"Game wars"

[dair]

That's the title of a great non fiction book I'm reading, about undercover guys going after poachers.
First I need to say that I eat almost only wild meat, and buy it from reliable sources.
But that doesn't mean there isn't some dirty business going on. Some eskimos are/were big time into walrus ivory hunting, and you even didn't need to bring cash if  to get some ivory, because vodka, and all sorts of drugs were even more welcome than cash. Of course the real big guys and corrupt institutions are a big part of it, and they all work hand in hand and need each others. And in the south, the rednecks and the government and judges are good friends and did a lot of damage by overfishing and over hunting ducks etc, but that does not mean the "poor" rednecks are just victims of the big guys, far from it. It's a dirty business.
The bleeding heart mentality for the lower classes and for some natives, who are "always right/good/victims" is totally an illusion.
It's good to know the whole story, and this book is a real page turner and eye opener. One of the major undercover guys is actually a hunter himself, and says the solution is not to prohibit hunting as many environmentalists want to do, but to have responsible hunters and stop the greedy ones. The responsible hunters are actually the true friends of the environment, because they want a healthy bountiful nature.

[dair]

Another book is called "The ecological Indian", and is about demystifying that image. Also recommended reading!
The scary thing is when people try to lump together all the tribes in America, but their habits, ideas etc were extremely diverse.
Some were very connected to the earth and careful not to overhunt/overfish, others were extremely wasteful (as with the buffalo for instance, but not all tribes). Some even had ideas that there were underground prairies were the buffalos where living and always supplying more, not matter how many were killed. Some believed that the more animals you killed, the more would come later on.
Some tribes that today preach for mother earth, actually got their ideas from some of the white people coming from Europe where they had seen what a "poor" over-hunted continent looked liked and tried to stop some of their most destructive habits, especially concerning beaver hunting, with steel traps etc
This doesn't mean that the whites weren't innocent, far from it.. And they loved buffalo tongues, which the indians would gladly supply to them in exchange for liquor, tools, guns, clothes.

[TnMann]

Thanks for sharing. The Ecological Indian looks especially interesting and made it on my to-read list.

I think it's funny how people (including myself) so easily simplify and idealize cultures, tribes, history, etc.

Sometimes we forget that people are simply people.

However, as a tie-in, I will add that a culture's diet has definitive influence on their behavior/customs.