Erratic Retaliatior

"an·thro·po·mor·phism (ān'thrə-pə-môr'fĭz'əm) Pronunciation Key
n. Attribution of human motivation, characteristics, or behavior to inanimate objects, animals, or natural phenomena." -www.dictionary.com
When Ishmael mentions anthropomorphism in this chapter I believe he is talking about how humans (and the people of "our culture") assume that animals have human characteristics, perform human like actions, and should be like humans because we believe that there is no other way to live, that we are civilized and living the way that humans were supposed to live (like Ishmael mentioned earlier when he talked about Tunes and Dancers). I think this because he says that "this anthropomorphism leads to much confusion. This is not only because animals are incapable of this level
of abstraction, but also because they know nothing about territories and have no interest in territories". This means that humans think that animals view territories the same way we do by actually claiming the land, but it turns out that they think entirely differently and it works for them, and that we should not assume there is only one style of doing things.
"This might be described as a strategy of erratic
retaliation: 'Give as good as you get, but don't be too predictable." When Ishmael says this he means if someone bothers you (like one of the tribes of Cawks) then bother them back, but if they aren't bothering you then it won't be a big deal if you bother them occasionally (because they will return the favor and make it even). Erratic Retaliation is a peacekeeping method because all who practice it understand the terms of it, so if someone attacks they just attack back and it never gets to out of hand (like annihilation). The reason Cawks just perform occasional attacks and don't just annihilate each other is because it does not follow the rules of Erratic Retaliation, and if one tribe started killing everyone then all the other tribes would take up the same practice, and soon there might not be any Cawks left. Another reason this wouldn't work is because if one tribe had five members left, and another only had two members left and they decided to unite against a greater enemy both of their tribes have different laws and customs which would clash and may cause conflict between them which would totally eliminate the purpose of uniting to kill the greater enemy.

Ishmael Questions

Ishmael’s two general rules on how to identify people from our culture are “You’ll know you’re among people of your culture if the food is all owned, if it’s all under lock and key.” The second rule is “They perceive themselves to be members of a race that is fundamentally flawed and inherently doomed to suffering and misery.” (Pages 39-40). I do not believe Ishmael when he says that all the world’s people are part of the same culture. I believe culture is something that differs depending on location, resources, people, religion etc. For example, if you lived in Antarctica a long time ago your culture might have been eating fish, fishing for food, building igloos, wearing fur to keep out the cold. When Ishmael says that people from all over the world are part of the same culture it could make sense from a very broad point of view if he meant that we all wear clothes, speak a language, eat food, drink water, and are all influenced by mother culture.

Like Ishmael, I too disagree with mother cultures voice that tells us we are inherently flawed. Ishmael’s whole purpose is to teach a pupil how to save the world and if he thought we were totally flawed then we couldn’t be saved. Ishmael also recognizes the root of all our problems as being how we decided to lock our food away from ourselves and the agricultural revolution. If he and others across the world understand the root or the problem (which is something we caused, and we were not born with) than he knows how to abolish the root and then the rest of the problem at hand. After watching The Story of Stuff, I also realize that there are other ways of helping the human race so we are not doomed. It seems to me that we are not flawed, but its what we are doing that is flawed, and we have been doing it for so long and do not recognize the problem, so we accept it into our lives and believe that is how we were born to be, and will always be.

The takers and leavers are a metaphor for hunter/gathers/foragers compared to farmers. These relate to American culture because the first Americans, the Native American Indians were hunter gathers and foragers until European settlers came from the outside world. The Native Americans were perfectly content with their lifestyle but the Europeans had lived in a world where farming and modern inventions seemed totally necessary, and they told the Native Americans that is how they were supposed to live. If they didn’t comply they would take over the land, but some Indian Tribes liked the new foods they could grow with agriculture and were jealous of the Europeans and so they complied and joined the Europeans and helped them make new modern villages, and converted to a different lifestyle. This has grown into what American culture is today, with agriculture, grocery stores, factories, cars, clothing, money, government and more.

Sustainability

The first thing that comes to mind when I think of the words “sustainability” is the ability to keep something or sustain it, for it to be kept constant and within certain boundaries. When most people think of living sustainably can be found from the dictionary “Any lifestyle based on energy-saving and environmental responsibility” but I also think this term is limited to living based on saving energy and land but can be applied to government, or money and freedom. What I mean by this is if you look at the actual definition of the word “sustain” it means: to support, hold, or bear up from below; bear the weight of, as a structure. To keep (a person, the mind, the spirits, etc.) from giving way. If you apply this to a society it could mean being able to keep money within the community or distributed equally so no one is too drastically affected by poverty, or so the whole society’s money doesn’t lose value. It could also mean that government or freedom is kept throughout the community and that everyone is supported and happy.

When I think of my freedom the first thing I think of is the freedom my parents allow me to have. If you base it on that I don’t have much freedom due to my parents paranoia that I am going to get kidnapped and die… If you look at a larger scale like the freedom the government gives me compared to adults we don’t have a lot. We can’t vote for who leads our country, we can’t really drive freely, we aren’t allowed to drink, work most places, buy a house, stay out on the streets past 11 pm (well at least in San Diego) etc… If you compare our freedom to other countries we actually do have a lot of rights. Boys and girls are allowed to go to school, we can wear anything we want, we can have any religion, we are allowed to participate in numerous activities etc. It just depends how you look at it and from what point of view you are taking.

As a 14/15 year old I think I can live my life more sustainably by paying more attention to world issues and problems America or my community is having and trying to help them and play my part in the solution. If you look again at the definition of “living sustainably” : “Any lifestyle based on energy-saving and environmental responsibility” If you look at our world today we are obviously experiencing major issues with our environment due to global warming, pollution and lack or recycling. If I wanted to help that I could recycle more or pick up trash, try to convince my parents to buy hybrids.