After the discussion yesterday someone made a comment the different
between bottom up or top bottom strategy on conservation, and another made one on
the ethics of whether or not it is okay
to spread conservation to native people. One on hand the spread on knowledge
dealing with conservation can have positive effects and on the other hand how
it is usually meet with resistance such as in the roots of colonialism. The
video of milking the rhino brought up some good points on how people who have
lived there for so long and are not used to change and when the “pink people”
(which was funny), come in and invade their culture to tell them one thing or
another they are inclined to basically refuse their advice on certain environmental
problems like conservation of certain animals. One of the guys living there commented
on what a rhino was to him and he it was really nothing import at all to him,
it was just another animal like any other. I’m actually believe that he
probably wouldn’t mind not seeing any more rhinos for the rest of his life.
Also he said “you need a committee of white men when it comes to an antelope”,
and another one commented on how all the west or north, just bring papers and contracts.
So here I believe we see that there is obviously
a large gap that we the NGOs need to address. Maybe some of these people that
are fighting in order to have stricter rules on different environmental ideals
need to think of a more bottom up strategy and get to know exactly what kind of
culture that they are dealing with and how they would feel about their ideals
if they were in these peoples shoes who have lived here for so long. The
student who brought this up on Thursday mentioned for example how maybe ethically
it is better to have a stricter stance on environmentalism such as a sort of utilitarianism
stance. Here it would be even if it causes great displeasure to certain small villages,
it would still be good for the environment and the people as a whole, I suppose,
if certain ideals are made into law to protect the biodiversity of the area. Of
course this more sounds much more extreme then what they actually do, I think
it brings up a good point that some of these people can even be struggling to
get by, and when someone comes to you with a contract to sign on what type of
animals to hunt it can become very confusing as to why this is happening to
them. There was also a point brought up in the Columbus power point about their
stupidity about generosity and how they seemed to not know what private
property is. This can be linked back to no days and for example most of these small
villages probably share food like wheat and meat. And when NGOs come in to tell
the people what they can and cannot hunt they may be like “but no one owns
these animals, (or wheat when talking about GMOs) how can one man tell us what
to them”. Or like when the one guy in the video said “why are you selling gods
water?” Anyways going back to how I think a more bottom up strategy, I could
kind of think of an example here in Maryland. Although I have personally never gone
hunting, I do have a hunting license and they really stress how hunting white
tail in Maryland is part of conservation. And this leads in to how in one
county, I believe it was Montgomery County, was going to try to have a billed
passed in order to extend the hunting season for white tail because they have become
so overpopulated. If NGOs can promote a more bottom up strategy, I think that
it will improve conservation.
No comments:
Post a Comment