{"id":57214,"date":"2021-03-22T06:36:14","date_gmt":"2021-03-22T11:36:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=57214"},"modified":"2021-03-22T06:36:14","modified_gmt":"2021-03-22T11:36:14","slug":"the-fat-takers-cross-the-oceans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=57214","title":{"rendered":"The fat-takers cross the oceans"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The fat-takers cross the oceans<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/header>\n
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Ecological overshoot is a global crisis today, but the problem did not begin with the fossil fuel age. From its beginnings more than five centuries ago, European colonization has been based on an unsustainable exploitation of resources.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In\u00a0Seeker of Visions<\/i><\/a>, John (Fire) Lame Deer says \u201cThe Sioux have a name for white men. They call them\u00a0wasicun<\/i>\u00a0\u2013 fat-takers. It is a good name, because you have taken the fat of the land.\u201d<\/p>\n

The term, often also written as \u201cwasi\u2019chu\u201d, has engendered discussion as to what the words originally meant in the Lakota language.<\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span>\u00a0In any case, the phrase \u201cfat-takers\u201d seemed fitting to Lame Deer, it caught on quite widely \u2013 and it took literal meaning to me as I learned more about the history of European colonization.<\/p>\n

When I wrote a newspaper review of a then-new book by Farley Mowat in the 1980s, I couldn\u2019t help but recall Lame Deer\u2019s words. Nearly thirty years later, I\u2019ve come to regard Mowat\u2019s book,\u00a0Sea of Slaughter<\/i>, as a foundational study in biophysical economic history.<\/p>\n

Here, Canadians may ask incredulously, \u201cSince when was Farley Mowat a biophysical economist?\u201d And readers from everywhere else are likely to ask \u201cFarley who<\/i>?\u201d A brief bit of biography is in order.<\/p>\n

Farley Mowat (1921 \u2013 2014)\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>was one of the most successful Canadian writers of all time, author of dozens of best-selling books beginning in 1952 and continuing into the twenty-first century. He wrote in a popular style about his own experiences in Canada\u2019s far north, the maritime provinces, travels in Siberia, and his life-long love of the natural world. Never shying from controversy, Mowat became a hero to many Canadians when he was banned from entering the US, and he was vilified by many for his support of the direct-action\u00a0Sea Shepherd Conservation Society<\/a> which named two of its ships in his honour…<\/p>\n

\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n

canada, farley mowat, an outside chance, Bart Hawkins Kreps<\/a>, overshoot,\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The fat-takers cross the oceans Ecological overshoot is a global crisis today, but the problem did not begin with the fossil fuel age. From its beginnings more than five centuries ago, European colonization has been based on an unsustainable exploitation of resources. In\u00a0Seeker of Visions, John (Fire) Lame Deer says \u201cThe Sioux have a name […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[11879,11876,103,31063,3197],"class_list":["post-57214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment","tag-an-outside-chance","tag-bart-hawkins-kreps","tag-canada","tag-farley-mowat","tag-overshoot"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=57214"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57214\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57215,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57214\/revisions\/57215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=57214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=57214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=57214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}