Survivalism and Stigma in Online Communities

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Ready for Apocalypse: Survivalism and Stigma in Online Communities

Author: Stephen RobertsFaculty Mentor: Beverly Ann Davenport, Department of Anthropology, College of Public

Affairs and Community Service, University of North TexasDepartment and College Affiliation: Department of Anthropology, College of Public Affairsand Community Service, University of North Texas



Ready for Apocalypse 2

Bio:

Stephen Roberts is a senior majoring in anthropology. In spring 2009, he received the Academic

Excellence in Anthropology Award and was inducted into Lambda Alpha, the National

Collegiate Honors Society for Anthropology. He recently participated in the National Science

Foundation Summer Research Experience for Undergraduates at the University of North Texas.

His research interests include the relationships between public policy and terrorist, millennial,

and racist groups; stigma; and alienation. Roberts will pursue a doctoral degree in anthropology

after graduation and plans to continue his research and teach at the college level.




Abstract:

This article examines survivalists in online communities and how they manage the stigma

assigned to their culture. It explores who survivalists are and then discusses the fringe groups

commonly associated with survivalists by the mainstream, set against the backdrop of American

apocalyptic belief. Ethnographic examples illustrate survivalists‟ conception of their stereotypes,

their awareness of unregistered guests observing their online activity, and their methods of

stigma management in this context.




Introduction

“What if the America you knew was about to change?” These words spanned the tattered

flag, spelled out in capital letters the same dim gray as the background. The flag itself was

recognizable as American, but within its faded blue square was a diamond of twenty-one stars,

not the familiar fifty. The red and white stripes were arranged vertically instead of horizontally.

They had browned and deteriorated through exposure to time or smoke or both. The edges were

frayed, and in the dead center of the flag was a gaping hole with ragged edges. For some reason,

its shape reminded me of the Grinch‟s head.

This image of a transformed American flag was part of the header graphic for one of myfield sites: an online forum dedicated to the discussion of survivalism. Survivalism, or survival

and preparation (S&P), is a set of practices intended to ready individuals for disasters, life-

threatening situations, and progressive degrees of social collapse. The beliefs underlying these

practices are varied. Generally, the idea is to be able to live through anything, regardless of the

environment or circumstances life generates. Survivalists form communities online to share their

stories, build a knowledge base, and network with like-minded individuals.

As I was browsing through S&P websites, I was immediately attracted to the site with the

tattered and transformed American flag, and the hole torn from its center that reminded me of the

Grinch‟s head . My mental image of Dr. Seuss‟s hateful, green iconoclast may have reflected my

own unconscious bias against survivalist culture. The realization that survivalism is stigmatized

by the American mainstream propelled me toward the research question I address in this article:

What are the stigma management strategies used by survivalists in these online communities?

To answer this question, I will describe who survivalists are generally, and then

characterize the specific populations I chose to study. I approach the literature with an emphasis




on why survivalists are stigmatized, and how mainstream culture views disasters and apocalypse.

As my research was conducted entirely through web forums, I then discuss virtual ethnography

as my method, followed by my findings. I conclude by discussin g this study‟s impact on my

perspective and by raising questions for future research.

The Survivors and TEOTWAWKI

In his book, Dancing at Armageddon, Richard Mitchell notes that survivalism “is

centered on the continuing task of constructing „what if‟ sce narios in which survival preparations

will be at once n ecessary and sufficient” ( 2002, p. 13). The particulars of these imagined futures

vary from group to group and individual to individual. By and large, there are two main types of disaster as described by survivalists: WTSHTF and TEOTWAWKI. WTSHTF (or just SHTF)

stands for “When the S *** Hits the Fan” and is used to describe any kind of localized

emergency, such as blackouts or riots, including those that develop into more serious

circumstances. TEOTWAWK I means “The End of the World As We Know It” and refers to an

utter and complete change in the social landscape, an apocalypse. These two concepts are not

mutually exclusive; a disaster can exhibit characteristics of both. For example, riots may spread

and spark a civil war.

