Americans Don’t Know What Urban Collapse Really Looks Like

That’s something that’s been bugging me for a while about this sub. A collapse is, by most definitions, a sudden event. I think most people here are actually talking about a decline. There’s lots of historical examples of civilizations declining, and that is quite different from a civilization collapsing. Rome declined and eventually the empire transformed or was replaced. Mycenaean society collapsed, most cities were quickly abandoned, their way of life ended and the survivors lost their written language.

It’s possible to live in peace and prosperity while society declines, it is not during societal collapse. In a decline you might go live off the land or adapt to life without our modern comforts. In a collapse you and everyone you know will very likely be killed or conscripted by a warlord to go kill other refugees. The events of the Bronze Age collapse were so violent and disruptive in the western Mediterranean that people assumed (and many still do) that some foreign army must have invaded i.e. the Sea People. That’s not what happened though, neighbors turned on each other and war pillaging burned across the region and then there were centuries of stagnation and decline.

/r/collapse Thread Parent Link - theatlantic.com