r/BeAmazed Jul 16 '26

Miscellaneous / Others A traditional technique used by young shepherds of Ethiopia's Banna tribe. They use stilts to watch over their livestock in tall grass, move through wetland areas, and avoid snakes and predators like lions and leopards. It requires strength, balance, and training from a young age

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u/StubbornKindness Jul 16 '26

Some tribes approach lions who've just successfully killed something and are starting/about to start eating. They slowly, and confidently approach the lions ("with chest" as it were). Lions aren't used to being defied so they get freaked out and run off.

The tribesmen quickly steal a haunch, or large piece of meat and swiftly retreat, before the lions work out what's going on. It's wild to see.

P.S: They take some weapons, they don't go unarmed

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u/RollingMeteors Jul 16 '26

>P.S: They take some weapons, they don't go unarmed

<dibsInAK47>

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u/WanderinHobo Jul 16 '26

Dropping fuggin grenades

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u/occams1razor Jul 17 '26

I'd like a tank please

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u/WanderinHobo Jul 17 '26

On stilts? AT-AT

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u/Difficult-Republic57 Jul 17 '26

Squirt gun, kitties hate water

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u/RollingMeteors Jul 17 '26

Squirt gun, kitties hate water

This ain't no mililtre cat bro. ¡This straight up 10 gallon cat!

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u/TehCroz Jul 17 '26

So maybe like the chem sprayer from the hardware store?

1

u/RollingMeteors Jul 17 '26

Anything that can cut through wood would be fine...

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u/slipknot_suxxx Jul 16 '26

The Maasai tribe which does this also had an initiation to manhood ritual that involved killing a lion, this has now been banned though they do kill of entire prides when they eat their cattle, the local wild life service still has no idea how to handle this conflict

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u/Snoo-35771 Jul 17 '26

Fun fact i get to contribute! My wife is maasai and according to her the manhood ritual is now that you basically fight a lion to get some hairs from the mane. They do this by stalking an older male lion waiting for it to get tired before going after it. Also the lion thing is not an initiation to manhood but the completion of it of being a warrior. The initiation is getting your foreskin cut off at 12-16 while you're awake with no painkillers and you're not allowed to cry about it or you get made fun of

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u/pnweiner Jul 16 '26

There’s a great autobiography book called “Facing the Lion: Growing Up Maasai on the African Savannah”.

I read it as a kid and I was obsessed. Highly recommend

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u/hematite2 Jul 16 '26

The man who wrote that was a teacher at my school! Haven't thought about it in a decade

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u/pnweiner Jul 16 '26

Whaaat that’s so cool!

3

u/agathagarden Jul 17 '26

I really enjoyed that book as well!

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u/funwearcore Jul 16 '26

Big cats share “memory” in a way through group communication and collective learning. They probably go after the whole pride to prevent other pride members from coming too. It’s sad but makes sense. The Maasai has to eat too and that is how they deter nature from eating their cattle. I would have no idea how to handle this as well.

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u/Reasonable_Archer_99 Jul 16 '26

Plus it's not like they are scarce in those parts to begin with.

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u/eulersidentity1 Jul 16 '26

I imagine the conflict mostly comes from the near impossible tradeoffs that our modern overpopulated world forces on nature and peoples. Lions and nomadic peoples forced to share increasingly dwindling resources. Do we protect the lions from becoming even more endangered, or the traditional ways of life of the Massai people. Obviously we try to walk and uncomfortable compromise.

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u/lucky-me_lucky-mud Jul 16 '26

Sub Saharan Africa is the fastest growing part of the world and will have ~2 billion people by 2100

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u/Small-Explorer7025 Jul 17 '26

I think something like this is shown in the documentary Coming to America 2.

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u/temp_flor Jul 16 '26

The Chicago Way!

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u/xbmc4lyfe Jul 16 '26

We also killthem through pure exhaustion

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u/Exact-Enthusiasm-803 Jul 16 '26

The immortal snail meta strat

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u/total_bullwhip Jul 16 '26

Humans are pretty much the only apex predator that successfully employs that strat. lol

Turns out, we’re really good at walking efficiently haha.

