#also it's possible native americans did eat them but naturally there is not enough evidence

[revlyncox]

Trees (2021)

A talk abut growth, hope, and paying attention to history

Revised and expanded for the Washington Ethical Society by Lyn Cox

February 7, 2021

In this place halfway between the beginning of winter and the beginning of spring, we draw on imagination and memory, caution and optimism, hope for the future and learning from the past. Many of these things are contained in stories.

I don’t know if the story happened exactly this way, but I believe it’s true. A sage, a wise person, was walking along the road and saw someone planting a carob tree. The sage asks, "How long will it take for this tree to bear fruit?" "Seventy years," replies the gardener. The sage then asks: "Are you so healthy a person that you expect to live that length of time and eat its fruit?" The gardener answers: "I found a fruitful world, because my ancestors planted it for me. Likewise I am planting for my children." I will tell you where this story is from because I want to give credit, but I also want to notice that this story has a universality to it, a truth that the beginnings of things we set in motion can have an impact long past the horizons of our own lives. This story is from the Talmud, a collection of rabbinic conversations on ethics and customs. (Talmud Ta'anit 23a)

We drink from wells we did not dig and eat from trees we did not plant (Deut. 6:11). Our physical, intellectual, and religious lives depend on those who have gone before. Following their example will lead us to plant literal and figurative trees for the world of the future.

I believe caring for ourselves AND others will help us sustain a shared life of meaning and compassion for a long time.

My first semester studying for my M.Div. degree in California, I worked at one college in the south bay area, and went to school in the east bay area. I enjoyed the fragrance of eucalyptus trees around both campuses. The dry leaves rustled in the breeze, leaves rubbing together like the wings of singing crickets. Some people were distracted by the sound and allergic to the smell, but I liked them. The eucalyptus trees were tall and graceful. One might imagine that they had always been there. There’s a story about those trees. I don’t know if it happened exactly this way.

The American West in the late 1800’s was heavily influenced by dreams of getting rich quick. Non-native eucalyptus trees were brought from Australia because they grew quickly. It was imagined that the lumber and oil would become quickly replaceable commodities for those who farmed them. They were promoted as ornamental trees for rich landowners new to the area and not used to treeless landscapes. Eucalyptus trees were all over California by the 1900’s, and were tested for use as railroad ties. They didn’t work out. Eucalyptus from Australian virgin forests, seasoned and treated properly, behaves differently than eucalyptus grown from seeds in California, hastily treated, and set down in the Nevada sand. Some of the railroad ties were so cracked they couldn’t hold spikes. Some decayed within four years.

The trees themselves grew like weeds. They did what non-native species are famous for doing: thriving in the new environment, edging out diverse native plants that provide food and habitat, with consequences for the entire food chain. An attempt at a quick profit turned out to have unintended consequences. Recently, there has been more discussion in that region about restoring native trees, but it’s complicated. To say that it will take time to mitigate the damage of an invasive species is an understatement. Then again, compare that to the 2,000-year growth of some living redwood trees. May we learn patience and commitment from slow-growing trees.

We strive to be among those people who have the hope and imagination it takes to envision a world of justice and compassion, a world of liberation and self-determination, a world of peace where people sit calmly in the shade of slow-growing trees. In our neck of the woods, we might imagine a world where every person lives in safety and abundance, with access to the shade of a Witch Hazel, Hackberry, or Redbud tree; the three logically native trees our Earth Ethics Action Team recently arranged to have planted on the WES property. In folk music and wisdom tales, slow-growing trees symbolize enough time for a generation to grow without being uprooted by hunger or violence.

The California eucalyptus story reminds us that some of the environmental mistakes we humans have made were decisions made by a few but using the resources and the risk pool of many. Another time, we can unpack the harm that white American westward expansion had on indigenous land rights and communities, and on the horrors of labor exploitation involved in the transcontinental railroad, and on the energy and resources that were available for white colonization but not reparations for formerly enslaved people after the Civil War. Understanding the wrong choices that have been made in the past may help us turn toward making better choices as a society going forward. We can play an active role in the governments, corporations, and organizations to which we belong and who act on our behalf. Let us embody these relationships for repair and renewal.

Contrast the rushed, climate-disrupting story of the eucalyptus trees with the story of George Washington Carver. I had to catch up on some of his story this week, when my kids noticed discrepancies between what was said about Dr. Carver in the elementary school reader on our bookshelf and what they had read elsewhere. Some of us learned in school that the most important contribution Dr. Carver made as a scientist was discovering and promoting new uses for peanuts, but this version of his story is grossly oversimplified and obscures the way his research and activism supported Black self-determination as well as environmental repair.

After he graduated from the Iowa State Agricultural College in 1896, Dr. Carver accepted a position at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. Riding on the train to his new home, he noticed immediately that growing nothing but cotton was causing soil erosion and depletion. He had scientific solutions to that. What took longer was figuring out how to empower Black farmers -- especially those who were being exploited as sharecroppers -- to feed their families, improve their chances for subsequent years, and still make enough money to try to get out of debt. Smithsonian Magazine quotes biographer Mark Hersey about the way Dr. Carver understood the problem:

“What Carver comes to see,” Hersey says, was that “altering [black sharecroppers’] interactions with the natural world could undermine the very pillars of Jim Crow.” Hersey argues that black Southerners viewed their lives under Jim Crow through an environmental lens. “If we want to understand their day to day lives, it’s not separate drinking fountains, it’s ‘How do I make a living on this soil, under these circumstances, where I’m not protected’“ by the institutions that are supposed to protect its citizens? Carver encouraged farmers to look to the land for what they needed, rather than going into debt buying fertilizer (and paint, and soap, and other necessities—and food). Instead of buying the fertilizer that “scientific agriculture” told them to buy, farmers should compost. In lieu of buying paint, they should make it themselves from clay and soybeans.

So ends the excerpt. Dr. Carver understood way before what we think of as the modern environmental justice movement that liberation and conservation are entwined projects. The decisions we make for our families, for our communities, and for the planet all go together, and they all benefit from remembering interdependence and the long years of generations to come. Honoring the very beginnings of things, continuing to work on hopes that are barely tangible, believing in the distant future, allows us to live into Beloved Community. White Supremacy depends on the hurry-up-and-profit mindset that brought cracked eucalyptus logs to the Nevada desert. Beloved Community invites us to consider what may come from a seed.

Strong trees grow slowly. Strong communities learn and grow and make connections to other communities little by little over decades. Healing takes time. Repair takes time. And for all of these, we can’t always tell that it is happening. In most cases, we don’t see the seed unfolding under the soil. Our senses are not adjusted to notice the growth of trees right in front of us. Sometimes resilience is about knowing in your heart that change is possible, even when the evidence is not yet obvious.

The nearly imperceptible beginnings of change are also a theme in the earth-honoring holiday of Imbolc. The Celtic calendar where this holiday comes from is rooted in the seasons of light and dark of the northern hemisphere and the agricultural cycles of western Europe. At approximately the same time of year in the British Isles and here in the mid-Atlantic, the middle of winter means that we can start to perceive the time of sunrise and sunset edging toward spring, just a little more daylight each day.

February into March is the time of year when lambs start to be born, vulnerable and full of promise for the coming spring. It’s still cold outside! One theory for where the word Imbolc comes from is that it’s related to the word for sheep milk. The lambs need a lot of help to stay warm and to survive. Yet their arrival shows the persistence of life. Sometimes resilience is about remembering that life is possible.

This is also the time of year when people who grow vegetables in climates like ours make a plan for the next six months, gathering seeds, starting a few indoors, and figuring out how to make the most of the soil and sun that will be available later. Making plans at this in-between time of year takes courage.

For earth-honoring folks in Celtic traditions, the goddess Bridget (and, in her later form, St. Bridget of Kildare) is associated with this early February holiday. In the legends, Bridget protects access to clean, healing water. She is also a figure of light and flame. When you put fire and water together, you can make entirely new things out of what you had before. You can forge iron, cook food, sculpt clay and fire it into ceramics. Maybe this transformative potential is why Bridget is also associated with childbirth, poetry, healing, song, and art.

There is one thing that newborn lambs, vegetable seeds, soup ingredients, raw iron, and future poetry all have in common: They don’t look at the beginning the way they are going to look at the end. You have to have some hope and imagination to believe in the transformation that is coming. You have to keep doing what you are doing, when the evidence for success has not yet appeared. We need to hold on through the long term, through step-by-step processes, through the discomfort of growth and change. And so another thing we learn at Bridget’s holiday is the need for commitment.  

If we’re paying attention to a legendary figure of generosity, art, and transformation, it’s a good idea to listen to the voices of poets who figured out how to sustain themselves and their families and communities through difficult times. During Black History Month, we are reminded of many examples of poets and artists who showed and inspired perseverance as they provided hope and imagination about a better world that was not yet fully manifest.

