...and people inevitably helping themselves in smaller communities...

Yes, this is how we'll survive. Steemit, however, is perhaps the largest of all possible communities. Working in this type of forum we can develop a false idea that there are many of us and that we are gaining power. But just spend an hour standing next to the greeter at Wal-Mart and you'll soon realize that we are just a handful of people worldwide. The vast majority don't care a whit about any of this... not until they can't buy food.

Our power comes from being able to awaken those around us. Steemit is just a way of creating nodes of knowledge all over the world. We have to be active locally, in the flesh, with the people who occupy our immediate terrain. That is the only community that will enable us to survive. Then, if communication collapses, we are well prepared. Steemit is a way forward, but it's just a phase.

war is often always the last gamble of a dying empire ...

It's going to get a lot uglier before it gets better.