous, smelly, crowded, crime-ridden, and violent. Illegal drugs were everywhere, as were anger, greed, and corruption. What’s worse? I didn’t even realize how bad it was until I left.
Living in New York City was like living with my first wife; they both sucked, but I felt a sense of relief when I moved on.
Cities Suck
Over the past decades, my work has taken me to Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Richmond, Raleigh, Atlanta, Miami, Chicago, Nashville, St. Louis, New Orleans, Houston, Dallas, Austin, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Minneapolis, Green Bay, Denver, Salt Lake City, Las Vegas, Reno, San Diego, Los Angeles, Seattle, and many smaller cities in the U.S. I’ve also been to Montreal, London, Paris, Frankfurt, Barcelona, Madrid, and other cities in Europe. I’m convinced that all cities share the same problems; any differences between them are because they are at different places on the continuum between rock bottom and renaissance.
With the exception of Montreal, Barcelona, and Salt Lake City, I have no desire to go back for a visit. I certainly wouldn’t want to live there. Maybe it’s because I’ve been there, done that. The easy access to alcohol, sushi, drugs, and sex is no longer something that appeals to me.
More likely it is because my car was broken into or stolen three times, I was assaulted by two big guys in a parking lot, and my apartment was burglarized while living in or visiting big cities. Nothing like that ever happened once I moved to smaller cities and towns.
Instead of views from tall buildings, I have mountain views. Instead of being eating small servings of expensive food made by chefs who consider themselves artists, I have down-home cooking at places where the owner knows you by name. That’s a trade I’ll take any day of the week.
Urban Prepping is an Oxymoron
As I have discussed elsewhere, I left New York after I became a prepper and moved to a series of smaller and smaller cities, suburbs, exurbs, and finally to a remote location outside a town so small it probably qualifies as a village. I left the city because I realized my only chance at survival in any kind of longer-term crisis was to leave before everyone else clogs up the bridges and highways.
While you can prep in the city, survival is another question. Yes, you can put food in your closet and under your bed. You can store a couple cases of water and maybe buy a gun. These preps can help you weather a storm, a few days without power, and a couple days of rioting. Your steel door, multiple dead bolts, and bars on the window may keep you safe for a limited time, but what will you do when you face a hardcore problem that has no foreseeable end?
When the store shelves are stripped bare, the electricity goes out for the last time, and the water stops coming out of your faucet, how long do you think you can you survive in your apartment, townhouse, or on your one-sixth acre lot?
Your best bet for survival as an urban prepper is to have a well-stocked bugout bag, a fast car, and an excellent early warning system that can tell you when to bug out.
Or, you can leave now, while you are in control of your destiny and have time to make good decisions.
Leave Now
If you take prepping seriously and you live in the city, you need to ask yourself why you are still there. If it’s for your job, get another job or work remotely. You think you can’t work in your field without living in Los Angeles, New York, or wherever? Look at Tucker Carlson. He left Washington, D.C., and has a studio in Maine.
If it’s for your kids and their education, you are kidding yourself. They will get a more wholesome education with less liberal indoctrination well outside the city. They will also be able to spend more time outdoors and avoid exposure to air pollution and chemical emissions.
Look at the sights and sounds around you in the city. Look at the homeless people in open-air encampments, the drug dealers on the corner and the rampant drug use all around you; see the prostitution, the gangs, the murders, and ask yourself why are you subjecting yourself and your family to that? Do you want your kids to grow up thinking that is normal and acceptable?
Listen to the noise of sirens, the car horns and curses, the yelling you try to ignore, and the jets passing overhead. Think what it would be like instead to live somewhere where the only noise is crickets, the wind, the patter of rain, a babbling brook, a bird call, or the laughing of your kids playing outside unsupervised. Or, maybe you’ll hear the satisfied sounds your chickens make as they put themselves to bed on their roost and you’ll smile, knowing you will have fresh eggs tomorrow.
Leave the city and your family will be happier and healthier. Anxiety will go away. Allergies will clear up. Life will be more relaxed and you’ll all be calmer. You will find you drink only for pleasure and no longer for escape, because your subconscious will know you don’t need to escape; you will already have done so.
The Coming Zombie Apocalypse
There is a reason the rich own compounds in Wyoming or Montana, why the super-rich have bug-out destinations in New Zealand or South America and private planes standing by to take them there. Because they know the cities are inherently unsafe and large numbers of people are dangerous. Nothing can control a city full of people during or after a large-scale disaster. All hell will break loose.
Our cities are already a disaster. They are a tinder pot, waiting for a flash to set them off. They are three meals away from chaos. The liberals want equality; they will get it in the city during a disaster because everyone will sink to their lowest level.
You want to know who the zombies are in the coming Zombie Apocalypse? They are city dwellers who have been on their own for a week after society crumbles.
Get out while you still can.
Great article. Resonates with me. 1 year ago I lived on the outskirts of a city. The I saw the race riots after George Floyd. That was just a small scale event. If an entire city went that wild I stood no chance. I sold my place and got a remote house at roughly the same value. Got off city water. Got generators. Got fruit trees, raised beds, and a chicken coop. If I don’t turn on the TV I wouldn’t even know there was a pandemic. I consider the cities to be a death trap. The gangs will quickly take control after SHTF. When the gangs run out of food they’ll start killing and robbing the suburbs. And with many people that want to eat, the gangs will grow to small militias.
I live in a suburb of Phoenix. We won’t hardly any delay/cushion even though we are 30 miles out. We have heavy plywood and they are already cut for the windows, so we can lock up on a hurry.
I figure I can last a couple months here if all goes “well” if shit were to indeed hit the fan. Lol
In other words, This post is spot on haha
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