I just got back from La Push, WA and was horrified to see gill nets stretched across the river. The indians were driving the trout into the net by scaring them with jet skis. They do this for every fish run including the Puget Sound Salmon, which is an endangered species.
The front page story in the Paper the day I was in Seattle was that the indians had dumped 700,000 POUNDs, of clams because they were too small.
My conjecture is that the indians destroying the environment. The only reason that there was any game left when the white man got here was because the natives didn’t have good killing technolgy.
Can ayone tell me why the hell native americans are allowed to destroy wildlife populations/ What could possibly by the reasoning?
You obviously have no idea how Native Americans lived prior to their desecration by the Whites. They did not kill more than they needed. They learned that from the Whites.
So now you wanna bitch and moan because they wanna make a buck just like everyone else? You want to damn them because they now slaughter species the way Whites do?
You want to know what I say to that? You are a fucking hypocrite who wants to blame anyone who isn’t you. Is what they do wrong? Yes. But are they the only ones doing it, or the reason that those species have been nearly obliterated in the first place? Hell no.
You are barking up the wrong tree, and coming off as pretty racist while you are at it. Find someone more responsible to blame or the next thing we know you will start blaming woodpeckers for clearcuts.
Rather, I was in the position of a spore which, having finally accepted its destiny as a fungus, still wonders if it might produce penicillin.
–Ayi Kwei Armah
You want to know why they are allowed to “destroy wildlife populations now?” It is because the government fucked the Native Americans over for decades and owes them for it. The government chose now (the time when many species have been nearly wiped out by Whites) to give the NAs their hunting rights back. Looks bad for the NAs right? Of course it does, that way they can rip those rights back away from the NAs in the name of “environmental protection.” And who comes out smelling like roses. . .why, the government does! Surprise, surprise.
Do I sound bitter and angry? It is because the Native Americans are the only group it isn’t taboo to badmouth and slander. People slander all races, but it is only acceptable when that slandering is about Native Americans. Only nowadays (over a century after much of their land was taken from them, and many were slaughtered mercilessly) is it becoming politically incorrect to be openly racist towards them.
I am sure I am going to be lambasted for saying the things I have said in the last two posts. So I will clear some of it up right now. I do not condone what some NAs are doing to the environment. What they are doing is wrong, but for you to blame them for destroying the environment is so ignorant as to be nauseating. They aren’t helping matters, but they certainly aren’t responsible for the state of affairs today. Secondly, you are clearly a racist when it comes to Native Americans. I half expected you to start ranting about how they are all disrespectful alcoholics. I found your tone quite offensive, and your implications even more so. I am sorry if you felt attacked in any way, but I could not excuse your post.
Rather, I was in the position of a spore which, having finally accepted its destiny as a fungus, still wonders if it might produce penicillin.
–Ayi Kwei Armah
Somehow I really doubt that after the white man came here, some Native American said “Holy shit! Apparently you can kill these things when you aren’t hungry. I always thought that they wouldn’t die unless you actually needed the meat. We just needed the white man to show us.”
Don’t fucking try that “it’s all the white man’s fault” line. I have heard of a few instances where Native Americans use hunting and fishing practices that are not generally allowed. I don’t know whether they are exempted from these laws or not. Either way, there are some legitimate gripes that could come from this.
Sin, where do you get your information on Native Americans never killing more than they needed? What does that have to do with what is happening now? I do think that they have the right to fish and hunt as their ancestors did, but they should do it in moderation. That sounds like an awful lot of clams to destroy, isn’t there a way to put the clams back? I just have Mr. Z describing the gill nets across the river, I don’t know if that is how it truly is.
Why would anyone fish like this? Are they trying to get back at the “White” man? Isn’t that pissing in the community stew pot?
Find my shape by the moonlight, why my thoughts aren’t so clear.
The world’s going to shit anyway, let the people who were in this part of it first do what they want. It’s not like everyone else doesn’t do their share of wasting resources (like trees). 700,000 pounds of clams doesn’t sound too bad too me (who eats those things, anyway?).
The Amerinds were & are no more environmentally consious than the average perso, because they ARE just people. Some are bad, some are good, some are greedy & wasteful, some are responsible; just like everyone else. It is true that now they can get away w more because idiots think we “owe” them something. It is also true that in the past, the reason they did not do more damage to the enviroment is because they did not have the tools. Witness “Head Smashed in” up in Canada, where the Amerinds were taken to stampedeing WHOLE HERDS of buffalo off the cliff.