In addition to these two levels of intensity, there are other ways to categorize survivalist

scenarios. According to Captain D ave‟s Survival Guide ( an informational website my subjects

referred me to) there are four categories of phenomena: natural, man-made, other, and personal

emergencies. Natural disasters are events such as hurricanes and earthquakes, volcanoes and

tornados. Man-made disasters are those related to terrorism and war, crime, and the collapse of

social infrastructure. “Other ” disasters include disease epidemics and alien attacks. Robberies,




fires, unemployment, and random acts of violence fall under personal emergencies ( “Captain

Dave‟s Survival Guide,” 2009).

The skills, knowledge, and equipment that survivalists accrue often coincide with the

disaster scenarios they foresee as most likely or realistic. The potential number of practices

involved is immense. Those generally regarded as most important are the ones centered around

food, water, and shelter. Among many other things, these include developing rotation systems to

successfully store food, learning to identify edible plants, finding and purifying water, using

vehicles as shelter, and surviving outside in the cold. First aid is a high priority, as is self-defense

using either hand-to-hand combat or weaponry such as guns or Molotov cocktails ( “CaptainDave‟s Survival Guide,” 2009).

A Question of Stigma

A wide variety of individuals fall under the umbrella of survivalism. Members of

citizens‟ militias , for example. White supremacists. Millennial cultists and apocalyptic fanatics.

Tax protestors. All these can represent themselves as survivalists, but so can the parent who

stocks up on groceries for a harsh winter, or the hobbyist who collects communication equipment

and becomes an amateur radio operator to aid in emergency broadcasts. Mitchell states that “one

sort of survival, the creative transcendence of calamitous cultural change” is what binds these

people together (Mitchell, 2002, p. 3).

Practitioners of survivalism exist at many points on the political and religious spectrum.

This does not stop the mainstream media from identifying “unrepresentative but accessible

confrontations, shootings, bombings, standoffs … by the name survivalism” (Mitchell , 2002, pp.

15-16). The profound impact of domestic terrorism forges a link between survivalists and the

right-wing extremists they are commonly associated with, such as the neo-Nazi, racist




organizations of the Order and the CSA (the Covenant, Sword, and Arm of the Lord), whose

members planned to bomb the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. This plan,

inspired by a novel called The Turner Diaries, was never carried out by these groups.

Unfortunately, it provided a blueprint which Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols elaborated on

and executed (Hamm, 1997).

Similarly, millennial groups are often paired with or defined as survivalists, a prominent

example being the Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas. Before the tragic raid on their compound

in 1993 that resulted in the deaths of David Koresh and nearly all of his followers, they

stockpiled guns and ammunition and illegally modified their weaponry. They also supportedtheir operations through participation in gun shows (Hamm, 1997, pp. 103-117). Organizations

such as the Church Universal and Triumphant and the Aum Shinrikyo also combine survivalist

practices with apocalypticism (Lamy, 1996, p. 23).

These groups are not representative of the survivalist majority, but in the minds of many,

a wide constellation of individuals forms a single lunatic fringe. Mitchell notes that through

association with extremist organizations, “other survivalists acquire stigma and perhaps prurient

allure unjustified by their own mundane action” (Mitchell 2002, p. 16). As I will detail below,

this sentiment was later expressed by several of my subjects.

Survivalists are not solely antigovernment extremists. In Neil Strauss‟s popular account

of his entry into and exploration of survivalist culture, Emergency , he interacts with billionaires

(“B people”) who prepare for economic and social collapse by tying their assets up in

complicated financial structures, and purchasing foreign real estate to acquire multiple

citizenships and passports. Their plan is to use these in the event of social collapse to escape the

United States and retreat to a “bug out location.” In testament to the variety of survivalists,




Strauss also learns from environmentalists and naturalists, hunters, FEMA officials, and first

responders in his investigation of the culture (Strauss, 2009).

