In a post-apocalyptic future would you rather...

[noblegiraffe]

struggle for survival on the harsh and bleak surface with other survivors

or

live in a nice comfy large bunker with a few thousand people and all the mod cons except you can't go outside, or communicate with anyone outside?

See, I assumed everyone would choose the bunker but some friends said they'd rather chance death on the outside than live in a bunker, even if it was huge.

Polling wouldn't let me put only two options so you can also choose to die in the apocalypse and opt out of either scenario.

Can I come and live in your orangery with your home grown food please? I promise I’ll sit in my own quiet little corner and won’t be too annoying. I can help cook some veggie casseroles but I won’t need to join eating the wildlife. Will there be electricity for my kindle ?

Both. I'd go to the bunker until I couldn't take it anymore then I'd chance the outside.

Outside, I’d rather be dead than be confined in a bunker.

Die from the outset.
I don't want to live in a world where we would kill our neighbours over a few tins of soup.
War, nuclear fallout, comet... I already have the means ready if it happens.

If it was a zombie apocalypse / nuclear war > bunker
If just battling natural extremes and the odd bear > outside

I'd be chucking all the pills down my throat with a bottle of rose as soon as I could. I'd be hopeless on the outside and claustrophobic so couldn't cope with the bunker. Game over for me thanks all the same.

Assuming we had access to entertainment (someone saved up the whole amazon kindle library and most movies/series that were ever made), then the bunker. I'd happily spend the rest of my days reading. Only if my kids could come with me obviously.

If we have no reading materials or movies, then I'd rather take my chances outside. Living locked up with nothing to occupy your mind isn't a life worth living anyway.

The show on Disney+ is called Paradise and it's very good. In that scenario I'd like to be in the bunker (with James Marsden).

I'd opt to go in the bunker, but I would be really worried about the smell of stale farts of the many people sharing the bunker with me. There is no ventilation - do I just have to breathe it all in?

If the answer is yes, then I would chance battling the barbarism of post apocalyptic life on the outside as long as I am not breathing in the stale farts.

Yep
The bunker will prove "this is why we cant have nice things" faster than you can say "fuck off those are my tinned hot dogs"

Unless as per @BrandyandGinger its like paradise aka luxury dream bunker with alk the beautiful people in which case yes lock me up....

I wouldn't mind becoming a zombie. Not much different from my current state

Oh if James Marsden’s in the bunker, I’m bunkering up!

There's good news and bad news there, really.

James Marsden is excellent in the show though. Oozes charisma.

Genuinely surprised that a third of people would rather die in an apocalypse than give the comfy bunker a go. I reckon if the asteroid was coming, people were panicking and someone grabbed your hand and said 'quick, let's get to the bunker', you wouldn't go 'nah I'm good thanks'.

After the initial impact, you'd have the same problems as anybody above ground, only with the added complication of being entombed with exactly the sort of people you'd be at risk from on the surface.

Food shortages - who gets fed, the leadership and their chosen ones, the non productive internees, the stronger, scary people prepared to kill? Same with medicine - any point in doing something for somebody who isn't critical to the leadership's plans? Childbirth is risky and creates new mouths to feed - do they interfere, do they encourage it, do they attempt to save women and babies, do they deal with disability or illness with Exposure or extermination? What happens when somebody conceives following a rape? Do they have a choice? How do they maintain order - what if they take against an intelligent internee who is well versed in voicing discontent with governmental or political approaches? Is that dealt with by a stern look and suggestion that they reflect upon the words they have used or by execution (as exile would make it possible that the location would be disclosed to outsiders)?

Confinement and an apocalypse would cause significant trauma or allow people's darkest opinions to come out - the leader who sees this as an opportunity to remake Society as they are now filled with Glorious Purpose (or the middle ranker who thinks they could do this if only the detritus of humanity were excised from the shelter and convinces others that the people they see as detritus, whatever form they personally despise, are the greatest threat to the shelter's survival).

There's a reason why no apocalyptic literature says 'They went into the bunker and lived happily ever after'. People.

I honestly couldn't bear to be in a bunker. Not for even the shortest amount of time.

I once had a very big panic going through the Blackwall Tunnel and I've been known to have to take deep breaths driving up the levels a multi storey car park.

I'll take death in the fresh air over horror underground any day!

I’d be the one trying to catch the bomb to make sure I go

The air wouldn't be very fresh though 😁😁

He's the perfect attractive but slightly dodgy politician. Everyone in Paradise is well cast.

If it's a choice of living an existance like in Harlan Ellison's A Boy and his Dog, a quick death is much the pleasantest option!

There's a reason why no apocalyptic literature says 'They went into the bunker and lived happily ever after'. People.

I guess a lot of that is a feature of post-apocalypse rather than specifically bunker. I can't think of any literature that's "And after the apocalypse they lived happily ever after". It's always dystopian!

Staying in a bunker is just kicking the can down the road. It would be a shit life.

Well as I'm deathly afraid of being underground and have reasonably good survival skills I'd brave the outdoors I think.

That ones called Paradise, its also on Disney plus. Its very good but it has a bit of twist before the end of the series.

I'd take my chances outside. In reality The Bunker People would go bad pretty quickly. They'd go political or feral (or possibly culty) and as a middle-aged woman I can't be arsed with it.

I'm with the stately home/deer park/walked garden/orangey people, if there aren't too many of us. I think we could build something civilised.