Back in October, on Vote Love Day, we heard about the story of Frances Ellen Watkins Harper. She was born in Maryland in 1825 to free parents, was educated at her uncle’s school, and had published a book of poetry by the age of twenty. She became a full-time lecturer and writer, and she was an activist for abolition and for economic self-determination in the Black community. One verse of her 1895 poem, “Songs for the People,” [more on that poem here] reads:

Our world, so worn and weary,

  Needs music, pure and strong,

To hush the jangle and discords

  Of sorrow, pain, and wrong.

Harper was well aware of the injustice, economic inequality, and violence that still plagued the cities and towns where she toured. She didn’t fail to address any part of that system in her other writing. Yet she still saw a place for music and art. For Harper, poetry was not a distraction from building the Beloved Community, but one of the technologies that can help bring it into being. Out of intangible words and ideas are woven a network of visions that lift up possibilities for liberation.

Good things grow from beginnings that are not yet obvious. The forces that will become spring are already at work under the snow in the middle of winter.  

On the Jewish calendar, we’ve recently passed the holiday of Tu B’Shevat, the new year of trees. This is a minor holiday. It’s been around for hundreds of years, yet more people seem to be noticing it as we learn to connect spirituality with care for the earth. Sometimes people in Jewish homes and communities gather to eat different kinds of fruit and nuts, to give thanks for ways of growing, and recommit to stewardship of the planet. In regions where it makes sense, Tu B’Shevat is a time to plant trees.

Clearly, looking out the window today, it is not the right time to plant a tree where we live. Nevertheless, in our gratitude for trees, we are reminded of the growth and the fruition of work that exist because of what has come before. The forces that create and uphold life and our ancestors who cooperated with them knew that growth and resilience don’t always look that way from the outside. They knew that growth can start with something tough or plain. They knew the importance of allowing time and of giving thanks.

We drink from wells we did not dig and eat from trees we did not plant. As a community, part of our task is to muster the hope and imagination it takes to consider growth and resilience over time. We think long-term. We honor beginnings of change, even when they are hidden or barely perceptible. Let us be mindful of the impact of our choices, now and in the generations to come.

May it be so.

[cortezcaleb]

Grape Stomper Grow Healthy Amazing Useful Ideas

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Catawba Grape Growing Zone

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Table Grape Trellis Design

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#Grape Stomper Grow Healthy Amazing Useful Ideas #How To Plant A Grape Seedling

[bhuva23]

'The Tempest' as a Postcolonial Text

The Tempest as a Postcolonial Text

According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the word ‘colonialism’ emerges out of the Roman ‘colonia’ which translates to ‘farm’ or ‘settlement’. It was a reference to Romans who settled down in other lands while retaining their citizenship. The OED definition of colonialism as Ania Loomba points out in her book Colonialism/Postcolonialism, does not make any reference to the natives, people who might have been living in places where colonies were established. This essay will consider The Tempest in the light of postcolonialism using Loomba’s theories and the relationship between the natives of the island and Prospero, Stephano and Trinculo.

William Shakespeare draws inspiration for The Tempest from William Strachey’s account of a ship that ran into a storm. It was on its way to Jamestown, Virginia. The passengers surprisingly were safe and it resulted in the first colony which was set up in 1607. The play was written in 1611. Loomba states that Shakespeare adds a major component to the play, which was absent in the account. This is the idea of the island being inhabited prior to Prospero’s arrival. It renders the play into an allegory of a colonial encounter, more than a romance. In order for Prospero to sustain his power, there was a certain “re-forming” and “un-forming” (Loomba, 8) that had to be done. It includes practices such as “trade, plunder, negotiation, warfare, genocide, enslavement and rebellions.” (Loomba, 8).

These are some of the factors that distinguish between colonialism in the Genghis Khan era and the modern colonialism. Modern colonialism made sure that there was a link between the economy of the colonized lands and the colonizers’ land. There was a flow of human and natural resources between the colonized and colonial countries. This was in the form of slaves and raw materials. The profits were obtained by the colonial powers. In The Tempest, Prospero uses Ariel and Caliban for their services claiming that he rescued one and raised the other. Ariel and Caliban are not only used for labor, but also are “educated” with the European ideology. Having established the colonized as the ‘other’, the Europeans felt the need to educate what they thought were savages. This idea is talked about by Edward Said in Orientalism where he notes how Arabs were seen as exotic, backward, uncivilized and dangerous. This idea is carried out in the case of Caliban who is described in an animal-like fashion. Prospero accuses him of attempting to rape Miranda in the past, a reason he uses to impose control on him.

Similarly, the idea of the cannibal was used by Columbus and by Spanish colonists later on to justify their brutal practices. Loomba talks about a Martin Frobisher who used an Eskimo for display in England. This idea resonates in The Tempest where Trinculo thinks about the money he could earn by doing the same with Caliban. He muses how people “will lay out ten (coins) to see a dead Indian” (1, ii, 32-33). This is a stereotype. Sander Gilman says that stereotypes promote an “artificial sense of difference between ‘self’ and ‘other’” (Loomba, 55). Prospero, Trinculo and Stephano clearly use this technique to degrade the position of Caliban.

On the other hand, the colonized people, as mentioned earlier with reference to Orientalism, were considered exotic, yet inferior, while the latter considered the former as enviable, and corrupt. This instance can be seen in The Tempest when Prospero refers to Ariel as “delicate” (4, i, 49) and as a “fine apparition” (1, ii, 319) but also reminds Ariel that he is a “malignant thing’ (1, ii, 259). Caliban views Prospero as powerful and desires to overthrow him. This highlights the ambivalent relationship that the two parties share. The idea of the colonized being “exotic” is carried out across the geography of the colonized land. This results in the colonizer using the colonized as a medium to access resources and ‘secrets’ of the land and culture. It shows how the colonizer considers it necessary to tame not only the natives, but also the land itself. Another factor used to create the binary of the European and non-European is the language.

Peter Hulme refers to two words which were derived from Native American languages. The words ‘cannibal’ and ‘hurricane’ were used to widen the gap between the colonizer and the colonized. Hurricane was referred to as a tempest, unique to the Caribbean and suggested the supposed violence and savage condition of the place. Similarly, cannibalism was not merely a synonym for ‘anthropophagi’ (savages who eat their own kind). Cannibalism was a marker for the threat the savages posed against Europeans, as Loomba points out. As a natural phenomenon and a cultural practice, the terms designated anything that was situated outside Europe. ‘Canis’ is a Latin word referring to dog, and the view was that the people of the Caribbean treated their victims in a ferocious, predatory manner. It is no surprise that Caliban is an anagram for cannibal (negating the ‘n’) and also explains why Prospero uses dogs to attack the rebels as Hulme points out. Cannibalism was also used as a pretext to justify the taking over the American lands.

Apart from the image of the cannibal, the image of the colonized as a dark-skinned rapist is established. Prior to this, the colonizers were seen as the rapists who plundered countries. The narrative changed with time. Caliban, too is alleged of an attempt to rape Miranda. The notion of the savage rapist, as Loomba argues, “…deflects the violence of the colonial encounter from the colonizer to the colonized” (Loomba, 70). Jenny Sharpe in her book Allegories of Empire: The Figure of Women in the Colonial Text demonstrates how Indians were seen as mild and meek until the 1857 revolt. Following this, the ‘mild Hindoo’ became a sexual predator who raped British women. Sharpe suggests that the rebellion left the British “without a script on which they could rely” (Sharpe, 67). Caliban is the more rebellious of the slaves. Ariel is mild and soft spoken. Caliban’s rebelliousness ears him the place of a savage rapist.

This brings up the need for civilizing the ‘savage’. The phrase ‘white man’s burden’ was used as an ideology to denote the duty of the white colonizers to educate the colonized with western ideologies in order to ‘help them out’. In the play, Prospero educates Caliban and teaches him the former’s language. Caliban exclaims “You taught me language, and my profit on’t / Is I know how to curse. The red plague rid you / For learning me your language!” (1, ii, 365-367). It is similar to the ‘subaltern’, a term coined by Antonio Gramsci to identify people excluded from society’s established institutions. Gayathri Spivak notes how the subaltern, in order to be heard, must adopt the Western language. Caliban, similarly, uses Prospero’s language to insult him and express his discontentment. Through his language, the colonizer creates narratives to explain the local history of the colonized land. These narratives overwrite and silence the local narratives. Prospero repeatedly tells Caliban and Ariel about how he rescued them. The story of Caliban’s childhood and Ariel’s imprisonment is continually repeated by Prospero. Joseph Goebbels says “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” So the questions one needs to consider while looking at The Tempest as a colonial text are – Did Caliban really try to rape Miranda, or could it possibly be a narrative used to oppress him, and one also needs to consider how much of the native perspective is highlighted. However, one does see Caliban claiming his authority over the island, as he is the true inhabitant and considers Prospero as an outsider. It is visible in the lines where Caliban says “This island’s mine, by Sycorax my mother, / Which thou takest from me.” (1, ii, 333-334). This leads to the representations of the play as a depiction of colonial oppression. In the 1960s and 1970s, de-colonization movements began in Africa, Caribbean and Latin America. The anti-colonial writers challenged the notion of Prospero’s ‘art’ being considered as a part of the civil world, while Sycorax’s natural black magic is considered evil. Writers began defending Caliban’s right to the island. The lines quoted at the end of the preceding paragraph highlights this. Aimé Césaire, a black writer from Martinique rewrote the play to celebrate Caliban’s verbal attacks on Prospero and questions his claim to the island. In Jonathan Miller’s 1988 production of The Tempest, Prospero is a white colonizer and Caliban is a black slave. In David Thacker’s 1995 production, Ariel was played by a woman with face paint of a Native American Indian. Hence it is evident how the text was interpreted from an anti-colonial point of view, recognizing the postcolonial ideologies and representations in the original text.

