The flipside of this is: how effective is preparing actually going to be? If you look at what most preppers are doing, not very.

As an avid hiker and rock climber, when I watch a lot of prepper videos on YouTube, I find a lot of laughable ideas.

* About 50% of the preppers I see have seemingly no concern for cross-contamination of their water system, and no anti-diarrheals in their med kits to deal with the giardia they aren't preventing.

* Paracord is popular among preppers, but it's pretty unclear why. I've literally never seen a prepper demonstrate hanging a bear bag, which is literally the only reason I've ever used paracord in the wild. Lashing together structures boy-scout-style requires a lot more cord than they are carrying, and having hiked a few thousand miles in my hiking career, I don't think I've ever felt that lashing together a structure was necessary or even worth the effort, despite that being a skill I'm proficient at. The fanciest paracords out there have metal wire (for electricity) and fishing line inside the paracord--maybe it's just me, but I would rather just carry the fishing line separately, and I can't imagine a situation where I have access to electricity and not wire. It's also unclear to me whether any of these preppers actually have any skills as electricians.

* Knives: the number one item I find left behind on trails are these giant Bowie knives. People buy them at an army surplus or sporting goods store, and then a few miles onto the trail they realize their pack is really heavy, and the item that stands out as the most weight with the least usefulness is the 3 pound knife. I carry a CRKT NIAD[1] when rock climbing, and a Snow Peak knife (part of a cutlery set--I think an older version of this[2]). What these knives have in common is that they are extremely light. But what do preppers have? In some cases, the Bowie knives aren't even close to the largest things.

* Guns: while preppers seem unconcerned with the weight of their knives, when it comes to guns, weight suddenly seems to be a concern. To achieve low weight, it seems most preppers are willing to settle for the idea that they're never going to hunt for, or defend themselves from, anything larger than a jackrabbit. Almost all the popular "prepper guns", i.e. this Henry AR7[3] are in caliber .22LR, which beyond being a tiny round, has reliability issues. Of course, there are also preppers who go to the other extreme[4]; if you've got your 9mm handgun, .22LR rifle, 12 gauge shotgun, .308 bolt action, and .223 AR15, I hope you're in your gun bunker when the apocalypse happens, because you're not moving anywhere with a quarter of of a ton of firearms and ammo. Personally, I think fishing would be far more consistent for food, and I don't have the stomach for violence even in self-defense (maybe once, but on a consistent basis?) so I'd probably rather use the weight for carrying a light fishing kit and more food.

I don't mean all of this to come across as super harsh on the prepper community. If you enjoy collecting this stuff, do it. I'm not criticizing what anyone does for fun, and it's pretty unlikely that you'll ever have to rely on this stuff, so there's no real harm. I'm just saying that if my experience in the outdoors is any indication, a lot of attempts to prepare for life that doesn't rely on civilization are pretty ineffective.

[1] https://www.crkt.com/niad.html

[2] https://snowpeak.com/collections/cutlery/products/titanium-f...

[3] https://www.henryusa.com/rifles/u-s-survival-ar-7/

[4] https://prepperswill.com/5-guns-every-prepper-should-own/