We don’t need any Rousseauian myths to cloud our reasoning.

Even herbivores can be extremely dangerous. I’ve worked with elk (wapiti), and they are very high-strung, trembling even as you feed them. They are always in flight-or-fight around humans (or were at this particular farm), and that can go either way in an instant.

If Napes exist, this doesn’t make them ‘evil’, but when we haven’t exactly got a rigorous database on their behavior, we should be cautious. We ought not assume that they are a replacement for native Americans and polynesians as Rousseau’s “noble savage.” That could get people killed.

You’re affiliation with the MQ show is as a consulting expert. And I give you high marks in that capacity.

I did, however do more investigating on the incident involving the girl that supposedly hit a biped with her car and it getting shot with a gun by her boyfriend.

From what I found out, the local authorities did interview the girl and her boyfriend. After being questioned, the girl’s story fell apart and the boyfriend admitted that it was all a hoax they cooked up. He shot into the trees to make the story plausible. I’m not sure if they cooked it up because they knew MQ was coming into their area, or if it was for other reasons.

In any case, it’s sad. Sad because MQ believed and trusted their story. Sad because this is the kind of thing that makes Bigfoot look like an aggressive creature, And sad, because people like myself believe in bigfoot and would like others to take it seriously.

I’m not sure I have ever heard of a less-violent animal than the sasquatch, including most protozoa. (Actually, there may not be ANY animal less violent than the sasquatch, all protozoa included.) The forbearance shown by bears toward our species – which should no less than embarrass us – is far more than overshadowed by that of the sasquatch.

I’ve read more reports than just about anybody, I think, and I’ve never read of a violent encounter. (By which I mean: someone got injured or killed, without having done anything that could be construed as provocation.) I’m more than suspicious of any that have been reported.

That said, mystery_man is right. Some bears give bears a bad name. And I firmly believe that animals are individual personalities, and your luck with one depends on which one you meet.

Which makes the total absence of violence from the sasquatch encounter reports I have read even more remarkable.

The men in Ape Canyon had taken shots at the large, hairy man-like creatures they saw before their cabin was stoned and attacked. Loren’s earlier postings of articles from the 1930’s and 1940’s told of the Sasquatch hurling rocks at people in the B.C. interior. Early European pioneers and prospectors throughout B.C., Yukon, Alaska etc. were always carrying their firearms and I wonder how many of them shot at and possibly wounded any of these large hominids simply out of fear or sadly for fun.

Undoubtedly any such behaviour from humans like these would give humans in general a ‘black mark’ in the minds of Sasquatch drawing violent (stone-throwing) behaviour in response and even against people who had no intent to harm them. Violent reactions from Sasquatch might then be area specific depending on the historical actions by humans travelling through their territories and with a possibility of passing on this reactionary behaviour towards humans to their progeny.

How does today’s scarring of the environment by vast swaths of clear cutting forest, huge open pit mining operations and the pollution made by these industries have on Sasquatch conciousness and their response to human beings? Would they become saddened like Harry (and the Hendersons) and retreat to less populated areas or would they make a stand and fend off any human incursions?

This sort of behavior is common not only with large primates, but with other mystery hominids such as the Yowie as well. In some cases, they could very well have easily killed or severely injured the person in question (and the person may have felt their life was in grave danger), but they did not. This suggests to me that in some cases of seemingly violent behavior, there may not be as much earnest aggression there as it may seem. The fact that some victims of Bigfoot violence have even lived to tell the tale says something.

I also wanted to mention that if sasquatch are out there, these sort of encounters are likely to become more common as human development encroaches on the creature’s habitat and increases the chances for contact. The more human settlements push into sasquatch territory, the more we can probably expect to see aggressive incidents and friction between our species. This sort of trend has happened time and time again with many wild animals.

Well, swnoel, you may think that “a program on BF attacking people is a leap,” but you don’t know your television documentary history if you truly feel that.

“In Search Of” in the 1970s did one of their best episodes on Bigfoot attacks, if you will recall, on the Mt. St. Helens 1924 miners-being-stoned-by-Bigfoot story. How about the Teddy Roosevelt tale that has been retold numerous times? Other programs have done likewise. Bigfoot attacks as the subject matter of programs are hardly a leap, but actually more a regular part of the menu.

My quotation, of course, was edited and extracted out of a longer discussion I was having about the speculative evolution of human-primate interactions and the possible nature of more violence as evidenced and experienced by humans in the Eastern USA, especially based upon dog killings and what people testify as having happened. Also, therefore, it had to do with the increased intensive content of violence in the Bigfoot community reportage. Testimony, story-telling, and speculation are not necessarily tied to actual facts, of course. Almost everything written and said about Bigfoot, needless to say, is speculative, viewed through the human lense, and reflective of the cultural environment in which the alleged events take place.

My ability to make predictions, 25 years out, about what kinds of stories we will be hearing (as opposed to what actually takes place) is thus based upon my sociological and psychological sense of the humans, as much as my knowledge of what a Bigfoot might do (which is much more difficult to foresee). I have never denied that I speak first and foremost from the human point of view, not from that of the Sasquatch’s.

There are some cases in the BFRO and GCBRO files (available online) of Bigfoot encounters where objects were thrown, animals were attacked, etc.

Also, in the appendix of the book “Florida’s Unexpected Wildlife”, there are several reports of people being attacked (a few in their cars).

Finally, there was a case out near Apopka years ago of one allegedly ripping the screen door off of a house and chasing the resident into the woods, a case in Belleview I believe of a hitchhiker being attacked, and another of a security guard being attacked.

How bout proving it exists first!

Loren, did you make a statement to the effect that BF would kill someone within the next 25 years or did I misunderstand?

Or did you mean , it would be proven to exist, within the next 25 years.