Ethics of landownership

> -----Original Message-----
> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu]On
> Behalf Of Michael Roberts
> Sent: Saturday, December 13, 2003 4:00 PM

> -------------
> Burgy ( I have seen your photo and Glenn's who looked like a KGB agent!)
> How might it best be answered?

I do look like I am a KGB agent. That picture on my posts in the natural
science forum on www.theologyweb.com is from a grouse shoot in northern
Scotland in December 2000. There are two dead grouse in my hand. All the
guys on the hunt razed me about my attire, until we had been in the field
for about 3 hours with temperatures around freezing and a wind of about 80
mph. One guy then offered me his brace of grouse to wear my hat (which kept
my ears very warm). I kept my hat on my head.I had replaced a photo of me in
a cowboy hat in front of Glenmorangie Distillery. That might not have been
the greatest place for that picture. :-)

But that shoot raised some interesting ethical issues for me in Scotland.
The crofters don't own their land. It is the Laird's land and he can sell
hunting rights to a bunch of guys like us. We would line up about 100 yards
from some crofter's house and shoot grouse over the house. In the States,
of course, the farmer would grab his rifle and shoot back. There, the
tenant has no choice but to put up with that activity. He also has no guns.
I felt bad for those families because of their lack of rights. Did I have a
right to spend a Saturday shooting over people's houses?

 It was the first inkling of understanding of the class nature of British
society and possibly why communism started there. It also explained the
strong leftward tilt of many in British government. Something like 60% of
Scottish land is owned by 791 people. whole towns and villages, even whole
islands can be owned by one individual, who can, at a whim, decide to kick
the people off the land. I recall one village on a small island that was
sold, was afraid they were going to lose their homes and have to move.
Shades of the Highland clearances. In the Highlands, 100 people own half of
all land, which was inherited from their ancestors who were feudal lairds
and got their land by less than honorable means (crown permit, or warfare).
That is the history of the country but it sure does seem to me that by
ruling out a practice of giving the land to one offspring, the problem could
be solved peacefully. Eventually there would be so many heirs that many of
them would sell parts of the big estates.
Received on Sat Dec 13 19:24:22 2003