Amazon tribe sighting raises dilemma of contact

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My favorite quote from this news article reminds me of being an Aspie in a non-Aspie world.
Merle

"While we are getting arrows in the face, it's fine," he told Brazil's Globo newspaper. "The day that they are well-behaved, they are finished."


Stuart Grudgings
Reuters North American News Service

May 30, 2008 12:17 EST

RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) - Dramatic photographs of previously unfound Amazon Indians have highlighted the precariousness of the few remaining "lost" tribes and the dangers they face from contact with outsiders.

The bow-and-arrow wielding Indians in the pictures released on Thursday are likely the remnants of a larger tribe who were forced deeper into the forest by encroaching settlement, experts said.

Rather than being "lost", they have likely had plenty of contact with other indigenous groups over the years, said Thomas Lovejoy, an Amazon expert who is president of The Heinz Center in Washington.

"I think there is an ethical question whether you can in the end keep them from any contact and I think the answer to that is no," Lovejoy said.

"The right answer is to have the kind of contact and change that the tribes themselves manage the pace of it."

The Brazil-Peru border area is one of the world's last refuges for such groups, with more than 50 uncontacted tribes thought to live there out of the estimated 100 worldwide.

They are increasingly at risk from development, especially on the Peruvian side which has been slower than Brazil to recognize protected areas for indigenous people.

Jose Carlos Meirelles, an official with Brazil's Indian protection agency who was on the helicopter that overflew the tribe, said they should be left alone as much as possible.

"While we are getting arrows in the face, it's fine," he told Brazil's Globo newspaper. "The day that they are well-behaved, they are finished."

Contact with outsiders has historically been disastrous for Brazil's Indians, who now number about 350,000 compared to up to 5 million when the first Europeans arrived.

"In 508 years of history, out of the thousands of tribes that exist none have adapted well to society in Brazil," said Sydney Possuelo, a former official with Brazil's Indian protection agency who founded its isolated tribes department.


CONCERN OVER PERU POLICY

In recent years, though, tribes like the Yanomami have succeeded in winning greater protection by becoming more politically organized and forming links with foreign conservationists.

"It's not about making that decision for them. It's about making time and space to make that decision themselves," said David Hill of the Survival International group.

More than half of the Murunahua tribe in Peru died of colds and other illness after they were contacted as a result of development for the first time in 1996, Hill said.

Sightings of such tribes are not uncommon, occurring once every few years in the Brazil-Peru border area where there are estimated to be more than 50 out of the total global number of 100 uncontacted tribes.

In 1998, a 200-strong tribe was discovered by Possuelo living in huts under the forest canopy, also in Acre state near the Brazil-Peru border.

In September last year, ecologists looking for illegal loggers in Peru spotted a little-known nomadic tribe deep in the Amazon.

The sighting underscored worries among rights groups that oil and gas exploration being pushed by the Peruvian government, as well as logging, is putting tribes at risk.

Peru has no equivalent to Brazil's long-standing Indian affairs department, which has a policy of no contact with unknown tribes.

"There is a lot of logging going on over on the Peruvian side," Hill said. "It's had all kinds of effects on the groups living there, particularly on the uncontacted groups -- it's led to violent conflicts and deaths."

In May, Peru's petroleum agency Perupetro said it would exclude areas where isolated tribes live from an auction of oil and gas concessions. Perupetro had been under pressure to limit exploration activities near tribal areas, and had cast doubt on the existence of isolated groups, angering activists.

(Additional reporting by Pedro Fonseca in Rio and Terry Wade in Lima; editing by Angus MacSwan)

Source: Reuters North American News Service

I was readin about this story HERE and some of the comments made on the artical was unreal!

Such as: "They deserve the gospel.

Human beings aren't animals to be studied and catalogued. They have an inherent dignity and a right to know the truth. To let them continue to live in ignorance would be a crime."

People like that don't realize that is was religious groups including christians where have been the biggest offender of tainting cultures and causing war, some of the great culters of the the world where destroyed by early christans.

I just hope that the missionaries stay away from them.

YOUR RELIGIOUS BIGOTRY SHINES THROUGH!

They are not animals, but why would anyone visiting them be any worse than them coming to visit you. The human thing is a two way street, you know. They're just people. Visiting them is no more of an issue than visiting anyone else in Brazil. The line gets crossed when people don't behave as a guest should.

WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU GOING ON ABOUT?!

My in-laws are only a couple generations removed from Amazon indigenous people. There are un-assimilated and semi-assimilated tribes. As long as you respect them as equals, there's nothing wrong with contacting these tribes. Some of them can be downright nice places to escape the crap you have to tolerate in everyday life. Some of them are downright nice people that happily offer you food and a place to sleep. Like any culture, let them decide. They are intelligent adults, treat them as such.

I was referring to you accusing Chibi_Neko of having "religious bigotry", which is false. If anything, she has anti-religious sentiments.

Native people during the crusades where intelligent adults, but where not given much of a choice. People who did not convert where often tourtured. People in Norway where drowned if they refused to convert. The crusades has taught us some harsh lessons, which is not to let this type of thiing to happen again. Today christanity is more about helping your fellow man more then spreading the word, but there are still missionaries who go out to convert people.



Overall I am against trying to convert any religion to any other religion, if people are happy with the faith that they have, then they should be left alone. Some old cultures would be here today if they where left alone.