American Apocalypse

The idea of impending disaster or apocalypse is not actually a deviant ideology at all.

Rather, it is embedded deeply in American mainstream culture. Kathleen Stewart and Susan

Harding emphasize this point through their broad survey of United States history and the

millennial groups and apocalyptic militias that have popped up throughout. In a discussion of

pervasive eschatological thought, Stewart and Harding consider how apocalypse transcends the

boundary between the religious and secular, and has the potential to unite the general public(Stewart, 1999). In his work, Mitchell recalls how millennialism has played a “dominant role in

American sectarian Christianity for more than two centuries,” and declares that “ anticipating

cataclysmic transformations of society is a venerable American tradition” (Mitchell , 2002, p. 12).

A recent example of this mainstream millennialism can be found in the Y2K event

leading up to New Year‟s Eve of 1999, and the non -event that followed. As Patkin explains,

“Computer programmers, facing machines that were tight on memory, simply identified the year

by the last two digits, setting the stage for confusion as computers would read „00‟ as the year

1900, not 2000” (Patkin , 2009, 3). Although the ultimate result was underwhelming, the fear that

widespread disaster was imminent resulted in a third of all Americans planning to “stockpile

food, water, and other supplies” according to Lacayo using information from a July 1999

Associated Press poll (as cited in Patkin, 2009, p. 6).

Accompanying the repeated formation of millennial groups and mainstream events like

Y2K, popular entertainment constantly delves into apocalypticism. Films such as The Matrix,

The Terminator, and 12 Monkeys all envision a post-apocalyptic world from a secular




perspective (Ahrens, 2009). Elements of pop culture as diverse as Buffy, the Vampire Slayer

(Holba, 2009) and the folk music of Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan (Baines, 2009) help create

this American eschatology: Buffy through direct reference, Guthrie and Dylan through Dust

Bowl ballads and Cold War anxiety. In literature, the Left Behind series is an example of “the

increasingly prominent genre of end- times fiction” (Lundberg , 2009, p. 97).

Perhaps the clearest modern example of a cultural fixation on Armageddon is the “war on

terror.” John Hall interprets this admirably in his essay, “Apocalypse 9/11.” He discusses how

Islamic fundamentalists have consistently approached their acts of aggression from an

apocalyptic perspective, portraying their war with the West as the definitive war between Goodand Evil. Hall argues that the United States government has adopted that interpretation as well,

accepting that it is indeed a holy war and, thus, apocalyptic. Evidence of this is found in the

language of public policy, including such phrases as “axis of evil” and “crusade.” Using the war

on terror as a defining aspect of an American generation, and comparing it to events such as the

Cold War, Hall expresses the idea that apocalypticism has become an increasingly important part

of the American way of life (Hall, 2004).

The literature thoroughly establishes that apocalyptic thinking is a normative aspect of

American culture. In essence, this recasts most survivalist practices as a rational response, and

suggests that the primary reason for stigmatization is association with fringe groups and cultural

outliers. Within this contextual framework, I sought to explain how survivalists cope with this

stigma, and I used their online forums to do just that.

Virtual Ethnography (and a Dead Man)

During Bronislaw Malinowski‟s famed two -year ethnographic immersion in the

Trobriand Islands in the early 1900s, he interacted daily with the indigenous peoples, becoming




extremely proficient in their language and familiar with their customs. He talked with them face-

to-face and he developed relationships. He came to know the people by name, know their

families, their likes and dislikes, maybe even their hopes and fears. His fieldwork would set a

precedent in anthropology, a high standard for years to come (McGee, 2008, p. 161).

Nearly a century later, I sat in my air-conditioned home office, looking at my flat-screen

LCD monitor, drinking a decaf coffee with just the right amount of cream. My pajama pants

were exceptionally comfortable that afternoon, or maybe it was the cushion on my blue roller

chair. Probably both. Something was bugging me though: I could not decide just how, just the

perfect way , to introduce myself to the subjects I had been observing on the internet for the pastcouple of weeks.