On a similar note, Joanne Drayton in her article talks about how chess is seen as a metaphor for the “postcolonial relationship between Maori (indigenous Polynesian people of New Zealand) and Pakeha (New Zealander of European descent) in Aotearoa New Zealand.” (Drayton, Researchgate). It brings about questions of diaspora and the idea of the carrying of culture, since chess has been attributed to Viking culture. In the play, one finds Ferdinand and Miranda playing a game of chess. This symbolizes how Prospero’s every move is calculated and used to manipulate the rest of the characters in in the play.

With regard to a counter-view when studying the play as a postcolonial text, Meredith Anne Skura suggests that the parallels to colonial discourse are unintentional and cannot be taken seriously. She claims that the exploitation of people has been dealt with in several other plays of Shakespeare, and that it was too early for the colonial ideology to set in, since the play was written merely four years after the setting up of a colony in Virginia. She further explains how the characters can be seen as manifestations of human personalities. Caliban could be a representation of Prospero’s evil side. The latter acknowledges this at the end of the play when he says “This thing of darkness I / Acknowledge mine.’ (5, i, 277-278). Skura makes several important points including the fact that Caliban is not a representation of the cannibal, since he does not eat meat, instead “confining himself more delicately to roots, berries and an occasional fish” (Skura, 59).

However, as pointed out by Loomba, the fact that the playwright added the presence of inhabitants, slavery, narratives, and a subjugation and exploitation of the inhabitants renders the play as a portrayal of colonialism, whether or not the writer intended to represent it in that light. In popular culture, one sees colonial ideas and attitudes, for instance, in the Tintin comics, the artist depicts gypsies, native Americans, and Indians in a racist and stereotypical light, and the same can be said about the film Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Professor Yvette Rosser comments on how the film is a racist portrayal of Indians. Kayleigh Donaldson in her article Problematic Faves: Indiana Jones talks about the blatant racist outlook on Indians and South Asians, as the Hindus are represented as blood drinking, demon worshiping savages with odd and revolting food habits. Hadley Freeman highlights the racism in the movie in her article Blacking up, wacky Asians and the Libyans: the worst of 80s movie racism, where she makes references to the racist representations of Blacks and Asians. Hadley Freeman hardly finishes pointing at how the films have shown to be racist, when the stark irony is revealed, when she exclaims “Ha ha ha, Asian people are GROSS” (Freeman, The Guardian) .This goes on to show how racism and stereotypical notions along coupled with the white man’s superior attitude still permeate the society today, as a result of colonization.

To conclude, The Tempest has been considered from a postcolonial critical viewpoint, since it embodies the attitudes, practices and ideologies of the European colonizer. It has also been observed how colonization has led to racism and stereotypes that still exist in today’s society.

WORKS CITED:

Books

Loomba, Ania. (2005). Colonialism/Postcolonialism. Routledge, 2005.

Shakespeare, William, and John Crowther. The Tempest. Sparknotes, 2003.

Speaight, Robert. Shakespeare On The Stage. Little, Brown, 1973.

Sharpe, Jenny. Allegories Of Empire. University Of Minnesota Press, 1993.

Gilman, Sander. Difference and Pathology: Stereotypes of Sexuality, Race and Madness. Cornell University Press, 1985.

Websites

Donaldson, Kayleigh. "Problematic Faves: Indiana Jones". SYFY WIRE, 2019, https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/problematic-faves-indiana-jones. Accessed 2 Apr 2019.

Freeman, Hadley. "Blacking Up, Wacky Asians And The Libyans: The Worst Of 80S Movie Racism". The Guardian, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/may/10/wacky-asians-blacking-up-and-the-libyans-the-worst-of-80s-movie-racism. Accessed 2 Apr 2019.

"Joseph Goebbels On The "Big Lie"". Org, 2019, https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/joseph-goebbels-on-the-quot-big-lie-quot. Accessed 2 Apr 2019.

"Production History | The Tempest | Royal Shakespeare Company". Org.Uk, 2019, https://www.rsc.org.uk/the-tempest/past-productions/production-history. Accessed 2 Apr 2019.

Anne Skura, Meredith. Discourse And The Individual: The Case Of Colonialism In "The Tempest". 1989, https://www.jstor.org/stable/2870753. Accessed 2 Apr 2019.

#shakespeare #postcolonialism #Literature #article #Theory #postcolonialtheory #art #Theatre #thetempest #play #drama

[bookedsuccess]

DAY EIGHTEEN

The Book “Guns Germs and Steel” in Three Sentences

Summary by James Clear

Some environments provide more starting materials and more favorable conditions for utilizing inventions and building societies than other environments. This is particularly notable in the rise of European peoples, which occurred because of environmental differences and not because of biological differences in the people themselves. There are four primary reasons Europeans rose to power and conquered the natives of North and South America, and not the other way around: 1) the continental differences in the plants and animals available for domestication, which led to more food and larger populations in Europe and Asia, 2) the rate of diffusion of agriculture, technology and innovation due to the geographic orientation of Europe and Asia (east-west) compared to the Americas (north-south), 3) the ease of intercontinental diffusion between Europe, Asia, and Africa, and 4) the differences in continental size, which led to differences in total population size and technology diffusion.

Guns, Germs, and Steel summary

This is my book summary of Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond. My notes are informal and often contain quotes from the book as well as my own thoughts. This summary also includes key lessons and important passages from the book.

History followed different courses for different peoples because of differences in their environments not because of biological differences in the people themselves.

This book seeks to answer the question, “Why did the rate of progress differ so much for cultures on different continents?”

Around 11,000 years ago all human societies were hunter gatherers.

Understanding the causes of history improves our ability to intervene and improve the world. Many people mistakenly assume that discussing history is just a way to explain away tough issues. Not at all. It improves our ability to take effective action.

The most common explanation of the different trajectories experienced by Europe compared to Africa, Asia, Oceania, etc. is genetic and biological. People assume there is some innate biological difference that made Europeans smarter, more creative, or more resilient. Science, however, has produced no substantial evidence to indicate this is the primary cause of different outcomes.

Interesting side note: scientists are always competing to discover the “earliest human remains” or the earliest XYZ. As a result, every few years there is a new “earliest” discovery. Only one can actually be the earliest, of course.

The occupation of Australia was an incredible feat. It was the first use of water craft and range extension by humans.

Humans were likely responsible for the extinction of nearly all of Australia's large mammals. The same is true for many large mammals that occupied the Americas over 10,000 years ago.

The environment of ancient Polynesian society heavily dictated the lifestyle and behaviors. The many islands have widely varying landscapes and climates. Whether or notcultures developed weapons and became skilled at warfare, whether they became hunter gatherers or farmers, whether they acted more tribal or more hierarchical was largely determined by the environment in which these people lived.

Food and animal domestication arose independently in five different areas of the world (at widely differing times) and possibly four others although there is still some contention about those.

We often think there is a clear division between farmer and hunter gatherer lifestyles, but actually there can be a blending of the two. For example, some cultures plant crops, resume a hunter gatherer lifestyle while they grow, then return to harvest and eat.

Agriculture did not lead to an unequivocally better lifestyle. In fact, for those who actually grow food life tends to be worse than it would be as a hunter gatherer. If this is true, and the evidence seems to point that way, then it means that advancement of civilization has essentially happened on the backs of society's have-nots. In other words, the entire system we live within – agriculture, capitalism, etc. – requires inequality to function.

Agriculture allowed food production per unit area to increase, which meant a given area could support a larger population. This allowed farming cultures to defeat hunter gatherer cultures by sheer force due to larger populations. This, in turn, led to the spread of more agricultural societies across the globe.

Throughout the industrial revolution in Great Britain, moths of darker colors became more likely to survive because the surrounding environment become dirtier and covered in soot, smoke, and debris. Thus, it was more likely that dark-colored moths would survive than light-colored moths. As the environment changed, so did the evolution of moths. A fascinating example of evolution on a small scale.

Cereal crops alone account for more than half of the food consumed by modern humans.

The rise of indigenous food production in certain areas was the result of a few factors. First, certain areas had plants better suited to domestication. This led people to domestic earlier in those regions. Second, because of this early start, these people eventually domesticated more difficult plants. Evidence seems to indicate that all people's are capable of food production and even modern hunter gatherers seem to be naturally moving that way.

The rise of agriculture in some areas before others has to do with the environment, not the intelligence of the people.

