ABCNEWS.com: Did Meat Eating Help Shape Society?

[Guest guest]

You have received this ABCNEWS.com mail from:

 

lauren

grinnysmom

 

I thought you might find this story interesting.

 

Did Meat Eating Help Shape Society?

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scitech/DyeHard/dyehard.html

[Guest guest]

For those interested, this sci/tech piece on ABCNEWS.com is not a good

example of recent scholarship in archaeology. It's sad that the general

public would see this snapshot of one man's weak theory.

 

Michael Alvard is making a big assumption based on *his* observations of one

isolated group of people.

 

Culture, organized society, teamwork and cooperation were not developed or

created by males who hunted. Both females *and* males created culture by

doing what they did best: making and gestating infants, birthing and nursing

infants, raising the infants to maturity, gathering plant foods, finding

water and safe places to sleep, and protecting and defending individuals,

homes, and the group.

 

It has been proven time and time again that the first humans ate an almost

exclusively herbivorous diet. On almost all continents, the archaeological

record shows that between 80-90% of all calories came from gathering (not

hunting) and that animal flesh (often that of insects) represented a rare

and sometimes ceremonial contribution to the diet.

 

Of course gathering was predominately a female activity (in *some* human

groups) - and thus in the past many male archaeologists played up and even

falsified the hunting role of males. Contemporary scholarship (with the new

inclusion of female archaeologists) could not continue to ignore the strong

evidence suggesting that early societies were " gatherers who sometimes

hunted " and not " hunter/gatherers " .

 

Simply put, the first humans relied on gathering, and the creation of

society or *culture* was not limited to one gender. Most scholarship has

focused on the role of the mother interacting with her infant and the new

preference to walk upright - thus freeing hands to 1) carry infant 2) gather

fruits, vegetables, roots and 3) signal to others in group.

 

There is also limited scholarship looking at the role of menstruation

(measuring time/moon cycles/mother blood) and its role in the creation of

*culture* and its influence MUCH LATER on the blood rites of males who

hunted (males would often mimic the female menstrual ceremonies before a

hunt).

 

Too bad Stanford University biologist, Paul R. Ehrlich, didn't have a more

prominent voice in the ABC news piece. He is well-respected and has a

better understanding of the current archaeological/biological evidence.

Michael Alvard's theory doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

 

 

 

 

> grinnysmom

> Thu, 21 Mar 2002 08:52:58 -0800 (PST)

>

> [sFBAVeg] ABCNEWS.com: Did Meat Eating Help Shape Society?

>

> I thought you might find this story interesting.

>

> Did Meat Eating Help Shape Society?

> http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scitech/DyeHard/dyehard.html