• Diamond argues further that tribal societies are considerably more violent than industrialized societies and that ‘most small-scale societies [are] trapped in… warfare’. His conclusions advocate the imposition of state governments, stating that ‘the biggest advantage of state government is the bringing of peace
• In an article published by the US publication Daily Beast entitled ‘Savaging Primitives: Why Jared Diamond’s “The World Until Yesterday” is completely wrong’, Survival’s Director Stephen Corry attacks two of Diamond’s main messages: that today’s tribal peoples are a model of how everyone lived until a few thousand years ago (in a ‘world until yesterday’); and that tribal societies are more violent than industrialized societies
• Diamond argues that tribal peoples (he calls them ‘traditional societies’), while partly modified by contact, are best thought of as living more or less like humankind did until the ‘earliest origins of agriculture around 11,000 years ago in the Fertile Crescent’. But the idea that today’s tribal peoples live anything like humankind’s ancestors has been contested by many scientists. Like all societies, tribal societies change constantly in order to survive, and are just as much part of the 21st Century and ‘modern’ as everyone else.
• But Corry questions the validity of Diamond’s data and concludes that the idea that tribal societies are more violent than industrialized ones is ‘dangerous nonsense’, and his conclusions akin to colonial ideas of ‘pacifying savages’

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• Tribals forced into naked dance

   

    Headlines Today | January 11, 2012 

   

  The incident came to light as The Guardian released a video of a cop urging Jarawa tribals to dance for the amusement of the tourists. Story

• Government has ordered an inquiry by the Chief Secretary and Director General of Police (DGP) of Andaman & Nicobar Islands into a video footage showing semi-naked Jarawa tribal women allegedly being ordered to dance before tourists in return for fo
• "Inquiry has been ordered (into the episode) and it is being headed by the Chief Secretary and DGP of Andaman & Nicobar Islands. They have been reporting to the Home Ministry and they are in contact with the Tribal Affairs Ministry as well," Union Tribal Affairs Minister V. Kishore Chandra Deo said.

• The shocking footage -- released by The Observer and The Guardian -- shows semi-nude women of Jarawa tribe being made to dance for tourists. Moreover, the tourists are seen throwing food and money to these tribal people during a trip organised by the operators in connivance with the local authorities
• The Observer reporter Gethin Chamberlain, who released the video, said, "You go to a tour operator in Port Blair, you pay them 15,000 rupees and he will make sure selling human safari packages... 130, 150 cars line up. They are not there to see the caves at the end of the road as they claim. They are there to see tribals like animals in a zoo."
• Tribal have now started covering themselves. This video could not have been shot recently unless from a moving vehicle.
• National Advisory Council member Harsh Mander regretted the delay on part of government in implementing its recommendations, including on the tribal areas of the union territory

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