The Anna Karenina Principle: In many areas of life, success is not about doing one thing correctly, but about avoiding many possible modes of failure.

Domesticated animals differ in multiple ways from their wild ancestors. For example, many domesticated animals are different sizes and have smaller brains than their wild ancestors.

Domestication of large mammals ended approximately 4500 years ago. This indicates humans attempted to domesticate all of them and no suitable species remained. This is another piece of evidence that the type of animals available dictated the domestication in certain regions, not the people living in the region. This the spread of agriculture was once again impacted by the environment.

There is a inefficiency during the eating process. The nutrient transfer is much less than 100 percent and typically around 10 percent. For example, it takes 10,000 pounds of corn to create a 1,000 pound bull.

The primary geographic axis of North and Spith America is north-south. That is, the land mass is more longitudinal than latitudinal. The same for Africa. But for Europe and Asia, the primary axis is east-west. Interestingly, this positioning and shape matters greatly because it appears that agriculture and innovations spread more rapidly along east-west axes than along north-south axes.

Locations along the same east-west axis share similar latitudes and thus have similar day lengths, seasons, climate, rainfalls, and biomes. All of which increase the speed of innovation relative to north-south axes.

All tropical rainforests are within 10 degrees of latitude of the equator.

One collection of evidence for the difference in spread along geographic axes is the spread of domesticated crops. Many crops spread across Asia with one domestication, while crops like cotton or squash were domesticated in multiple individual areas throughout Mesoamerica. This is because the crop spread too slowly for one domestication to takeover the region.

It is vital to realize that although Diamond is discussing long time frames of hundreds or thousands of years, the core idea can be applied to short time spans of individual behavior as well. Indeed, large long term differences only occur because short term differences are repeated over and over again. Small environmental differences led to small changes in individual behavior, which resulted in significant differences when repeated for thousands of years.

One reason farming communities developed immunity to diseases that wiped out hunter gatherer populations is that some diseases (like measles) are “crowd diseases.” They require a large population to sustain themselves because they act quickly: you either die or develop immunity. In order for the disease to sustain itself there must be enough new babies born to contract the disease from those who have already developed immunity. Only agricultural communities could grow to the required population size.

On average, farming sustains populations that are 10x to 100x larger than hunting and gathering.

North America was populated by about 20 million Native Americans when Columbus landed in 1492. Within two centuries, 95 percent of the native population had died, most of them from infectious diseases.

Writing systems are historically seen as the deciding factor on whether an ancients civilization is considered advanced or not. This can be debated. The Incas built a great civilization without writing.

All alphabets in the modern world evolved from one original alphabet, either in idea or actual written form, developed in the Middle East.

Writing evolved independently in a few areas, but was spread via idea diffusion in most cultures and locations.

Most inventions are not a result of necessity, but rather the result of tinkers and curiousity.

Technology develops cumulatively rather than in isolated heroic acts. Even people we often associate with acts of genius like the Wright Brothers and Thomas Edison actually built upon the work of predecessors and had capable people who followed them and advanced ideas.

Technology finds most of its uses after it has been invented rather than being invented to solve a foreseen need. The phrase, “necessity is the mother of invention” is generally incorrect. (Even though some examples, like the Manhattan Project, exist.)

Long life expectancy is one reason technology might develop and spread faster in some locations rather than others. A longer life increases the surface area you have to test ideas and allows you to take on longer projects that you might otherwise avoid with limited time.

Geographic location is a key determinant in the pace of technological innovation and acceleration because a centrally located society will not only accumulate knowledge and technology from their own inventions, but also from neighboring societies. In the case of a particularly large land mass like Eurasia, technologies can spread from one culture to another and continue to do so along the entire span of the continent. This spread occurs much more quickly in these locations than it would to, say, aboriginal cultures in Tasmania, which did not receive outside contact from other civilizations for over 10,000 years.

Government and religion are two of the main reasons some societies overcame others. These shared myths led to collaboration and increased power.

There are four levels of organization in society: bands (5-80 people), tribes (100-1000 people),  chiefdoms (1000 to tens of thousands of people), and states (50,000 or more people).

Humanity has been on a clear path from small groups to larger ones, culminating in states, over the last few thousand years.

The size of a population in a region is a strong predictor of the complexity of the society.

Culture is heavily dependent on population density. The higher the population, the more culture seems to spawn and spread.

War, or the threat of war, is the primary factor in the amalgamation of human societies throughout history. It is how cultures merge.

Five dog night is an Australian phrase referring to a very cold night because you would need to use five dogs as blankets.

Isolation is a key factor preventing creativity and innovation from spreading because most people and societies get their ideas from outside societies. So constant connection to others and trading of ideas and resources is essential for technological and creative progress.

Food production was a key component in the determining the strength of a society. People sharing similar ancestors inhabited New Guinea and Indonesia, but the Indonesians were still hunter gatherers while the New Guineans had develop agriculture. When Austronesians invaded the region, Indonesians fell under their control, but New Guineas (with their food, germ resistance, and technologies) were able to resist.

Again and again, the environment dictated the spread of power throughout islands of East Asia and the Pacific. Depending on location, islanders differed in their connectedness to other peoples and in the plants and animals available to them to domesticate. People with favorable locations for food production and access to technology replaced those with less favorable environments.

The end of Chapter 18 shares multiple interesting examples of peoples who were largely similar genetically because of similar ancestors, but developed very different societies and technologies due to the their individual environments.

Example of cultural evolution: the Moari of New Zealand were able to determine the most useful rocks and animals for domestication within a century of arriving.

The striking differences in the histories of peoples on different continents have been due not to differences among the peoples themselves, but to differences in their environments.

There are four primary reasons Europeans rose to power and conquered the natives of North and South America, and not the other way around.

Reason 1: Continental differences in the plants and animals available for domestication. The differences are vast. Europe and Asia had the best prospects, then Africa, then the Americas, then Australia. The improved agricultural aspects led to larger populations and larger armies in Europe and Asia.

Reason 2: the rate of diffusion of technological innovation due to the orientation of continents (east-west vs. north-south) and geographic barriers (mountains, deserts, etc.). The favorable geography of the Europe and Asia landmass resulted in much faster agricultural and technological expansion.

Reason 3: ease of intercontinental diffusion. It was easy for ideas, technologies, and innovations to spread between Europe, Asia, and Africa. However, it was quite difficult for things to spread to the Americas because of large oceans and the only close landmass being in cold climates and at high latitudes unsuitable for farming.

Reason 4: continental differences in total population size. Europe and Asia had a huge landmass where there was constant and widespread competition.

All human societies contain inventive people. It's just that some environments provide more starting materials and more favorable conditions for utilizing inventions than other environments.

The fragmentation of Europe was a key in enabling Columbus to cross the Atlantic. He was turned down by four different kingdoms before finally convincing the king and queen of Spain to fund his trip. Meanwhile, Chona had the technology to explore the world by ship, but their dictator at the time did not want to do so. In this way, one person prevented an entire made of people (with the technology) from succeeding. A little fragmentation is good. Too much centralized power means one person can handcuff the creativity of many.

In the 1960s and 1970s, the decisions of a few Chinese leaders resulted in the schools closing in the country for five years. Crazy how so much centralized power is still playing a huge role.

Europe has always been far more fragmented than China. Even at its peak, the Roman Empire never controlled more than half of Europe.

Understanding ultimate causes is essential to understanding human behavior.

Prediction of history is much easier over long time spans, but basically impossible over short time spans.

Great discussion of science in the last half of the epilogue.

Careful observations of natural experiments (things happening in the real world) can lead to fascinating and useful insights.

Epidemiology, ecology, and evolutionary biology are developing better methods for dealing with the confounding factors often present in natural experiments.

#DAY18

[beaver-time-blog]

RTBC #11

Here’s a good Reason to be Canadian

You Have The Right To Be Canadian II

                 Welcome to 2017, where feminism mean elitism (nothing new), racism means safety (an oldie but a goodie), and irony is a dear departed memory of our past (Like compassion, trust, and rationality). Now we could dwell on the socio-political nonsense the previous year had been, but that would be a bigger waste of time than the governor general pretending to not adore thick black cock. SO! Let us do our finest imitation of a 69-ing Tom Cruise and look forward… to the future… not David Miscavige’s alien-probed butthole. Today we take a trip down south to Canada’s biggest neighbor, the United States of America! Yes the land of the brave and the home of the free, or whatever, is Canada’s biggest trade partner, and very much our social sister. Take any Canadian, and simply remove everything altruistic and neighborly about them. Ta-Da! Instant American. Now I’ve had many people claim that our differences are obsolete and irrelevant, but I’ve also had Tom Mulcair look me dead and the eye and say his favorite food group wasn’t cum, so I have trust issues. Now I bring up the U.S. because of an incredible moment that was overlooked by some during the 2016 presidential election, which may well have defined the fate of both countries occupying North America. Before we bring up that subject, however, please allow a message from our sponsors…

                Quick ad read then to the laughs...