I see no problem with voluntary conversion based on intellectual conversations with natives or anyone. One unarmed missionary versus a tribe of armed people -> they don't have to listen if they don't want to.

Exactlly, but I got a feeling that they wont seeing as they don't know anything about the outside world, they seem to rather keep to themselves.

I do.

From Oil Watch, Oil Exploitation in the Yasuni Biosphere Reserve, p.8-9 (http://www.oilwatch.org.ec/english/docu ... ni_ing.pdf)

“The tragic history of the Huaorani begins with the arrival of the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL), a North American group with a religious approach that learns the native languages, translates the Bible and evangelizes the indigenous populations, in order to achieve a favorable environment for the North American companies. Starting on the second decade of the 20th Century, SIL worked in Ecuador to favor Texaco.

Due to their reputation as ferocious warriors, it was necessary to “clean” the area before exploration activities could begin, so that oil workers could have a peaceful work environment. So SIL created a “Protectorate” whose intentions were to reduce all of the Huaorani people into a very small space controlled by SIL. This process took several years, between 1958 and 1971.”

From The Peoples of the World Foundation, The Huaorani (http://peoplesoftheworld.org/text?people=Huaorani)

“In the late 1960s the oil company, Texaco, approached the Ecuadorian government hoping for permission to drill for oil on Huaorani land. Saint and Dayuma became a key part of the following massive displacement of hundreds of Huaorani.”

“The missionaries and the Ecuadorian government agreed to relocate as many Huaorani as possible away from the drilling areas to the missions that had been established in the previous ten years. Hundreds were relocated, while others fled to even more remote parts of the jungle.”

From Brandon Yoder, Indigenous People and Oil Production In Ecuador's Oriente (http://www.cwis.org/fwj/51/b_yoder.html)

“Out of all of the negative aspects that have come about as a result of oil production in the Oriente, the one that has had the greatest impact on the indigenous people, outside of the pollution, has been the encroachment of missionaries into their daily lives. Beginning in 1967 with Texaco’s discovery of the Oriente oil field, oil companies have constantly used missionaries as a method of quelling indigenous animosity and relocating the indigenous peoples from possible drilling sites. The missionaries used in these procedures have drastically reshaped the indigenous communities and are responsible for altering the behavioral practices that once served as a way of life for the indigenous peoples. Although Rachel Saint’s establishment of a permanent indigenous community precedes Texaco’s oil exploration (Kimmerling, 76), her role in the early years of Texaco’s oil production was momentous because of her success in aiding the relocation of the indigenous people.

When Texaco first began to move into the Oriente, it was the Huaorani tribe that presented the greatest obstacle to Texaco’s efforts. Various attempts to bribe the Huaorani with air dropped packages containing metal goods and food supplies were unsuccessful and Texaco initiated the use of violence against the indigenous peoples (Kimmerling, 78). The violent outbreaks with Texaco scared many of the Huaorani, who in fear relocated to Tihueno, Saint’s permanent indigenous community.”

“After missionaries were successful in abetting Texaco’s attempts to overcome the obstacles that the indigenous people posed, further impact on the indigenous peoples continued. While the displacement and relocation of the tribes was occurring, Texaco lost no time and began construction on the Via Auca, a roadway that extends sixty miles deep into the center of traditional indigenous lands (Kimmerling, 85). The Via Auca was responsible for the deforestation of 2.5 million acres of rainforest and a government encouraged flood of settlers. The invasion of settlers and the pollution from oil production were both liable for the degradation of the rainforest, which brutally impacted the indigenous peoples who had not migrated to permanent indigenous communities. The surrounding lands that transcend the length of the Via Auca have been severely polluted, in addition to being colonized and deforested. The settlers inhabiting the land along the Via Auca have often held very tense relations with the Huaorani and other indigenous tribes, a tension which infringes on the indigenous peoples’ ability to live a life in accordance with longstanding cultural standards. Texaco’s practices in the areas encircling the Via Auca have contaminated the environment so harshly that the indigenous people residing these surrounding areas are no longer able to live a healthy life.”

yes but they don't want to change their faith
why not just leave them alone!

If they don't want to, then they don't have to. A person only believes what they want to anyway, even if someone tries to force a belief and get them to practice said belief, what they actually believe will still be internal regardless of the external.

Forced conversions are wrong and really don't work, changing a person's mind is more than changing their actions. So, my stance is: if they want to talk, talk while you can. If they don't want to hear, don't bother because it isn't worth it.

but why can't they just leave them alone?

if they wanna be christians they can find out themselves

That would not be possible, also it defies the Commission that Christ gave.
We are suppose to be out there sharing our faith with anyone that will listen,
not just sit around and do nothing like lazy cowards.

Missionaries went to Hawai'i because the whalers were coming back to New England all sexually free and laid back after being there. The Royals (Ali'i) saw the big ships, the manufactured goods (with raw materials not available on the Islands) and were told that the new God would bring them these things too, if they stopped exposing their skins to the sunshine and only loved their legally married spouses, so of course they did not resist the missionaries.
so frankly, it is not Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus, but practicalities that change the mind.

IMO. the religion is just an excuse for some larger, more sinister purpose, (As the research posted by sinsboldly, illustrates very well.) Things are never what they initially seem, at first.