Somewhere, a famous anthropologist was rolling in his grave.

The work I had been doing wa s called “virtual ethnography.” An emerging realization

among ethnographers is that the line between the real and the virtual is blurring. We may be

moving away from fieldwork that is bounded in a single place, or even multi-sited. As more and

more of our interactions are mediated by technology, ethnographers begin to derive meaning

from the interactions between sites or individuals as they are managed through the medium

(Jordan, 2009, p.186).

Jordan distinguishes between virtual and hybrid ethnographies by saying that “virtual

ethnographies are based on fieldwork carried out exclusively in the virtual world, while hybrid

ethnographies explore how people design, encounter, and use the Internet in their physical, real-

world lives” (Jordan , 2009, p.184). I had decided to exclusively observe and participate in these

online forums without interacting with my su bjects in the “real” world.




According to Mitchell, survivalists “for the most part do none of the things that make for

easy writing or research. They do not meet or recruit regularly in public, ally with established

associations, respond to focused leader ship, or recognize a shared agenda” (Mitchell , 2002, p.

15). The internet provided a convenient place to interact with large numbers of the population at

once. One of the first websites I studied had approximately 770 members at the time of my

research, with varying degrees of activity. Another website I explored had about 180 members,

while two other sites recorded over 17,000 members apiece, although the numbers were likely

inflated by spam-bots and fake user registrations.

Despite the convenience and accessibility of virtual ethnography, there were some ethicalconsiderations. At first, I f ound myself just “watching” the survivalists , reading their

conversations without announcing who I was or what I was doing. I had not yet created a login

name, so I e xisted to them only as an anonymous guest, what they would call a “lurker.”

The situation created by online discussion boards is difficult to analogize to the real

world. Imagine a room full of people all wearing masks, most of them shirtless, but some of

them wearing shirts with printed names they have chosen for themselves. Everyone is staring at a

wall. On this wall, the Shirts post letters and notes and questions and answers, and the Skins just

come in and read them. There I was, a Skin in a mask, turning from the wall to the people and

back to the wall, trying to see what the Shirts were doing and why.

On the one hand, I was doing participant observation by being a “lurker.” But I was not

there to study the lurkers. In his definitive virtual ethnography, Coming of Age in Second Life ,

Tom Boellstorff discusses the usage of an unidentifiable persona. He notes that “ethnography is

predicated on participant observation, not abstracted observation, ” and goes on to say that

conducting incognito research “would not allow the tension between participating and observing




to produce the kinds of complicity and failure that are necessary for ethnographic knowledge”

(Boellstorff, 2009, p.80).

So I started participating. I put on a shirt with the name “rebelsaint” and accepted the

forum rules, signed in with my password, and typed out my first post. In total, I submitted 24

posts over three websites during a week-long period. Given the limited window for research, I

attempted to blend rapport building with very focused questions. The ability to think carefully

before submitting helped immensely. Some of my posts were created specifically to address

questions from the users about my work and who I was. A few posts were probing questions in

direct response to a spec ific user‟s comments, and others were intended to discuss what I wasthinking as a way to test for validity against the population itself.

By the end of the week I had received approximately a hundred replies from various

users. I analyzed these discussion threads through open coding to develop workable categories,

and gradually refined these categories as my research progressed. This coding and categorization

system elucidated certain themes in how survivalists saw their own stigma, their perception of

the ever-present lurker, and their various impression management techniques.

A Militant, Racist Cultist Wearing a Tinfoil Hat

If I was to explore how survivalists coped with their stigma, I would need to see certain

cultural elements from their perspective. My initial point of focus was the survivalists‟

understanding of how they were stereotyped by others. This was more important than how others

actually stereotyped them, if there was even a disparity, because their perspective would convey

exactly what they felt defensive about and what impressions they tried to manage.

