quote:

Originally posted by Les Staley:
The last couple of episodes have been shoving Global Warming/Climate Change down my throat. Every one of the stars has been consistent in mentioning and embellishing this as FACT. I'm done watching! Told my wife to stop recording this and have deleted all the old ones. Now there is NOTHING on the tube worth inconveniencing any electrons for, besides I don't want to contribute to global warming/climate change by wasting the electricity. Guess you guys are stuck with me here on the 'net

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No we don’t. None of it is real. Don’t waste your time.

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Originally posted by Frostbit:
REALITY

Exactly what reality TV shows are not about.

Alaska became very popular on the reality TV show circuit. I live in Alaska. When Joyce and I travel the first thing people ask us is “oh do you watch” ..... about Alaska?

No we don’t. None of it is real. Don’t waste your time.

quote:

Originally posted by Lamar:
every single episode of Nature on pbs and the blue planet-2 on BBC have gone the same route.
they start out like the old shows but turn into carbon footprint infomercials half way through.
I can't stand to watch either of them either.

quote:

Originally posted by farbedo:
Don't you have some wolves to hunt?

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Originally posted by Fourtyonesix:
He’s family to me so I’m bias. Plus I’m from a village so I also have a soft spot. But I see your point.

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Originally posted by dpcd:
After I finished watching Life Below Zero, I watched the series, NORSEMEN; on Netflix. It's only 3 seasons and I didn't like the way it ended, but you will see.
I highly recommend it.
Totally historic and accurate depiction of the way the Vikings livcd.
Totally, just like Life Below Zero in Alaska. Without politics.

quote:

Originally posted by A.J. Hydell:

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:
After I finished watching Life Below Zero, I watched the series, NORSEMEN; on Netflix. It's only 3 seasons and I didn't like the way it ended, but you will see.
I highly recommend it.
Totally historic and accurate depiction of the way the Vikings livcd.
Totally, just like Life Below Zero in Alaska. Without politics.

'Life Below Zero' was great show! That Glenn Villenevue is a real bear & moose killer.

Better still are the episodes of 'Buying Alaska.' ... Real Alaskans 'seeking to get a small stake of the Alaskan experience.'

Gotta love that hook line!

Last show I saw (a re-run) featured a pretty black-haired gal who turned out to be the former Miss Alaska and her husband. He's in the Mil service and stationed up there.

Still, the best series was always 'The Last Alaskans.' Bob Harte (R.I.P.) really made that series shine.

Unlike some of the bush-people wannabes living in Wasilla.

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Originally posted by MARK H. YOUNG:
Come and plunk your butt down in any off the road system village for awhile and you'll soon find out what life up there is really like. It isn't very romantic in any way, shape or manner. It can be quite good though if you have the right attitude. It was for me.

Mark

quote:

Originally posted by 458Win:
Alaskan reality TV shows are no different than professional wrestling. They are entertainment for the masses, aimed at the lowest common denominator!

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Originally posted by tsturm:

quote:

Originally posted by 458Win:
Alaskan reality TV shows are no different than professional wrestling. They are entertainment for the masses, aimed at the lowest common denominator!

That is an understatement!!

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Originally posted by 458Win:

quote:

Originally posted by tsturm:

quote:

Originally posted by 458Win:
Alaskan reality TV shows are no different than professional wrestling. They are entertainment for the masses, aimed at the lowest common denominator!

That is an understatement!!

And I might add
Funded, I mean subsidized, by a state with no taxes and quickly running out of money !

quote:

Originally posted by Fourtyonesix:
Remember all their hunting is edited and what we see may or may not be “ reality”. Also shooting seals with birdshot is a common practice. Putting holes in a seals nasal keeps them from being able to dive and remain under water and easier to get a boat up on to harpoon and retrieve. Some will water skip a .22 thru the side of a seals nose to get the same effect.


