this post was submitted on 03 Jan 2024
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[–] Erika3sis@hexbear.net 15 points 2 years ago

When I was a kid in the midst of the whole "zombie apocalypse" trend in media with the Walking Dead and so forth, I drafted a zombie apocalypse survival strategy. This strategy involved going to the Bolærne Islands, presumably by driving through the countryside to somewhere on the eastern shore of the Oslo Fjord, then taking a boat to Bolærne.

My idea was to build a self-sufficient society with collective ownership of resources, governed by a system of decentralization, whereby each of the three islands would govern themselves by consensus, and would directly elect a representative who could be recalled at any point, to a council of leaders to make decisions concerning the archipelago as a whole. The citizenry would be united in pride, and identified to others and themselves, by a symbol under which they could rally: a vertical tricolor of green-red-white, centered in each stripe a five pointed star, two white, the flymost red.

"Heh, kind of funny to use a red star, makes this place look like some sort of commie thing, lol", I said to myself.

My logic was that, firstly, zombies can't swim, and Bolærne would be easier to defend due to its military history; secondly, the location of Bolærne would allow this "republic" to be a vital trading outpost for all survivors in the Oslo Fjord region, thereby guaranteeing Bolærne has a high amount of regional influence among survivor factions, and a high degree of independence due to its self-sufficiency; and thirdly, this system of collective ownership and decentralized governance would have the greatests chances of distributing scarce resources fairly in a way that would maximize comfort, survival, peace, and democracy, particularly as writing down legal documents might be difficult with a presumed paper shortage and lack of electricity.

In those days I didn't know what a "commune" was. I'd heard the word "communism" but only associated it with "no food 100 billion dead". I sincerely believed that this would only be a temporary step, with the ultimate goal of restoring society "back to normal".