Not Enough for Everyone’s Greed
January 20, 2011
We
don’t have to look far to learn of ways we have exhausted the
resources of our planet, and driven countless species to extinction, by
our addiction to more, more, more. Recently I read an example of how
this played out on the American continent over 150 years ago. The
following is not meant to support meat-eating, but rather to relate how
another group depleted their food supply past the point of no return.
The Comanche tribe of the Southwestern grasslands depended on bison
herds for their sustenance, not only for food, but for clothing, tipis,
and simple tools. They very successfully developed a wide-ranging trade
economy based on bison meat and especially bison robes, becoming so
dominant that their language was the language of commerce from eastern
New Mexico across all of Texas, from southern Kansas all the way to the
Mexican border, in the 18th and first half of the 19th
centuries. Had they killed only the number of animals necessary for
their own needs, and been careful not to take pregnant bison cows, the
herds would not have diminished. But the Comanches were taking far more
than they needed so that they could increase their wealth by trade, and
the animals’ thicker fur in winter brought the highest prices. Winter
was also when the bison cows were pregnant, so killing them at that time
had a serious impact on the animals’ ability to reproduce. As time
passed, the tribe began accumulating huge herds of surplus horses for
trade as well. The horses competed directly with the bison for grass in
this fragile environment. Furthermore, as the Comanches began to cement
alliances with neighboring tribes by permitting them to use the same
hunting grounds, many more hunters further depleted the herds.
By the 1850's bison numbers were noticeably declining, and then
several years of drought on the plains brought them to the point of
collapse. (This was a couple of decades before bounty hunters came West
and methodically slaughtered bison by the millions.) Just like us today
when we see our environment in trouble due to our excess exploitation,
the Comanches did not change their behavior for years. Their experience
had taught them that herd numbers bounced back after a decline, and they
failed to see the seriousness of the situation they themselves had
caused. The tribe was starving by the time the U.S. Army arrived and
paradoxically saved those who were left by moving them to reservations
where food was provided.
I don’t have space here to tell the whole story (read The
Comanche Empire by Pekka Hamalainen) but like them, our society is
overreliant on livestock, and greed leads to ruin. In our case, instead
of just a regional impact, we are ruining the entire planet’s ability
to produce enough food for our bloated numbers (the entire Comanche
population at the time of the drought was only about 20,000).
The time to go vegetarian and drastically scale back our
overconsumptive lifestyles is now.