                Today’s reason to be Canadian is brought to you in part by “Shutting the fuck up!”. Are you full of rage and tears over the electoral decision of your country? Do you perhaps toss and turn every night over something somebody said that wasn’t perfectly in line with your predetermined beliefs? Are you by chance someone who identifies as a feminist? Are you Jenny McCarthy? Try “Shutting the fuck up!”!! “Shutting the fuck up” will provide you with all the time in the world to do things like; Checking the mail! Educating yourself on an issue! Appreciating how good you have it! Getting the fuck off of my twenty-dollar bill! “Shutting the fuck up” is the only service which will let you calm down and respect other peoples opinions! Try free today, or use the promo code “Hey, just because somebody disagrees with me doesn’t mean they’re evil” To receive the added benefit of no longer being a dick.  Now I hate ad reads as much as the next guy, but this is a service I truly believe in. Across the united states of America, there has emerged a group of people determined to de-throne the currently elected President, Daffy Trump. Daffy here has infuriated countless classes of clowns with his language and laughable political intent, causing many to protest and refute his right as an elected official. These guys we’ll call the Bald Eagles. Forewarning though, If you want to read in depth about the choices Daffy has made to create the Eagles, go watch John Oliver. I won’t lampoon Daffy for the same reason I won’t hunt an unarmed man. No Sport. If something is easy, it’s not worth doing. Ever jerked off? Easiest thing in the fucking world. Probably not going to share it at the dinner table. Ever fucked Justin Trudeau? No you haven’t because that shit is impressive and you would have told EVERYONE, and you wouldn’t have walked right for a week. Guys is packing heat. Seriously ask anybody, taking that dude is like playing ring toss with a hula hoop and the Eiffel tower. No way bud.

                   Everyone’s their own protagonist.

                Back on track to the Bald Eagles though, there is some comedy that wrote itself I’d like to point out. During his campaign, Daffy spoke how if the vote came out against him, he would not accept its results. Naturally this pissed off every self-respecting Bald Eagle living south of our border, as it should. A politician disregarding the very system designed to elect them is more dangerous than an armed Hillary Clinton on her period. Not that her love cave has cried red tears since 1984, but that’s irrelevant. Now the comical part of all of this is that Daffy won the election, and never needed to cast doubt on voting reliability at all! But what happens next? Bald eagles took to the streets and their Tumblr’s to repeatedly shout things like: “not my president!”, which was meant to resist and deny their new elected leader. If you haven’t noticed the irony yet, I hear buzzfeed has a new top ten list, maybe that’s more your reading level? I’ll spell it out though; Refuting the results of the election moments after you had judged a politician for doing just that is evidence enough to suggest you seek only an opponent to fight, not a cause worth fighting for. IF at this point you STILL haven’t picked up on the irony, let me then be the first to welcome you to Beaver-Time, Mike Pence. Fuck you, Mike Pence. This unfortunate trait of the Bald Eagles is not unique to them however. Look at what goes for feminism today; a bunch of glue sniffing self-identified “Victims” of the patriarchy. For fucks sake. There too, along with the “black lives matter” community (a bunch of chimpanzees that make even Martin Luther King blush) you can find hordes of people that fight careless to the cause. Don’t believe me? Go to any coffee shop within two kilometers of a university, and wait for somebody (ANYBODY) to voice an opinion, ANY opinion, and deny it for as long as you can without laughing. So that bitch thinks bunnies are cute? Take her down. Your mother was RAPED by a bunny god damnit. I mean all the bunny did was accidentally make eye contact while he was eating a carrot, but sill that is RAPE! Watch what happens. Their entire existence is now committed to how evil you are, how you are definable as negative as Hitler. Be sure to wear sunglasses and part your hair differently, because you are now the star of their blog. Oh my god aren’t you that guy form Allmenarepigs.org? Can I have an autograph?

                Onward to reality.

                I specify then rationalize the poor judgement of the bald eagles to be as fair to them as possible, because despite my jokes and jabs, they are incredibly important to me. Alex Jones knows how I feel, the guy is always having to bash the faggot community on his show, but tell me… have you ever seen him and Chaz Bono in the same room? I’m onto you Jones… Truth is, these bald eagles are going to help shape Canada in the years to come, which brings us to that fateful day in November. Once the vote began to turn toward the favor of Daffy’s republican Party, the Canadian government website dedicated to immigration crashed from over use. In that beautiful moment, bald eagles everywhere decided that their best bet was to flee the scene, and fly north for the winter. While these birds were publicly shamed across numerous sources of media, truth is, that was the right decision. If you live in a democratic state, you only have two options when a politician you don’t like is elected: deal with it, or fuck off. Canada says, for better results, fuck on. But spare a thought for the long-term ramifications of these migrants coming to Canada. Those infuriated by the election were the same people who valued equality and freedom. They may be confused about the best way to achieve these ideals, yet still they remain their central influences. So, these progressive, equality minded eagles come north, and what happens? Well, less and less of these great birds will occupy their native country, so more and more racist and sexist legislation will be allowed to exist. This will in turn provoke more eagles to come out of hiding and make the trip to Cancukville, and by now you can see the pattern. Within a decade, the divide between the progressive eagles and the regressive pigeons will no longer be a civil matter, but rather one dividing Canada, and the U.S.. Just as the lack of progressive minded people will slow the evolution of American politics, the surplus of these forward-thinking eagles will speed up Canada’s evolution. Daffy may be the final nail in the American coffin, but he alone will transform July 1st into an international holiday. But wait there’s more… The one real positive aspect Daffy provides is economic reform. He has promised to reset and kick-start the American financial system, yet this benefit is not exclusive to the states! Canada’s own market directly mirrors Americas own financial success. When they’re good, we’re good. When they’re bad, we’re still ok. So come to Canada, where you can enjoy every benefit, yet no punishment, from Daffy Duck’s administration. And don’t worry about all of this creating a country populated exclusively by people from 1945, if they get too rowdy, we’ll just build a wall on our southern border.

                But can people just come on over?

                   Oh yah, and travel will be a piece of cake. You know why? Even if for whatever reason you get turned down as an immigrant (you won’t) you can still get in as a refugee! How’s this? Well I’ll tell yah. American Government is like the strap on dildo Meryl Streep would use to butt fuck Bill O’Reilley. Looks like a dick… feels like a dick… makes him cum like a howler monkey….like a dick…but that aint no dick. I won’t go into detail, but here’s the problem: American government does not elect its leader based on the popular vote. When an American votes, they vote for who the STATE should vote for. If the majority of the state votes democratic, then the entire state is labeled as democratic, and a number of what’s called Electoral College Votes are given to the person who won that states majority. The problem here is each state has a different number of votes to give out, and the number of these votes IS NOT dependent on population. Meaning, that your vote means a lot less than somebody form a different state. Because of this system, Daffy was elected yes, but he lost the popular majority to his opponent. This means you hail from an oppressed country, and you can file for refugee immigration! Yay! If America was a true democracy, the white house would be staffed by a washed up half dead housewife that couldn’t even suck dick properly. But because of this unfairness, the leader of the country who thinks they are the leaders of the free world (they’re not), Is a sexist, racist, hypocritical liar. Please, come to Canada. You can do so much good here.

                Not that we’re perfect...

                   I throw these stones from the relative comfort of my glass house.  Canada is no more democratic than the U.S. Remember, we have the Senate. A group of cunts, who was elected by this one cunt, who in turn was elected only by this other cunt, who only has power because she was born into the right family. Now, it is legally treason for me to suggest that if anybody ever has the chance to give her the cobweb cleaning she deserves, to contract HIV first, so I won’t suggest it. Nor can I or anybody else ask that the next time she waddles out onto the taxpayer-funded palace gardens, that the closest person there do us all a favor and bounce a rock off her skull. Seriously, it’s illegal for me to ask you to do it! So please don’t hurt the queen. Besides, if you really wanted to kill her, you could just run for MP, put in a private member bill to separate from England, and at the ceremony that will be held to say goodbye, as you shake her hand, lean in and whisper, “Downtown Abbey isn’t very good”. Bitch will keel over right there.

                Welcome to the tribe!

                But enough of that dick-breathed sex-demon the union calls a queen (only queen I respect wants to ride their bicycle), and focus on the eagles immigrating. Like Kanye West’s first attempt at prostate probing, there will be some tension at first. The Bald Eagles themselves will feel intimidated, until they realize that even though they were always a symbol of America, Canada has way fucking more. Welcome home guys. There will be of course, Canadian tensions as well. We haven’t forgotten that these new additions are still the annoying as shit causeless rebels that haunt many attempts at progression, despite being progressively minded themselves. However, there is a fast and simple solution to instill some logic and empathy into our American friends. Try “Shutting the fuck up” free today.

Things to take back to the dam... 1. Utilize difference in opinion to make friends, not enemies. 2. Democratically elected officials should be respected. 3. Non-democratic elected officials should get off the twenty dollar bill. 4. Shut the fuck up a minute. 

