What Is Up With The Disaster Prep People?

I've noticed a weird disaster prep trend with people hoarding canned goods and turning their spare room into a stockpile area for medical supplies and bottled water.

There is TV show Doomsday Preppers, there are forums on disaster prep and there are TONS of Youtube videos of people showing their stockpile of supplies and showing how to rig your own camp stove. There's video after video of normal looking housewives talking about how to cook with no electricity , how to purify water and what supplies to have in your 72 hour survival kit.

Walmart even sells a $3,000 kit that contains emergency food for a family of 4 for a month. What is going on here?

When did this prepping trend start and what are they prepping for?
Is the world ending again? One housewife sounded a little crazy as she talked about the bottom dropping out of the economy and how her family would be the only ones with food. Are these people waiting on Armegeddon, zombies or some kind of financial collapse?

I feel like there's this popular movement or trend and I'm completely out of the loop.

 

It's popular, yes. It's so weird! I am not one of these people, and I don't know much about it other than what i've seen on TV. But people build bunkers underground, save up food, stock up on weapons... it's scary!
I don't like to think about the end of the world and all that jazz...so i don't.
Whether that's what they're planning for or something else, it's silly in my book.

 

People have always prepped. My great grandparents had one of those root cellars like you see in The Wizard of Oz and it was full of canned goods and water. The main difference is that our grandparents prepped for crop failures and tornadoes and people today are prepping for zombie attacks. In the 50's they prepped for the Russian invasion and nuclear attacks. It never hurts to be prepared but like anything else there is such a thing as 'too much'.

 

Eh, it isn't like it matters. They think they are solid, but the same paranoia and outlier attitude that led them to prep is the same that will lead them to splintering and attempting to murder each other in their sleep. Seriously though if this makes them happy that's fine then.

 

I've seen some of the prep videos on Youtube out of curiosity. The people all look so normal until they start talking about the disaster they are preparing for.
One lady said something like 'And when the financial collapse happens and breakfast cereal is priced more dearly than uranium, those of us who learned how to can our own food will be the ones who laugh last."
I know this all seems sensible to her and to other disaster preppers, but she just sounded crazy to me.

People have always prepped and had bomb shelters and whatnot, but it just seems to have hugely risen in popularity in the past couple of years, to the point where there are TV shows devoted to it. I wonder what's making it trend upward?
The war? Zombie shows? Hostess going out of business?