Obama to test wilderness skills on Bear Grylls TV show

It isn't that Grylss doesn't have skills. Again, it's that he's supposed to be teaching "survival", which by definition means reducing, not increasing, risk.


It's also because of things like staying in a hotel while filming "Man vs. Wild" as well as hiding a life jacket under his shirt what floating down a river. Not a good thing when actually teaching survival. If you have to hide a life jacket to help you stay safe, maybe the best advice would be to warn viewers not to do this at all, let alone with a life jacker.


I think his appeal has more to do with things like taking extreme risks and doing extreme things, drinking his own urine and eating gross things, not to mention the time he gave himself an enema on Man vs. Wild to hydrate himself with brackish water. I'd have been OK if he'd just told us about it.


And it's one thing to give credit to Bear for "surviving" when the two people I mentioned actually live that lifestyle. Les Stroud not only teaches survival, he lived for a year in the wilderness. He also goes out alone for 7-10 days and does all the filming himself, not easy toting 70lbs of camera gear.


Matt Graham doesn't just teach survival skills on TV, he has lived a primitive lifestyle for decades. He once raced against something like 38 horses in a long distance race and beat all but two of the horses. He's also a world class atlatl thrower. He's every bit as "laid back and positive" as Grylls.


Grylls is a great athlete, but not many people are able to climb waterfalls if they get lost in the woods. And hiding a life jacket under your clothes while floating down a river is just plain wrong and gives people ideas they probably shouldn't have.

Creek Stewart is also a great teacher of nature survival skills. He has a show on Weather Channel called "Fat Guys in the Woods" where he takes 3 fat, out of shape guys out for 4-5 days with minimal gear. They learn a lot about themselves in those situations.