#trump #canada #feminism #equality #rapedbybunny

[icarusproject2015-blog]

I’ve been in this game long enough that I’m always shocked when someone comes to me with a story of animal exploitation that I’ve never heard of. And yet, it happens, far more often I’d like. There is, apparently, an inexhaustible number of people eagerly awaiting their chance to “teach” the public about the animals they’re exploiting. Which brings me to the Great American Frontier Show: Wolves of the World. I had never heard of the show, which was founded by a man named Michael Sandlofer, a number of years ago. Mr. Sandlofer passed away in 2016, so I will be as respectful as possible in the writing of this article. The article will, however, be honest, and forthright.

The Sandlofers have owned and trained captive wild animals for entertainment purposes for multiple decades. They even had performing bison at one point. From as early as 1979, they’ve had animal shows performing for audiences, at a price, while claiming the animals were all “rescues” and that they were “educating” people.

Finding articles about the Sandlofers and their shows was easy, but I quickly learned that none of those articles contained more information than that the show was “educational”. Those claims were accompanied by quotes from either Michael, or Sharon like “Wolves are the most misunderstood animals in the world.” and “If you look at wolves up close, you’ll see that their two center toes are longer than the others,” Sandlofer said. “That gives them better traction when they’re on the hunt.” and this gem “Many just don’t understand the pyramid of life cycle and the part these wolves play,”. That last one got a long snarly breath out of me, because by just a few articles into my research, the doublespeak and incorrect information provided made it clear that 1) the Sandlofers did not, and do not, actually know much about wolves, and wolf biology, and 2) the interviewers and authors of the articles either didn’t know, or didn’t care, enough to fact check the information provided by the Sandlofers.

For example, Michael and his wife are described as “having been involved with animal rescue and conservation for decades”. However, aside for Mr. Sandlofer’s participation in the saving of a beached whale back in 1981 (totally commendable) there are no references to the Sandlofers “rescuing” animals by anyone other than the Sandlofers themselves. And while the Sandlofers claim that their animals come from “an animal rescue organization” I have been unable to find any rescue group who works with them, nor have I been able to find where the Sandlofers have ever named the organization.  At the time of the whale incident, Michael Sandlofer was a deep sea dive instructor and worked with the North Wind Museum, which he founded in 1979. The North Wind ran the “All-Star Animal Revue and Circus” for a number of years.

Most articles note that Sandlofer was “awarded the prestigious Rolex Award” for his conservation efforts. However, when I went to the Rolex site, and checked their records, Mr. Sandlofer is not listed as a Laureate (winner) of any Rolex award, in any year. I did, however, find this write up, which clearly states that he received an honorable mention from the award in 1984. Still noteworthy, and respectful, but it’s not the same as actually being named a Laureate.

       I finally decided it was probably best to just check out actual videos of the Sandlofers’ show. So I spent about three hours, cumulatively, watching Sharon put on the Wolves of the World show. I also watched a great many commercial-style video spots of Michael Sandlofer hocking his show, encouraging fair grounds and entertainment facilities to book them because of the “huge crowds” they draw. The performances I watched ranged from the years 2012 to 2016 and took place all across the country, captured by attendees. At least one was put on by the Sandlofer’s daughter, Brenna. Here are some fast bullet points I got from all my screen time, which I’ll then explore further.

The shows run about 20-30 minutes, but on average, 15+ minutes of that time is spent simply introducing the animals one at a time, or in sets. Many shows state specifically that all of the animals are Eastern Timber wolves.

Sharon is the primary handler. Her husband refers to her as the “Wolf Whisperer” *cough* *Lion Whisperer influence* *cough*

Both Sandlofers repeatedly use the term “positive reinforcement” to describe what they call their “training method” while also repeatedly stating that “you don’t train wolves”.

They call the actions that the animals perform “behaviors” rather than “tricks” insisting that they are all “natural behaviors” while also stating that they “train” the animals “to perform the behaviors for their enrichment.” But each time they say this, they add “but you don’t really train wolves.”

About half the meager wolf biology and scientific information provided by Sharon is either wrong, or extremely simplified and misleading.

The shows always ends with Sharon offering the audience chance to (for more money) take photos with “a wolf pup” and “tour their “den” trailer”.

Despite that the Sandlofers repeatedly refer to their animals as wolves, and as “the pack” I found no evidence that the animals are ever housed together in a functional pack, even off the road.

From 2012-2016 the script of the show remains virtually unchanged, with Sharon reciting the same lines over and over again, almost verbatim, despite that over those years, science’s understanding of wolves has increased and changed. The only real alterations are in the backstories of some of the animals. But the new information provided often directly conflicts with the biographies and information given in previous shows, indicating that the Sandlofers change facts to suit situations.

The main shtick of the Wolves of the World show (aside from being the “Only traveling wolf pack in America”) is that wolves are “the most misunderstood animal in the world”. In addition to being a painfully hackneyed phrasing, it simply isn’t true. There are thousands of completely misunderstood animals in our world. The wolf is just one of them. To describe the wolves and their importance to the environment as being “misunderstood” by Americans is like saying Jews and their importance to humanity was “misunderstood” by Hitler. The hatred and savagery directed at wolves in American history has little to do with them being misunderstood, and everything to do with them being blamed for things they had nothing to do with, and thusly sanctioned for annihilation. And just as with the Holocaust, wolves were systematically exterminated for their perceived worthlessness. Sandlofer, when she does touch on the subject,–something that doesn’t even happen in every show–states that wolves were targeted for hunting because “man saw them as competition”. That is, to put it mildly, an extremely narrow and simplistic perception of the matter, and a largely modern interpretation of modern wolf conservation issues, not historical ones.

In the 1700s, explorers were not concerned with the idea that wolves were going to eat all of their deer or other food staples. In the 1800s settlers were not concerned with sharing food with wolves, so much as saving their livestock from the perceived danger of wolf attack. During hard winters, this ended up being a literal danger. In the 1900s, professional wolf hunters were not concerned with how many deer a wolf pack ate, so much as how many dollars they could get for each wolf killed.

The mass extermination of wolves was driven, not by their “competition” with human hunters, but by the desire for cold hard money, as well as old world fears and hatred, which early settlers brought with them from Europe, where wolves had already been effectively exterminated by 1680 in Scotland, 1786 in Ireland 1707 in Switzerland, and so on. By the late 1800s, wolves were all but extinct in most European countries, and those still alive had been driven into Russia.

True wolf extermination efforts in America did not even begin until the 1870s, and that period of violence lasted up into the 1950s. 

To present the idea that wolves were killed by “settlers” because they were viewed as “competition” for a food source, or perceived as dangerous to humans, implants visions such as this into the minds of listeners:

When in reality, the intentional butchering of wolves is a much more recent event, and one that was driven by outright hatred, monetary gain, and sport. (both historical and modern wolf extermination shown here)

Sandlofer’s noble intonement that “Native Americans were really the only people who truly understood wolves. They thought of the wolf as their brother.” is also an idealistic fabrication of “white thinking” (usually presented while mood-setting Native American pipe soundtracks are played for the audience) The relationship between American Indian Nations and the wolf was, and remains, complex and deep, and not always friendly. Some Nations admire the wolf and respect it, but rather than see wolves as “brothers” they see them as warrior spirits which can be invoked by wearing wolf hides, or tails tied to themselves as they go into battle. The Cheyenne Wolf Warrior society are an example of this.

Other Nations, most notably the Navajo, feared, and continue to fear, wolves, believing them to be human witches in disguise. They believed that a Navajo witch became a wolf by donning the skin of a hunted wolf. Navajo werewolves are, even today, often blamed for murders, mutilated bodies, and raiding graveyards.

Unlike Sandlofer’s presentation of American Indians taming wolves and turning them into todays breeds (it should be noted that there are many dog breeds older than the recorded history of North American Natives) the reality is that bringing wolves into camp rarely worked out, as the camp dogs (which Sandlofer’s timeline insinuates wouldn’t have existed yet) killed the pups, or superstitious tribe members stole them away and cast them out. It was far more common, particularly amongst the Cree, for children to find a wolf den, and approach it, at which time the adults would move away–with no recorded attacks on the children–and then the children would dig the pups out and play with them before returning them to their den, and retreating so that the adults to return.

To get back to the “educational” value of Wolves of the World, Sandlofer repeatedly says that you “don’t train wolves, you ask them to do something and hope they do it”, while at the same time openly giving the wolves verbal instructions, and rewarding them with food when they obey, which is the literal process for training through positive reinforcement. The conflict of her statements is obvious. She is, in fact, training the wolves. Or, to be more correct, the wolfdogs.

Czechoslovakian wolfdog.

Image of the Sandlofer’s animals taken from this undated article, where they’re described as Timber wolves.

It’s obvious to anyone with some expertise that virtually every animal in the Wolves of the World show, is actually a captive bred wolfdog, not a full-blooded wolf. Despite that the show describes the pack as “all Eastern Timber wolves” in this 2012 video, none of the animals are full-blooded wolves.

