Indeed. Their focus on omega 3 is a bit misguided but i did find the episode relatively unbiased and portraying the chukchis lifestyle in an overall positive light. I think the doctors did truly do their best in trying to get to the bottom of things. Yet years of medical school indoctrinationmake a full understanding of the issue quite difficult.
The omega 3 angle didn't bother me too awful much (though it's annoyingly reductionist and ignores the splendiferous benefits of high-quality raw saturated fat). It was more the bizarre assumption that only seafoods can be healthy and all land mammals must somehow apparently be magically poisonous that tempts me to hunt them down and cleave their arrogant heads. Utter nonsense.
I do agree that they did at the end of each video make an attempt to move beyond their modern, reductionist biases (with one of them usually only doing so grudgingly and the other more open-mindedly--whether honestly or for drama purposes), which is more than most moderners do. The fact that they didn't utterly condemn the Chukchis for killing animals is a miracle in this misguided, wimpified, artificial age.
Their ignorance re: all the peoples they studied was rather telling, though. I can't imagine traveling thousands of miles and countless hours to study peoples and not bothering to learn jack shit about them before doing so (though maybe this was required by the producers, knowing the bizarre ways that TV and book producers/publishers tend to think).
One confusing element is that the coastal peoples of Siberia are apparently widely varied, which the video doesn't get into. Reportedly, there are Chukchi, Siberian Yupiks, Sireniki Eskimos, Koryaks, Chuvans, Evens/Lamuts, Yukagirs, etc. on the Eastern Siberian coast, not just Chukchis. Too complex for this world of attention deficits.
One thing I learned from the Chukchi, Inuit, Yupik, zhu/wasi Bushmen and other peoples who live in harsh environs, is that the harsher the environment the less likely it is to be over-exploited (though even harsh environs eventually come under pressure, unfortunately). This is one factor that persuaded me to move back to Vermont from Florida. The general rule is,
the harsher the better to live in (as usual, the opposite of what most folks assume), as it keeps many moderners (aka Outlanders, Skraelings, Heavy People, etc.) out and helps preserve traditions (unless moderners discover gold, oil or something else of value in the land).
The harsher the environment the better (as a wise old man once tried to explain to me), the harsher the bed the better, the less cushy the shoe the better, and so on.
