Finalist selections for Conflicted - SCENARIO 1

STEPFORD RENEGADE

Okay, I'm going to be brave and start off

I'm going to against what I assume will be the majority will be (and probably throw my chances of winning out the window, but I would prefer to be honest) and say that I would most likely accept the extra family.

I'm basing this on a few assumptions:
1. If we can't replenish our supplies without risking our lives, it must be pretty dangerous out there and so help is most likely not coming - we are going to have to fend for ourselves indefinitely,
2. If they made it to ours "with nothing but the clothes on their backs" then they made it here on foot,
3. The fact that they are coming to us asking for help means they weren't very prepared, and
4. The use of the word "family" implies kids, and doing the maths if they cut our supplies in half it would mean they would have roughly the same number of people as us.

This is my reasoning:
1. Added protection - If they made it to our place on foot, their home and ours musn't be too far apart. This means that the area the looters are operating in could very well include our house. Also, if they aren't very prepared but are still going, there will probably be many other people out there on the edge of starvation getting more and more desperate. With just hubby, myself, 2 young kids (+ a pet cat & snake who I could theoretically throw at people if necessary - haha) we would be better able to defend ourselves with the extra people. Our home is relatively defendable but looters could eventually come in great enough numbers that just hubby and I would be overwhelmed. What good is 6 months worth of food if we get ransacked as well and it all gets stolen?

2. Information - the added family would be able to add extra information such as how things were looking in the local neighbourhood, areas to avoid etc. This info would help us on our eventual food scavenging trip. I doubt they'd be in a mood to supply this info if we were turning them away.

3. Moral - the addition of more people would be a moral booster, someone else to talk to etc. On the flip side I would be incredibly depressed with a fair amount of self loathing if I turned away another family.

4. Extra hands - if we can't replenish our supplies without risking our lives, our garden will have to go into overdrive to provide food. 3 months is enough to get certain seeds in and on their way to harvest stage. The extra hands for gardening will come in very useful. The fact that the friend has very few useful skills would definitely be a downer, but there will be lots of unskilled jobs that need doing around the house such as basic repairs, cooking, cleaning, child wrangling, some food preserving prep.

5. Personal morals/values - I could not justify turning away kids to starve on the street while I still had food and it didn't put my kids in immediate danger. I would struggle to punish the children for the fact that their parents could not protect them. If the food situation was more dire (e.g. 2wks down to 1) I would be more likely to compromise my values.

6. Two heads are better than one - if replenishing food is going to be so dangerous, more people for ideas on how to procure it is going to be better than just hubby and I trying to come up with a plan.

7. It will rain! Well, judging by the usual rainfall in my area, it will rain in 3 months so I can bump out our estimated minimum survival time by a little bit by using the rain gathered in our tank.

7. More people = less risk in food procurement - Eventually, we would have to go and get food (whether it be in 6 months or 3 months), and I would rather that the scenario be several adults at home with the kids and several adults out looking for food than just one of us at home with the kids, and one out getting food. If there is more than one person out looking for food their chances are greater at success, and if it does all go downhill and they don't come back, then there is still more than one adult at home to keep things going and protect the children. From a cold hearted perspective, if the food run didn't go well and they didn't come back, that would also mean less mouths to feed at home (and our supplies would again last longer).

PHENIOX17

better late than never

so 6 months of stockpiles

and the possibility of a another family to support

the chances are liability...

so based on info... the world has gone to absolute hell, no aid available???

based on this,
first depends on the friend, can't help those can't help themselves

second, I'm big on survival in numbers, and a level of trust

I have a small number of friends that would bleed for my family, providing that I'm willing to do the same for theirs

so there is a group of my friends I simply won't help

to the friends I would help, I would let them in no question (the misses agrees/suggested it)

the cost of supplies will be less due to extra manpower and security (allows risk to salvage forageables sp) it will also help with the mental game...

there are a lot of bonuses to accepting the risk... and in a event that is that bad where I'm stuck with just my family (that's misses and kids) the extra bodies will increase me and mines survival, between security, to trade, to foraging, to fishing... to just someone to play monopoly with to kill time

Hey guys, it's about time we wrapped this one up. Voting will be locked and a winner will be announced tomorrow night so if you haven't yet voted, get a wriggle on!

YEs the first one is over, second one is wrapped up too I think.

Meah thank you, thank you