In contrast wolfdogs (as I suspected most, if not all of the Sandlofers animals were when I first saw them) are the product of multiple generations of selective breeding between other wolfdogs in a manner which sustains a high percentage of wolf genetics, but provides a more doglike personality, and tractability. Because domestic dogs were taxonomically recategorized in 1993 as a subspecies of Canus lupus, wolfdog proponents say that they’re no different from other domestic dogs, and wolfdog are now recognized by the UCA. If you follow I.C.A.R.U.S. you’ll know our position on this matter. I have included informational links on wolfdogs to show the definitive differences between them, and captive wolves for the purpose of this article. And this article is not about wolfdogs, it’s about the misrepresentation of wolves by the Sandlofers in their show.

In order to confirm my hunch about the wolfdogs, I sought out and subsequently secured the expertise of an established professional within the wolfdog community. They were, understandably, dubious about speaking with me, considering I.C.A.R.U.S.’s position. However, when I explained my situation, they were willing to help me, as the misrepresentation of wolves, and wolfdogs, is bad business for anyone devoted to genuine conservation.

My contact was able not only to confirm that at least four of the Sandlofer’s main animals (Cody, the “hero wolf” Phoenix, Cheyenne, and another unnamed animal) are, in fact, wolfdogs, but also that those four animals were not “rescued” by the Sandlofers. They were, in reality, bought by Sharon and her husband a number of years ago. Furthermore, my source was given to understand that sometime shortly after the Sandlofers purchased the animals and began describing them as “rescues” they were approached by the former owner, and asked to refrain from calling the animals “rescues” since they had been purchased.

Yet, in virtually every video, or interview I found about the Sandlofers they steadfastly, though the years, have continued to describe their animals as “all rescues”. Likely, this is because “rescues” are far more sympathetic to the audience than purchased animals. The Sandlofer’s daughter, Brenna, goes even a step further in this 2014 video, not only repeatedly calling all of the animals “wolves” but also stating that a number of them are “wolves” people got a pets, and then became afraid of an couldn’t handle. As none of the Sandlofer animals are even full wolves, this is, apparently, another fabrication of fact, possibly to then allow the Sandlofer’s to “encourage” conservation by suggesting that wolves don’t make good pets. Which is true, but irrelevant, since the Sandlofers don’t have full blooded wolves.

The only bit of truth, it seems, to Sandlofer’s backstories of their animals, is the rescue story wherein Cody saved a child from drowning. That, my source stated, they knew to be a true story. My contact went on to say that as far as they know, Sharon still keeps her ear out within the wolfdog community for any animals that might be available to secure and add to the show. It is not, my source explained, uncommon for many of the “sanctuaries” which offer “wolf” interactions, to shop around for wolfdogs and wolfdog puppies to purchase for their programs, as wolfdogs are more outgoing, where wolves are incredibly shy, and wolfdogs are much more inclined to follow an established routine, when properly socialized and trained.

This is not surprising for those of us who are aware of the duplicity of pseudo-sanctuaries, but it was enlightening to hear it from the “opposite side of the fence” as it were, and I’m grateful to my contact for all the help they provided to me.

In the 2012 video, the animals Sandlofer refers to as “the boys” are all wolfdogs, bred in captivity and derived from several generations of wolfdogs at minimum. While Sandlofer offers lengthy histories for the other animals, she states that she “doesn’t really know the story” of these animals (there are about five) but that they “came from West Virginia” and that they “desperately needed help and we were there to give it.”

The owner of the show doesn’t know how she ended up with a batch of wolfdog puppies–which she’s introduced to her audience as full-blooded Eastern Timber wolves? How is that even possible? She goes on to say that they’ve had “the boys” since they were babies, and that she raised them herself, which makes them easier to handle and work with.

Fast forward to this video  of the 2016 show, and Sandlofer is now telling the audience that “the boys” are all brothers, about five years old, and all came from the same (undisclosed) place in West Virginia, and she points out that they “look different” because “they’re wolf-hybrids”. Confusingly, however, some articles from around the same still have the Sandlofers stating that “the animals in their show all are eastern timber wolves.”  While other articles quote the Sandlofers as stating that they are wolf-hybrids.

After showing off “the boys” Sharon then introduces three young pups, two boys and one girl, whom she states “have been really interesting” because they’re only a year old, and they’re the first young animals she’s gotten to work with because normally they only get older rescues. So now we have two separate shows performed four years apart both containing young animals that Sandlofer states are the “first” young wolves or wolf-hybrids she’s ever worked with. 

On top of that, Wolves of the World seems to have offered photo opportunities throughout the years, each with a puppy or set of puppies, which, of course provokes the questions where are the puppies coming from? What sort of pups are they? (the Sandlofers refer to a pup named Lobo as half Arctic wolf and half Timber wolf, at one point, then call him a full Arctic wolf in a different instance) And where are they going?

As far as the scientific information that Sandlofer recites for her audience, much of it is misinformation, or fragmented facts.

According to Sandlofer a wolf’s “golden yellow eyes see extremely well”. But the reality is that wolves see, on average, as well as a human during the day (they see more tones of gray, and can detect motion faster than we can, but don’t actually see “better”) and some researchers actually believe that wolves might be nearsighted due to the fact that there eyes do not possess a foveal pit. They have more rods than we do, though, and thus see much better than humans in the dark. In addition, the color of a wolf’s eyes range from gold to amber, brown, gray, yellow and even green. Only blue is explicitly excluded from a true wolf’s eye color range, yet Sandlofer repeatedly describes all wolves as having “golden” eyes, citing it as one of their defining features.

Similarly, Sandlofer describes a wolf pack as being “five to as many as twenty wolves” when in reality, a pack can consist of as few as two wolves, and in some cases, under certain circumstances as many as 40. In fact, at one point, the Druid pack of Yellowstone (and Sandlofer is quick to liken her own wolves to those of Yellowstone) swelled to 37 animals. During the winter of 2010-2011 there was even an unprecedented occurrence in the small town of Verkhoyansk, Russia wherein an exceedingly hard winter forced multiple wolf packs to merge, resulting in an amalgamation of hundreds of animals working together. Even conservative estimates put the number of wolves at over 200 animals, and in their bid to survive the winter, they wrecked havoc on the agriculture of the small town. A far cry from Sandlofer’s 5-20 wolf packs.

Sandlofer states that wolves are unique in the formation of their foot, wherein the two center toes are slightly longer, which “gives them superior traction while on the hunt”. In reality, this type of foot conformation is known as being “hare-footed” and all domestic sighthounds, as well as many other domestic breeds possess the feature. It provides more speed to the animal, but also take more energy within the execution of their gait. Domestic dogs with an evenly rounded feet (the result of short third digital bones) are described as being “cat footed”.

When Sandlofer discusses her wolves which were “rescued” from a Minnesota fur farm, she states that “fur farms are illegal”. Fur farms are not, in fact, illegal. They should be, but that’s another topic for another article. Fur farms in the US are not only legal, but they’re not even regulated at the federal level. Some states may, or may not have specific protections, but that’s no guarantee. The only possible protection for wolves would be the Endangered Species Act, but wolves do not currently have full protection under the ESA, and the ESA does not protect hybridized animals at all. So just as the Sandlofers are presenting their wolfdogs as full wolves, anyone owning full wolves could simply crossbreed their animals, and thus avoid the issue while still harvesting pelts. And since the Sandlofer’s other animals actually are wolfdogs, it seems plausible that the “wolves” they “rescued” from the supposed fur farm are also wolfdogs. Even if someone is accused of breaching the ESA, prosecuting them is an arduous and slow process, which multiple steps. And it’s not always completely successful.

The Wolves of the World show has, according to articles, and reviews, long been seen as an exciting and educational experience designed for family fun despite that the “education” they offer is comprised of falsehoods, exaggerations, and outright bullshit. With the increasing popularity of “education through interaction” programs and facilities, it’s likely the Sandlofers will only continue to expand their show, misrepresenting wolves in the process. By foregoing honest facts in favor of showy–and untrue–stories and histories the Sandlofers do no service to current wild wolf populations, nor to conservation itself. In truth, the only suggestions for “aiding wolf conservation” that I ever heard the Sandlofers mention was that audience members should “contact their congressman” and either demand an end to wolf culling, or ask that they not be removed from the endangered species list. Genuine issues and information regarding sustainable wolf conservation within wild populations were never mentioned.

The history of wolves in America is a complicated, often sordid affair that swings from utter vilification and near complete eradication, to glorification, and contrived reverence to the point of absurdity. It’s a subject that far outstrips the inane descriptives of “misunderstood” and “competition” used by the Sandlofers to describe the American conflict between wolves and humans. Likewise, the ongoing biology, and science of wolves, and wolf conservation is an ever-expanding realm of study. And it’s one that faces a constant and ongoing war against the misinformation, lies, and exploitation of groups like the Sandlofers. Those of us fighting to reach the public without the aid of flashy shows and routines will readily meet the challenge, each and every time we face it.

If you would like to know more about the true history of wolves in America, the three books listed below are a great place to start.