As long as the Amerinds hunt/fish using traditional methods, I feel they do not have to pay attention to limits & seasons, but once they start using guns, gillnets & jetskis, they have to follow the same laws as we do.
The native americans didn’t overhunt before the white man is because they were still in the stone age! The white man led a very similar life when he was back in the stone age in Europe. I’m not to keen on Aztec culture, but I’m sure that they didn’t eat all the parots they killed to make them fancy head dresses.
I agree that what some tribes are doing nowadays is beyond their allotted rights; and is in fact hurting the environment. Yes, I agree that wasting thousands of pounds of clams is a disgrace, but I would also like to read the article for myself. As for gillnetting with the use of jet-skis, I don’t know how widespread this is since I’ve heard there are very definite laws regarding how NAs are allowed to do their hunting. And as for pissing in the community pot–it became a urinal long ago.
That is really what my problem with the OP was. You cannot blame the NAs for something that they are just now a part of; just as you can’t blame Clinton for singlehandedly corrupting politics. Unfortunately, that was exactly what Mr. Zambezi was saying. He did not say “they are contributing to the destruction of the environment” (which I would have accepted), what he said was “the indians are destroying the environment.” As if they singlehandedly dessimated every species on the endagered or extinct list. And if that wasn’t what he meant, then by God, he should have worded it differently.
I admit, I do not have a source to prove that NAs did not slaughter animals before the example was set for them (although I don’t think it would be too incredibly difficult to find), but I am too busy with term papers to find them. However, if anyone can find a (credible) source that says more than a handfull of tribes or (tribal) nations did so then I will shut my trap. And yes, I say more than a few. There were hundreds of tribes, nations, and breakoff bands of Native Americans; therefore, finding one tribe that slaughtered animals does not quite prove the point.
Rather, I was in the position of a spore which, having finally accepted its destiny as a fungus, still wonders if it might produce penicillin.
–Ayi Kwei Armah
And Opal, don’t forget what the transvestites are doing to our atmosphere!!
:rolleyes:
Rather, I was in the position of a spore which, having finally accepted its destiny as a fungus, still wonders if it might produce penicillin.
–Ayi Kwei Armah
Mr Z, perhaps you can enlist Greenpeace to divert their attention to the great Northwest for a while. They can under cover of darkness head upstream in their dinghies and cut the nets thus restoring the land to its original pristine condition.
Nice perspective, SINsApple. As you can see, people are going to want to split hairs on some mundane point of anthropology when you have mainly pointed out a bigoted post with a twisted perspective on the environment.
Right now, I am trying to imagine a ‘scared’ trout–especially one being hounded by a mad indian in warpaint on a jet ski.
As far as this goes:
Well, that’s the same reason the white man is still here as well. But what is your point? Should NA’s be allowed to be environmentally irresponsible? No.
The Native Americans didn’t overhunt before the Europeans arrived because there is no reason to in a subsistence economy.
Overhunting, overfishing, etc. can only be done to advantage in the contect of a reasonably sophisticated economy, where you can transport your goods and sell them elsewhere.
Still and all, I guess that most people would rather live in La Push than oh, I don’t know, Bhopal?
White guys
Middle aged people
Baby boomers (increasingly the same as the previous)
Gen X’ers
Rappers
Religious people
Smokers
Military personnel
Politicians (including both good ones)
Teens
Gun owners
Gun ownership opponents
There is some evidence that as early man spread across the North American continent, animal species disappeared. It isn’t completely conclusive, but is it coincidence that when humans moved in, some local animal species disappeared? Why were there no horses in North America when the Europeans arrived? There used to be.
So I conclude that driving animals to extinction is a time-honored tradition for people.
Let me set the record straight about native americans and the environment. Yes, native americans did hunt more than the needed before the white man showed up. Brian Fagan, in his book Time Detectives talks about the archaeological evidence of the ‘over kill’ of buffalos at Head Smashed in Buffalo Jump http://www.head-smashed-in.com/ in Alberta. They would drive many more buffalos than they needed over the cliff, then take what they needed and left the rest to rot.
There is also evidence for environmental abuse in the Chaco canyon region of the southwest, prior to the white man arriving.
Gee, I don’t think any of us expected him to say that.
