From reading it many of us here on APS would probably be profiled as potential terrorists by MO law enforcement.
It's a mindset that goes beyond law enforcement. I was watching "The Unit" last Sunday, and the episode entailed the characters responding to a chlorine gas attack in their neighborhood. The main characters were doing stuff like taping up doors, closing air conditioning vents, and turning on heaters. When one of the "run of the mill" neighbor characters asked why they were doing that, they explained the properties of chlorine. The neighbor responded, "How do you know this? Are you guys some kind of survivalist nuts?" Of course to balance things out, the bad guys who started the chlorine attack were right wing extremist neo-nazis.
I realized that the neighbor character actually portrayed a mindset I've seen myself. There's been more than one occasion where some kind of practical "what would you do" question in conversations with friends and coworkers has come up, and when I've given a practical answer, someone has always been bound to say, "Oh yeah, NRA gun nut survivalist Ben". Nevermind that it's information anyone would learn in Elementary school, the Boy Scouts, the military, or even Federal government "ready.gov" type preparedness websites. Somehow the knowledge of practical skills or basic science, when combined with their application in an emergency, makes one a suspect fringe element unless they're wearing a uniform or somehow representing the government. Actually to be specific, it makes one a wacko in discussion of emergency scenarios. If it's an actual emergency, then the unprepared people are generally more than happy to "rally round the wacko".