War Against The Wolf, America’s Campaign to Exterminate the Wolf, Rick McIntyre, Editor

Of Wolves and Men, Barry Lopez

Vicious: Wolves and Men in America, Pro. Jon T. Coleman

For a plethora of scientific articles about wolves, and their conservation spanning decades check out this link.

Selling Utopia: Rewriting The History Of Wolves In America For Public Consumption I’ve been in this game long enough that I’m always shocked when someone comes to me with a story of animal exploitation that I’ve never heard of.

[mariacorley]

How to be Black

My original reason for self-publishing a novel was to allow my protagonists, Langston and Cecile, the light of day. I started with the notion that if only a handful of people read my book, my beloved creations would still have lived and breathed somewhere other than on my computer. Publishers who cater to people like me used to be called vanity presses; there's some truth to that. It didn't take long before I began to dream of a larger audience, watching YouTube videos and absorbing blog posts that purported to show indie authors how to achieve unimaginable success. One of the most important parts of the plan seemed to be reviews, and so, emboldened by three 5 star reviews from total strangers, I asked everyone I could who had read my book if they would mind posting their opinions about it on Amazon. Some did, but many didn't, so I took it to the next level, paying to join a database that allowed me to contact random people who had demonstrated an interest in writing and sharing reviews.

I sent out numerous requests, but so far only a couple of those people have followed through. One of them is the inspiration for this post. Dr. Jacques Coulardeau sent me his review—two pages so full of inaccuracies and negative extrapolation that I was shocked that he gave me 4 stars—on Martin Luther King Day, a coincidence that I find ironic. Examples of his misleading statements include his portrayal of Cecile as “one who makes love with any boy available that is rather good looking,” for whom “pre-marital intercourse is a basic principle,” even though she has sex with exactly two men in the book, the first a one night stand during which she loses her virginity, the second her eventual husband. Coulardeau then glosses over the character's considerable internal conflict between her religious background and her sexual relationship with the “love of her life” by saying, “She does not realize her contradiction.” Um...not true. When Langston and Cecile meet, the reviewer says that Cecile “of course gives herself as if it were a question of life or death,” even though their relationship unfolds long distance. He even rebuts his own statement by adding “Cecile in a way makes the relation kind of satirical, humorous, un-serious.” Dr. Coulardeau states that Langston's decision to open a West Indian restaurant is simply because the cuisine is trendy. Um...nope. He also mentions that Langston's friends-with-benefits relationship, while in college, with the daughter of his Italian boss is doomed because of her father's disapproval, implying that Langston and Marietta aren't both aware, from day one, that their contact is a dalliance, and failing to mention an even more intense disapproval from Langston's Jamaican grandmother. And so on.

I won't dispute every incorrect statement, but—call me Donald Trump—I can't leave his final conclusion about my protagonists alone: “They definitely tricked their life-treks and they ended lost in some kind of tasteless, heartless, mindless deculturated wasteland.” His evidence? The characters are neither black nor West Indian enough for him. They eat West Indian food, but they don't speak the way he thinks they should (he is apparently a linguist; I'm merely someone who grew up as a Canadian West Indian). Further evidence of lost cultural identity includes Langston's decision to cook a  jerked turkey with mango salsa at Thanksgiving. I forgot to mention that the expert on what West Indians are supposed to be is an elderly Jewish man, who also took time out to pass judgments on Cecile's Christian journey in ways that my devoutly Christian readers did not. Huh?

These days, it's rare that a white person is overtly paternalistic enough to publicly claim knowledge of who black people should be, which is pretty much the same thing as informing us of our proper “place.” For obvious reasons, these kinds of statements are not nearly so uncommon in the black community. For example, the inability to “code-switch” is seen by some melanated people as proof of being an oreo: black on the outside, white on the inside. What does that mean, though?

Being an immigrant changes things, whether your relocation is voluntary or involuntary. Isn't it both natural and human to exert and receive influence as a result? When Dr. Coulardeau rails against the evils of multiculturalism, I think he may mean that distinct ethnic groups shouldn't lose touch with their cultural heritage. I support this idea, however, what does that include and exclude? Am I allowed to like only a particular kind of music, or cook a particular kind of food? If I am allowed to like things that aren't native to my ethnic group, a concept that has become hopelessly tangled, in most cases, by intermarriage (and here I mean even Jamaicans marrying Nigerians), how much should we like those things? How often can we indulge in them? What if we understand some of our ancestral language or dialect, but aren't fluent? Do we all need to repatriate to a country of cultural origin? Can we live in the suburbs? Or should our entire lives become a kind of performance art?

Coulardeau noted that “Canada is the best representative of multiculturalism and New York (where Cecile attends Juilliard) is one of the most diverse melting pot or salad bowl in the world,” calling the references to the various cultures there “anecdotal.” First, Canada is a vast nation, and I can assure you that most of it isn't particularly multicultural, although Toronto, where Langston lives (in Little Jamaica!), certainly consists of distinct ethnic enclaves. My main focus in writing the book, however, had to do with issues of personal growth that people can confront regardless of their race. Nevertheless, one reviewer said, “The issue of race is an important sub-stratum of the story and adds to its depth.” Another take: “How refreshing to encounter complex people who deal with racism and nonetheless dream beyond the limits of what's realistic. Unlike a lot of prime time television, Letting Go's characters defy stereotypes and earn your trust as a reader.” This reviewer, who is an African American female activist, also said of Cecile, “She's confident in her blackness and even when she's down, she's not out.”

Enough self-defense. I am more drawn to people's internal lives, so people who are looking for detailed discussions of place may be disappointed; my references to setting have a tendency to be secondary. That said, my book is semi-autobiographical (SEMI!), and I certainly could have included more of my own experiences with race and culture, including the very self-conscious efforts made by me and my black friends to reject as much as possible that wasn't considered “black,” whether it was by claiming to hate most of the music on the radio in our overwhelmingly white town, or never wanting to say a white person was attractive, because black beauty was so undervalued that it seemed wrong to add to the problem by endorsing the prevailing notions, even slightly. Some of my other formative experiences with my culture included learning about slavery and segregation, both in America and the West Indies, being sent to classes in West Indian dance, joining the Junior Afro-Canadian society consisting of my siblings and friends (to mirror the Afro-Canadian society my parents had joined), annual visits to Bermuda with my mom, and learning Jamaican folk songs from my dad. I also felt especially proud of hall of fame quarterback Warren Moon and the similarly storied hockey goalie, Grant Fuhr. Then again, was it “black” to even be aware of hockey? Or was that, too, the result of losing touch with my roots? Was it breaking down a barrier or assimilation when Arthur Mitchell founded the Dance Theater of Harlem? And if ballet is okay for black people, should Misty Copeland have ended up in a predominantly white company?

To be fair, I suspect Dr. Coulardeau might have been okay with Cecile's focus on classical music if the book had followed up a conversation about the need to incorporate music by black composers into her repertoire— something I endorse and have put into practice—with concrete examples. I admit to dropping the ball on that one; I was more interested in her character's awakening as a self-confident woman, just as I was interested in Langston's need to confront the fears that kept him bound, but although the book is already 500 pages long, a few sentences here or there would have made my novel richer. Them again, why should any black person, real or imaginary, have to define him or herself by someone else's cultural standards, which are higher, in this regard, than the bar most white people need to reach? One answer is that everything about black people has been denigrated so much that we need to affirm our identity. The thing is, we're still human, which means we're not monolithic. Will black people ever earn the right to just be, in all of our complex variations and manifestations? Or should all books feature black protagonists who speak mainly the vernacular, ideally in the inner city, during slavery or the Civil Rights era? Will melanated people always have to earn their “black card,” even if they're fictional?

Coulardeau sarcastically refers to Langston “so black...that his first girl friend is a white woman.” I put that relationship in my book is because seeing a black man with a white woman still produces a twinge in my gut, even though I realize that the importance of race has been inflated by a history of hate. If I'm honest, I must confess that I have some litmus tests of black authenticity: Clarence Thomas doesn't pass, for example, because his Supreme Court rulings and other statements have shown what looks to me like evidence of self-hatred. Still, I don't think it's reasonable to assume that every black man who gets involved with a white woman has fallen for the false notion that their pale skin makes them the biggest trophy of all. I want black men and black women to heal the deep wounds inflicted by injustice, set down the resulting baggage, and truly embrace each other. Still, it is my firm belief that we can love ourselves without climbing into a box. At least, I hope so, because the opposite of multicultural is homogeneous. Even if it were possible to retreat behind impenetrable racial and cultural fences, is that advisable? Can't I be black and still cook a damned turkey? Especially in Canada, where Thanksgiving isn't connected to its ancestral sins against aboriginal people (which certainly exist), but rather the thought that having a day off to sit down with your family and express some gratitude sounded like a good idea?

People have mentioned finishing my book and wondering what the characters did after it ended. Despite everything I just said, if I do write a sequel, I may just go into more detail regarding culture, which is something I don't always analyze deeply unless affronted. So even though I find Coulardeau's  comments presumptuous, misleading, and at times completely inaccurate, they did make me think.  

#blackness #book review #west indian #canadian #mutliculturalism