Greetings, ATS!
What I am about to propose is pure conjecture on my part. I have no research to share, no sources to cite, and nothing but my own suppositions with
which to validate my claims. Therefore, please recognize that my topic is speculative in nature and must be discussed in the realm of common
sense.
For quite some time, I’ve been concerned about society’s growing dependence on technology.
As a child, my great grandparents lived on a farm where they grew their own crops, butchered their own meat, raised chickens and cows for dairy and
eggs, and were pretty much self-sufficient. They lived in the Appalachian Mountains in a “poor” community….they had electricity and it was
considered a marvel (I believe electricity came to the area around the 1950s, according to my father, who was young at the time). When I visited them
in the 1980s as a child, they had a huge radio and a stove and that was it for electric appliances. Eventually they were given a refrigerator (they
used a spring house) and a television (which they rarely watched). In fact, the most “advanced” room in the house was the midwife guest room (my
great-granny was the local midwife…she delivered over 2,000 babies and never lost one. The room was equipped with an incubator for the newborn
babies).
Now, compare how the majority of us live today (in the Western societies). We are completely dependent upon electricity….without it, we cannot
conserve or cook our food, communicate with anyone beyond a few mile radius, etc. Even the basics, such as light and warmth, would be gone.
Of course, this is nothing new. Everyone’s experienced the inconvenience of power outages. We survive for a couple of days without too much
trouble….but what if the power remained out for months? I realize “preppers” are acutely aware of this possibility and are “prepared” for
such an event. But I want to take it one step further.
In addition to our dependence on electricity, we’ve grown dependent on technology. Yesterday, I came across an article claiming that this
dependence was actually making us dumber. I created
this thread about it in case you
want to read it. Anyway, I’ve been thinking about this for quite some time, and I see the makings of a disaster.
Now its time to step into the realm of speculation. What would happen if we lost our electricity AND technology for a long time? In other
words….we’re back in the stone age. No access to anything that runs on batteries, etc.
How would we rebuild? Heck, how would we survive? Could we survive? My great-grandparents would have been fine; they were completely self
sufficient. But my generation? How many of us could start a fire without matches? (yes, we would eventually run out of matches). How many of us
could butcher meat, or even hunt for meat? How many of us could build adequate shelter, dig wells, forage for edible plants?
Would we even get the opportunity? I imagine, within a couple of weeks without electricity…..riots would be common place. People would
kill for food and water, medication and more. The cities would be the worst; with smaller cities and villages next in line.
I realize this doomsday scenario is nothing new to the ATS crowd…you’ve already explored this possibility and many of you are dedicated to
surviving the unthinkable. But here’s where my conspiracy spider-sense kicks in…..I think this is how TPTB might decide to depopulate the
planet.
It would be so easy. Perhaps those underground shelters would make a great place to sit back and wait a year or so while us plebians kill each other
or die of ignorance. Give it another year for the wildlife to scavenge the bodies….then switch the power back on.
Paranoid, I know. I don’t know why I’m thinking this way, maybe its too much time on ATS. But it’s a feeling I’m having and I
wanted to share. Hopefully some of the bright minds here can quickly shoot down my argument and explain how wrong I am.
Hopefully.
lol, there is lots of homes without power here in Northern Ireland at the minute due to the
weather. I am expecting mine to go out soon :-( last time it happened was about four years ago an that was only for a few hours. 