Subsistance hunting shouldn’t be compared with sport hunting and it’s “ethics”, look at it more like a wolf killing to survive, it is sometimes
dirty but you use and do whatever you have to
get that food.

quote:

Originally posted by 2th doc:

Subsistence hunting ,at least, to me is off a sled pulled by dogs not a snowmobile, a boat propelled via oars not a 90 HP Merc, as was the norm of the day when it was acceptible. Something galls my ass about seeing someone motor up along side of swimming caribou and shooting them with a .22. I have absolutely no issue if you do it the "old" ways, then fine but to use all the modern tech stuff to fill your Sears Kenmore freezer is nothing less than a ruse allowed to continue by the feel good Liberals.

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Originally posted by JBrown:

quote:

Originally posted by 2th doc:

Subsistence hunting ,at least, to me is off a sled pulled by dogs not a snowmobile, a boat propelled via oars not a 90 HP Merc, as was the norm of the day when it was acceptible. Something galls my ass about seeing someone motor up along side of swimming caribou and shooting them with a .22. I have absolutely no issue if you do it the "old" ways, then fine but to use all the modern tech stuff to fill your Sears Kenmore freezer is nothing less than a ruse allowed to continue by the feel good Liberals.

Your opinion of subsistence hunting is shared by many people who have had little contact with people who live a subsistence lifestyle.

I lived in a village that was only accessible by air. The 400 or so people living there were mostly Inupiaq and they were only the second generation to live in that village year round. Prior to that(1950) the villagers were still living a nomadic lifestyle, following the caribou through much of their seasonal migration via dogsled.

Shortly after 1950 this band of Inupiaq settled in what is now the site of the current village. They settled here so that a school could be built and their children could be educated. For years they still traveled by dog sled to access hunting and fishing. During the Summer they would leave the village and use their dogs as pack animals while they fished, hunted, berry picked and collected plants and roots for food.

By the 1970s there were a few snow machines in the village but most all hunting was done traveling by dogsled. Then the caribou population crashed due to factors that had nothing to do with hunting pressure. By emergency order new rules were put into place. One of these new rules made it illegal to feed caribou to dogs. With the cost of flying in dog food being out of the question the days of the dog sled were finished for this village. The only alternative was the snow machine in the cold months and 6 and 8 wheeled ATVs in the summer. Of course it took cash to buy these machines and fuel was costly so manny villagers took whatever job they could find. With jobs their was less time for hunting so they were forced to use the most efficient means possible.

So today the only people who have experience with dog sleds are elders who are mostly past their hunting years. There are no sleds, few dogs, and no one to run the sleds anyway. In other words, there is no going back.

Yet these people still rely on caribou, fish, berries and plants that they collect for food. Having lived with them I can tell you that those natural traditional foods mean a lot more to them than just the calories they provide. Those foods are who they are, their language, their ancestors, they themselves as people. To take that away from them would be like taking a family off the farm that they had run for generations and dropping them in a Chicago high rise apartment building.

It’s hard to put into words the importance that these foods have in their culture. They cannot be replaced with store bought foods. It is hard to explain because most of us lost these meaningful connections with our food many generations ago and the connections we have with food are largely symbolic feasts such as Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Consider for a moment the importance of foods your family prepares and eats at Thanksgiving. Now imaging you were forced to replace the turkey and other foods with fast food from McDonalds. Would the holiday lose it’s symbolic meaning if the turkey, stuffing and gravy was replaced with chicken McNuggets, fries and barbecue sauce?

Now try to understand that for the villagers everyday is Thanksgiving.

So before you try to constrain their subsistence activities to the aesthetics that you find acceptable, try talking your family into doing Thanksgiving at McDonalds next year. Until then let’s leave the “handicaping” to the archery hunters and muzzle loader hunters and allow the subsistence hunter to do what they need to do to collect the foods that they have been collecting and eating since way back when your ancestors were still hunting and gathering their food.

quote:

Originally posted by 2th doc:

All makes for good reading BUT one cannot overlook the fact that often times the subsistence hunter lives in a bigger town holds an oil field job all week long then uses his families bloodline to ride his ATV out to the caribou herd and pop himself a few easy meals.