Talk:Bearskin

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Edit for NPOV:

I hate PETA, but I still feel that "which seems misguided knowing the bears would be culled regardless." tacked onto the end of a sentence about how they protest the use of real fur violates NPOV, and so I've removed it.

Contents 1 Removal of Inuit and culling reference. 2 PETA 3 Other wearers 4 Population

[edit] Removal of Inuit and culling reference.

While researching an article on bearskins for a newspaper I have noticed the following errors with this entry. The bearskins were not culled by the Inuit as previously mentioned. The Inuit hunt polar bears, and rarely hunt below the tree line where Black Bears live. There is also no evidence that Black Bears are routinely culled, which suggests a managed population control. They are hunted.

John Triggs

[edit] PETA

Peta tries to push its Point of View into the article. But Peta is anything but an acceptable source. I read the things they write on their homepage and it is loaded with words like "slaughter" or "When mother bears are killed, orphaned cubs are left behind to starve." My favorite is: Bearskins "are not even bullet-proof". Therefore let us keep Peta out of here an stick with the version we have, as we are a encyclopedia and not an animal rights association. --noclador (talk) 11:37, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I completley agree on the point pushing of PETA and the imbalance in parts of this article. I have also viewed PETA's special sub-site for this campaign, and many of their arguments seem unfounded and classic cases of 'straw men' and 'ad hominem' arguments. I also get the overwhelming impression that many of the 'facts' they use are very inaccurate and sensationalised in order to put forward their point of view. Now I have no problem with them holding such a view; on the contrary, freedom of speech is a right I hold dearly - however, I don't believe it is valid to use facts from such an organisation in encyclopedia articles even if cited. The facts put forward are tools in an incredably biased argument, and therefore little weight cannot be placed on them due to the bias of the source. It is fair to represent PETA's objections in the article, but factual evidence from their site should be omitted from this factual article. 666roberto - 27/03/08. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 666roberto (talk • contribs) 01:08, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Roberto - I agree with you that the PETA sites about this subject are sensationalized. What do you expect? That's what they do. However, there are other references that are used in the Wiki article, like media reports and government rep statements, that appear to be free from PETA bias but nonetheless support their view. As you can see below, I felt the same way as you and went through to find some "real" sources, which I hope I did. Have you looked over those? If you can find better sources, or ones that appear less biased, please do. Part of the problem with this article being balanced is that the arguments being used in favor of the hats by the purchasers are

pretty weak and not well stated.Bob98133 (talk) 15:11, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree that unsupported, unreferenced material should be kept out as well as POV material promoting any point of view. However, just because you don't like PETA as a source does not mean that they don't exist. I don't always agree with them, but if an editor uses them as a source I think that you have to at least consider the information particularly if it is properly referenced. It looks like the PETA section in this article has been tacked on without references, since it doesn't belong where it is and only appears to be PETA POV, but there has been considerable controversy about this, so perhaps citing another source would be appropriate.Bob98133 (talk) 17:39, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I had some time today so I went through this and pulled references for a lot of the material that was unsupported. I also: supplied reference for Cdn use of bearskins

removed nick-name – the Van Doos – from Cdn unit – not very worthy info

changed 100 pelts a year to 50-100 bear skins per reference cited

added “allegedly” 100 years old since there is no reference, but this is believed to be true

added Opposition section

added reference from 1888 NYT

added reference from 1997 UK government call for ban

cleaned up and referenced section about PETA concerns

added info about uncertainty of source and number of bears

I think that having an Opposition section with a variety of points of view against the hats tones down PETA's propaganda and makes the focus more on the bearskin hats than on animal rights or any other POV. I was surprised at how much oppostion there has been to these hats - even back to the 19th century! Bob98133 (talk) 00:30, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Other wearers

Drummers and drum majors of 3 RAR and 2/4RAR (not sure now they are de-linked) wear bearskins hats. The drum major of one of the main US Army bands also wears one. Ozdaren (talk) 14:31, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Hi - if you can find some references, add them in. I looked for some and it was quite confusing since there are now a lot of groups that do re-enactments that wear them, but the present day corps don't. If there's enough of them, maybe it should be formatted in a short list or something.Bob98133 (talk) 15:17, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Not sure about links but I can provide photos from my time as a piper. Ozdaren (talk) 10:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

That would be cool, but it might not fly by Wiki standards. I found lots of contemporary pictures of military in bearskins, but as I said they were from reenactments, so it wasn't clear if they were still in use or not.Bob98133 (talk) 14:11, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Found an online photo link [1]. The drummers wear bearskins which were donated (not mentioned in the link) from the Scots Guards which is the UK affiliated regiment of 3RAR [2]. The actual drum major wears the complete guardsman's uniform. 2/4 RAR also wore bearskins for the drummers, this was due to their Irish Guards connection. It seems neither 2 or 4 RAR now wear them. Ozdaren (talk) 13:36, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Population

I removed the line stating that the Canadian population is roughly half a million and the source, not relavent to the bearskin hat, and if your read it you see that the population is on the rise and that the States also have almost half a million black bears, two halves is about one whole million. So, despite a growing population, despite being having approximately a million in north america, that sentence was phrased as if it was small and in danger from the hat industry. Furthermore, while the hats are black, ruling out that some of the fur comes from brown or other bears and can be dyed black without sources is not acceptable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.137.207.191 (talk) 01:53, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I think that line should be reinstated. The fur for the hats is only taken from black bears and only those living in Canada, so the number of black bears in North America, or the number of brown bears anywhere, is not relevent. Those who are using the bears for hats claim that the bears are plentiful, by stating the approximate number, the reader can decide.Bob98133 (talk) 13:04, 15 April 2008 (UTC)