The stereotypes they conceived of were as I expected. One poster gave a detailed list of

eighteen attributes that described the stereotypical survivalist as white, Christian, heterosexual,




masses, or the individual who believes that everything they do or say is being recorded and

catalogued (neither of which is necessarily impossible, though improbable). Another example of

this stereotype was eloquently put by a poster in the forums: “ People who are dissatisfied with

the world and can‟t adapt to living comfortably within it often have a desperate wish that the

world really would fall apart ” (personal communication, July-August 2009).

That these stereotypes exist in the minds of survivalists creates an environment for

community members to define themselves in relation (and generally, opposition) to them. As

Goffman has shown, they must negotiate the territory between an imputed virtual social identity

and their actual social identity (1963, p. 3). It was my belief that this necessity was exacerbated by the ever-present lurker, the unregistered guests who frequented the forums.

Who‟s Behind the Curtain?

On every forum there was a sidebar or footer with stats on it, and it indicated how many

people were logged on and observing. This included the number of unregistered guests, and an

awareness of the lurker‟s existence was made apparent in several threads in the community.

Some threads were directed at lurkers specifically, written to be read by them. My belief that the

lurker would encourage a need for stigma management was predicated on the idea that the lurker

was conceived of by survivalists as an outsider. This turned out to be largely false.

The survivalists‟ conception of the lurker was fourfold . The first type of lurker was an

obvious one that I had overlooked: a registered or openly affiliated member of the community

that simply had not logged in but was still browsing the forums. When asked directly about who

they thought the lurkers were, survivalists submitted replies such as, “I‟m betting a fair number

are us. I clear my cookies about once a day and am not always logged in when I‟m reading”

(personal communication, July-August 2009). Other examples of this were simply “people who




don‟t want to join in conversations, but enjoy reading about what other people have to say”

(personal communication, July-August 2009). The assumption widely expressed was that this

was a very common type of lurker.

A second type was the stigmatizing masses, or members of the mainstream culture that

cast survivalists as deviant. This type was referred to as “the enemy,” “the nay -sayers,” “those

that think survivalists are extremists/terrorists,” and “anti -gunners who are trying to figure out

new insights into what makes pro- gun people tick and how to defeat them” (personal

communication, July-August 2009). Although this theme was mentioned several times, the level

of concern for them appeared to be minimal. One poster noted that they “probably get boredquickly and move on” (personal communication, July-August 2009).

The third type of lurker envisioned by the community was a member of law enforcement

or one of the three-letter governmental agencies: CIA, DHS, FBI, NSA, or ATF. Referred to as

“LE people,” they were portrayed as “government snoops trying to pick out any tips to identify

who‟s who” (personal communication, July-August 2009). The conception of the authority type

as lurker elicits the stigma of paranoia and may seem to express the fourth stereotype mentioned

above, the “tinfoil hat.” However, the survivalists‟ concern that they are being watched by the

government may not be entirely unfounded given the historical relationship between law

enforcement and survivalist groups. Another obvious validation of this lurker type is that there

were registered members of the forums that work in law enforcement (one of the sites even has a

private section dedicated specifically to police officers).

The final type of lurker conceived of by the community is the survivalist (or aspiring

survivalist) who chooses not to register or log in because they want to avoid association with the

culture or because they are paranoid themselves. As stated by a forum member, these are “people




who feel as if what they‟re doing isn‟t normal, or is something to be embarrassed about”

(personal communication, July-August 2009). This lurker type creates an interesting dynamic:

the very act of trying to avoid association with the culture can itself be an expression of the

paranoid stigma and is, thus, identification with the “tinfoil hat” stereotype . The other possibility

is that it is a direct attempt to avoid the stigmatization that accompanies the culture.

Impression Management in the Face of Apocalypse

The survivalists‟ conception of stereotypes and their awareness of being watched by

lurkers combine to create an atmosphere that requires impression management (Goffman, 1963).