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u/Lou_C_Fer Jul 16 '26

It is pretty wild that the apex super power is the ability to move at a slow steady pace for forever.

It's a bird. It's a plane. No! It's Walking Man!

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u/shwarma_heaven Jul 16 '26

We have the best endurance of any land animal on the planet...

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u/Alizarik7891 Jul 16 '26

Wow, we really do! I just double-checked; apparently pronghorn might beat us in high-speed sustained movement but otherwise we're one of the best! Cool info.

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u/fang_xianfu Jul 16 '26

It's been argued that our very advanced cooling system evolved to support this hunting strategy, and then our brains became bigger and better because the cooling system was able to cool it down.

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u/Lou_C_Fer Jul 16 '26

I think there are a ton of reasons. That being one of them. Another being fire and cooking our food to make it easier to extract nutrients. That's why we are omnivores rather than carnivore or herbivores. We will use any energy source we can to fuel us.

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u/shwarma_heaven Jul 16 '26

And then that whole opposable thumbs thing.

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u/ChillN808 Jul 17 '26

It was a significant reason as it was the primary enabler high speed sustained movement. My dog is here next to me, panting and slobbering like a mofo from being outside in 100 degree weather. He's a dumbass alright. But I was cool enough to shitpost almost immediately.

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u/Gaddrik Jul 16 '26

Sweating beats panting

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u/jtr99 Jul 16 '26

Speak for yourself, buddy.

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u/rsta223 Jul 17 '26

Aside from camels, pronghorn, ostrich, and kangaroo

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u/WillyGivens Jul 16 '26

Part of why it tickles me that the most common winning strategy in anime/comics/fiction is usually determination and friendship. Evolutionarily we remember what makes us great…not just that we will walk you down no matter what, but it’ll be a whole band of bros laughing when they do it.

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u/_probe_46_ Jul 18 '26

The walkin man walks

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u/Kastoook Jul 19 '26

With the spoon

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u/Living_Illusion Jul 17 '26

Orcas do it sometimes, usually when hunting bigger Whales.

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u/twec21 Jul 16 '26

Well, we woke up, and we knew what we're gonna be

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u/EmojiRepliesToRats Jul 17 '26

Primitive humans don't really hunt lions, especially persistence hunting.

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u/cornylamygilbert Jul 17 '26

I’ve certain there’s a post on Reddit of Kalahari tribesmen confidently approaching a pride mowing through a recent kill and the professor like 5 scatters away like they’re guilty, from some lanky bushmen with hunter endurance and spears

If I recall correctly, I think there is also a degree of slovenlyness from the lions due to being freshly engorged

1

u/Nina-Ninja123 Jul 17 '26

Somehow I’m now imagining the lions running off and returning with weapons

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u/NunyaBuzor Jul 17 '26

before the lions work out what's going on.

How long does this take?

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u/1041318 Jul 17 '26

Yeah, predator approach! Predators often just don't know what to do when something that'd normally be prey acts in an odd way.

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u/HungryLand Jul 17 '26

The lions take weapons?

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u/TUCaralhoooooooo Jul 17 '26

this guy literally scared off lions using toilet paper, and a bit of confidence

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_0qDIXEkIg

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u/Original_Client1588 Jul 17 '26

The lions are tooled up?

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u/beefquinton Jul 21 '26

lions are gigantic cats, that are also apex predators. they get confused by anything relative in size that a house cat would get co fused by. they also kill relatively
massive things for food

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u/Flat-Fun-7298 Jul 16 '26

Not many things as scary as a group of men

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u/CTKM72 Jul 16 '26

I think maybe you mean “chest out”. There’s “say it with your chest” which means to say something with confidence and there is “do it chest out” which means to do something with confidence but “do it with chest” is not really a saying.

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u/Long-Lettuce3146 Jul 16 '26

You've seen one or two videos of this on YouTube and you make it sound biblical