Food for thought:
A very common disaster response plan for many preppers and survivalists is that they will "bug out" to some remote location away from any big city and live off the grid --self sufficiently.
One thing that this COVID-19 emergency is showing us is that the government -- state and local governments-- are interested in blocking the public's use of public highways and surface streets in times of crisis. Only a handful of such road blockages or checkpoints have taken place, but they are popping up across the country.
There's also discrimination going on, where local officials are identifying out-of-area travelers and, based on that status as a stranger from some other place, they are ordering them into home confinement or quarantine (even without those people having any symptoms of any illness.)
Your right to travel can be infringed.
Survivalists and preppers are not talking about this, it seems. Very few threads about emergency preparedness talk about the problems of travel during times of a travel ban. Everybody seems to assume that if you take enough fuel and guns, you can just drive to your destination with the ability to shoot anybody that you see who tries to hassle you along the way.
Is that a reasonable plan when the people putting up a roadblock in front of you may be law enforcement?
How you might deal with a gang of highway robbers or extortionists that block the roads illegally (and make you pay a tribute or tax before they allow you to pass) is both practically and legally different from when the authorities are blocking your road.
This topic is not about the coronavirus. That is just the latest example of the government interfering on your right to travel during emergency circumstances.
It happens all the time during tornadoes, hurricanes and other natural disasters. The government orders evacuations and then after a certain point in time announces that in the danger zone nobody is allowed to be out in public --no travel at all.
For snowstorms, the government often issues a stay at home order that effectively puts everybody under house arrest. Nobody is allowed to drive on the roads, and in some cities and counties they even say you're not allowed to go walking through the snow.
During the Bundy Gang occupation of a federal wildlife refuge and government office building in Oregon a couple years ago, the government shut down not only all the roads in the immediate vicinity of that incident, but they also set up other roadblocks specifically to screen people traveling in that direction to make sure they weren't right-wing allies of the gang. Any such people were detained and then forced to turn around they were not allowed to proceed forward even though they were breaking no laws, and even if there were other things for them to do and visit in the direction they were heading other than to go to the wildlife refuge.
Remember Hurricane Katrina? Not only did cops go around kicking down doors and confiscating guns from citizens but they also opened fire on a group of unarmed persons who were walking down a public road and crossing a public highway bridge --apparently for the "offense" of not obeying police orders issued earlier to evacuate, and then violating a second order to stay off the streets.
I think we should be talking about this more, and not just assuming that in a [much bigger] emergency that triggers our hard-core survival plan--and a strong Government crackdown on civil liberties in general and freedom of movement in particular --that we will be free to hop in our vehicles and drive wherever we want so long as we carry the fuel we need and don't depend on gas stations.
A very common disaster response plan for many preppers and survivalists is that they will "bug out" to some remote location away from any big city and live off the grid --self sufficiently.
One thing that this COVID-19 emergency is showing us is that the government -- state and local governments-- are interested in blocking the public's use of public highways and surface streets in times of crisis. Only a handful of such road blockages or checkpoints have taken place, but they are popping up across the country.
There's also discrimination going on, where local officials are identifying out-of-area travelers and, based on that status as a stranger from some other place, they are ordering them into home confinement or quarantine (even without those people having any symptoms of any illness.)
Your right to travel can be infringed.
Survivalists and preppers are not talking about this, it seems. Very few threads about emergency preparedness talk about the problems of travel during times of a travel ban. Everybody seems to assume that if you take enough fuel and guns, you can just drive to your destination with the ability to shoot anybody that you see who tries to hassle you along the way.
Is that a reasonable plan when the people putting up a roadblock in front of you may be law enforcement?
How you might deal with a gang of highway robbers or extortionists that block the roads illegally (and make you pay a tribute or tax before they allow you to pass) is both practically and legally different from when the authorities are blocking your road.
This topic is not about the coronavirus. That is just the latest example of the government interfering on your right to travel during emergency circumstances.
It happens all the time during tornadoes, hurricanes and other natural disasters. The government orders evacuations and then after a certain point in time announces that in the danger zone nobody is allowed to be out in public --no travel at all.
For snowstorms, the government often issues a stay at home order that effectively puts everybody under house arrest. Nobody is allowed to drive on the roads, and in some cities and counties they even say you're not allowed to go walking through the snow.
During the Bundy Gang occupation of a federal wildlife refuge and government office building in Oregon a couple years ago, the government shut down not only all the roads in the immediate vicinity of that incident, but they also set up other roadblocks specifically to screen people traveling in that direction to make sure they weren't right-wing allies of the gang. Any such people were detained and then forced to turn around they were not allowed to proceed forward even though they were breaking no laws, and even if there were other things for them to do and visit in the direction they were heading other than to go to the wildlife refuge.
Remember Hurricane Katrina? Not only did cops go around kicking down doors and confiscating guns from citizens but they also opened fire on a group of unarmed persons who were walking down a public road and crossing a public highway bridge --apparently for the "offense" of not obeying police orders issued earlier to evacuate, and then violating a second order to stay off the streets.
I think we should be talking about this more, and not just assuming that in a [much bigger] emergency that triggers our hard-core survival plan--and a strong Government crackdown on civil liberties in general and freedom of movement in particular --that we will be free to hop in our vehicles and drive wherever we want so long as we carry the fuel we need and don't depend on gas stations.