Although the lurker appears to play a less significant role in creating the need to manage stigmathan originally hypothesized, it does seem to operate as a management strategy. Lurking can

keep ashamed or paranoid survivalists from being revealed as participants in the culture. This

concealment strategy is viewed as mostly short-term by other survivalists, and, once the lurker‟s

experience of stigma is lessened by other factors, he may elect to begin posting and participating

directly. This is not to imply that lurking is primarily a stigma management technique. Almost all

fully-fledged members begin by lurking the sites and only post when they are comfortable

enough to do so.

An interesting point to note is that although the existence of the lurker probably has a

limited effect on the need for stigma management, the community is indeed aware of the lurker‟s

existence. When someone uses the strategy of lurking to avoid stigma, they increase the pool of

lurkers, and, thus, may increase the “lurker effect” on the stigmatized population (including

themselves). This could potentially operate as a feedback loop. Further research would need to

be conducted to determine the validity and extent of this phenomenon.




Beyond concealing their identity through lurking, survivalists use other impression

management techniques online. I noted two primary alternative mechanisms: legitimization and

redirection. Legitimization techniques include associating survivalism with authority figures or

governmental institutions, and rationalizing survivalism by negatively describing the mainstream

culture. Redirection techniques recognize that survivalist stereotypes are partially valid, but insist

that they apply only to other survivalists. This is accomplished through humor and direct

labeling.

Affiliating survivalism with authority figures, such as police officers or military

personnel, can potentially reduce the “guilt by association” effect that repeated links to domesticterrorists and millennial groups have fostered. This strategy seeks to legitimize the culture in the

eyes of the mainstream. Entire sections of the websites are dedicated to members who are

firefighters, law enforcement, or military. The rules and regulations generally include a ban on

discussing illegal activity (including the modification of firearms), and one site declares that

“Moderators are free to give cop and military haters 5 day bans at will” (personal

communication, July-August 2009). Another site‟s rules include recommendations by the

Department of Homeland Security for what is tolerable discussion and what is not. Although

these could simply be protective measures conducted by administrators of the forums,

associating with authority to reformat the survivalist image has its own logic. The majority of

survivalists want to be represented for what they really are: law-abiding citizens.

Legitimizing the culture can be approached from a different angle, however. Rather than

making positive associations with survivalism directly, it can be done indirectly by attacking and

negatively labeling the mainstream culture. This strategy strikes at perceived flaws in the

dominant hegemony and argues that survivalists do not exhibit these flaws. The masses are




referred to as “sheeple,” “gimme - people,” or “sheep that won‟t wake up” (personal

communication, July-August 2009) to see the potentially disastrous future before them. One

member states, “…o f course we have academia, the media, and the left in general who sneer at

self reliance, prudence in finance, the right to keep and bear arms and so on which are hallmarks

of the survivalist movement” (personal communication, July-August 2009).

This strategy is effective because it aggressively asserts the rational elements of

survivalism, and places them in contrast with irrational elements of modern culture. Why would

people not train to survive instead of “being brainwashed by mass media nonsense” as one

respondent suggested (personal communication, July-August 2009)? Some interesting variationson this strategy occur when members actively blur survivalism with a larger cultural group, such

as conservatism or the Libertarian party. This functions to place the survivalist on relatively

equal footing with the stigmatizing others of the opposition, and makes counter-stigmatization

easier.

Strategies that redirect the application of stigma require an awareness of stereotypes and

a partial validation of them, but only as applied to other survivalists. This is accomplished

through humor and simple labeling. Joking about stereotypes usually occurs through adopting

the persona of a survivalist caricature, and playing the role of the “tinfoil hat,” militant, or

“doomsdayer.”

I encountered this immediately after I announced myself on the forums. Although

members did express legitimate concern about whether I was actually a student researcher, some

mocked this concern playfully. One member‟s comment: “Are you with the BATF [Bureau of

Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms] ? ARE YOU GOING TO SHOOT MY DOG????!?” (personal

communication, July-August 2009). And another: “By the way „Mr. Undergrad from North




Texas‟ (wink, wink) tell the BATFE [the „E‟ is „Explosives‟] I‟ve sold all of my guns and ammo .

There is no need to send the Brownshirts to my house. Thanks and good luck with your

„project‟” (personal communication, July-August 2009).

These examples of humor indirectly identify survivalist culture with common stereotypes

and potentially take ownership of them. Alternatively, direct labeling of other survivalists not

only alleviates the effects of stigma but also places blame for the cause of stigma. An example

(here a forum participant is critiquing a different survivalist website): “…they got too far away

from serious discuss ion, and let the „reynolds -wrap[sic]‟ crew run amok in ev ery forum”

(personal communication, July-August 2009). Or a member‟s critique of their own site: “…wesure do have our share of the tin foil hat crowd” (personal communication, July-August 2009).

These management techniques reject stigma by assigning it to others, attempting to

reduce it, or by concealing the mark. Perhaps the most crucial management strategy is not a

strategy at all, but a phenomenon linked to the core values of survivalism. At the center of

survivalism is an intense drive toward personal security through self-reliance and independence.

The realization of these values can translate into independence from other‟s opinions as well . As

an individual moves closer to the core of survivalist philosophy, the need to manage stigma at all

is diminished through expression of this self-reliance. From a member of the forums:

Once you‟ve decided “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!” stigma ceases to

exist. It is replaced by resolution and acceptance of obstacles to be overcome.

You step beyond the victimization cult promulgated by those who gain by your

weakness to become an actualized human being (personal communication, July-

August 2009).




Other members echoed this sentiment in different ways. “Frankly, my dear, I don't give a

damn, so I don't have t o „deal‟ with it ” (personal communication, July-August 2009). Statements

similar to this were often expressed. A common attitude was that if you are getting ready for

disaster, cataclysm, or potentially the most significant destructive event in human history, what

do you care about how people are looking at you? The awareness among survivalists that their

non-actualized members do experience the emotional impact of stereotyping was leavened by

this perspective: “Maybe this site helps them move beyond stig ma management to where stigma

no longer exists” (personal communication, July-August 2009).

Against the backdrop of American apocalypse, some people reject the glut of imagineddystopian futures. Some prepare feverishly for the worst while praying for the best. Some

secretly wish for the end of modern society, and a few violently encourage it. Survivalists are

burdened by the actions of these few, by the stigma that comes with their affiliations in the

public eye. My findings indicate that their methods of dealing with this stigma are varied within

their own online communities, but that the most powerful of these is a celebration of the cultural

core itself: to be deeply free from everyone else and determined to survive against all odds. The

opinions and stigma assigned to them by others are ultimately insignificant in the face of

tremendous cataclysm. In this light, survivalism becomes an identity-building process rather than

just a preparatory practice. It becomes a creative art of self-definition, a craft. The world may

crash around them, but the survivalist seeks nothing less than absolute freedom from the

circumstances of history.

Conclusion

On a personal note, I do not consider myself a millennialist, and I do not adhere to any

doctrine that proclaims an impending end to the world. I am not inclined to think that if we make




contact with alien life it will trigger human extinction. I do not believe in a zombie apocalypse,

and I think a “gray goo” scenario is unlikely. I do, however, recognize that nation s rise and fall,

civil wars erupt, and revolutions occur. Riots, crime, and terrorism are real. Power-hungry

megalomaniacs can seize control of governments. Tornadoes and hurricanes can destroy entire

cities. I have been without power. I have gone without work. I have slept in the cold. Maybe

apocalyptic ideas are embedded in our social consciousness because we know that some day our

culture will transform to be unrecognizable to us, whether it is violently or gradually, in the near

or distant future. In spending my days actively engaged with survivalist culture, I became more

and more aware of the destructive and transformative potential in the present moment. In thefinal analysis, this seems to be a function of survivalism: to combat feelings of despair and free

floating anxiety in an uncertain world. To create the future in a dangerous, dramatic world. To

live, survive, and thrive in a world where the s*** could hit the fan at any moment.




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