Alaskan Bush People

I was HONESTLY born and raised in Ketchikan Alaska. One afternoon I was in a local bar having a beverage with friends and this guy comes running into the bar, looks around and says ,"YOU!" He runs over and asks if my friend wanted to be on reality TV show. laughing, my friends and i all thought it would be funny if she did! so we walked across the street to a little store they had roped off the streets to, with PLEASE BE QUIET FILIMG IN PROGRESS signs on the window. The producer told me it was a new reality show they were making (unnamed at the time) and told her she was girl #2 and to walk into the store and what the guy (noah) would say to her, hit on her and to reject him and walk out of the store. Whole thing was set up and loosely scripted! with different takes and all! Later that year we saw the show on TV and WERE SO RELIEVED that they didn't use the scene she was in because it is such a ridiculous embarrassing show. All i have heard about these people from friends in Ketchikan is that a few of the older boys do hard drugs, they trash all rooms, lots, and property they squat in/on with trash and filth. AND to top it all off they are all in deep trouble right now for not being real alaskan citizens or living here and getting our perm fund dividend money for YEARS!!! This is something us alaskans do NOT take lightly. seems they started believing their own lies and thought their tales for TV were reality! WELL WE SAY lock this slime ball Billy up and make an example out of these fake idiots! How in the hell can a man be so self righteous and proud of his family when all he does is let them down and teach them to make bad decisions and to be happy with failure! I hope that part of the show is just as fake as the rest. Go ahead and watch this show if you want to learn the exact opposite of what to do to survive in the wilderness.

This show, while it may be staged, is uber cringey and horrifyingly entertaining; much like a train wreck.

They leave all of their idiotic, uninformed, asinign decisions/choices up to "The Good Lord" and take absolutely no personal responsibility (because the "Good Lord will take care of us") Then they make up ridiculous excuses for every single thing that fails (ie: everything.) They seem to be immune to learning from their mistakes which they make over and over again, often in the exact same way) yet they have gigantic egos and would die before they'd admit they were wrong.

At every opportunity the parents proclaim that they live this way in order to be free yet they've created an unhealthy codependent demi-cult out of their kids who have absolutely zero freedom. Can you say Stockholm Syndrome?

None of them have the ability to survive in the real world or to live independently- isn't that the antithesis of freedom?

Adults playing with dolls? A grown man acting like a hyperactive four-year-old? Declaring that you are the modern-day Leonardo Da Vinci?

Billy and Ami are so excited to finally have grandchildren. They must have forgotten that they already had two grand daughters from Twila, the daughter Billy abandoned before marrying Ami. Billy was supremely selfish in all that he did while consistently claiming it was all for the family. He groomed under-aged Ami for brainwashing and raised their children the same way.

To be fair, never once do they claim to be year-round "bush people" so I don't have a problem with that as some do. Another plus is they produced some of the best quotes I've heard on any tv show: Mr. Cupcake, get out of my teepee! (But don't even get me started on how horribly trained that dog is.) And: (Bear) I don't mind leaving all my weapons because I AM a weapon! (Gabe responds) No, you're more of a tool.

Yeah, Gabe. Astute as always. (Look it up.) Oh, and great drinking game potential: drink every time Bear days Extreme, or every time Billy says I really am, or every time Bam is negative or every time someone says the good lord or every time their hair-brained psudo-plans go off the rails or every time they mispronounce a basic word or use a long, drawn out nasal Uhhhh as a sentence filler. (Warning: the above suggestions will definitely result in alcohol poisoning.) PLEASE BIRD- GET THEE TO A DENTIST! If Gabe deserves braces, so do you. Your parents both have full dentures but there's still hope for you.

After seeing how socially incompetent they are, I also understand if some of it was staged with the "townies." Normal people would need to be forewarned about these people so they wouldn't just run away upon meeting those boys.

Ugh, the wives. They are just overbearing enough to make the boys feel like they're marrying their mother (or their sister,) but whatever. You do you.

I've wondered how they'd do on an actual survival show such as Alone (Jordan rules.) I doubt any of them would make it a single day. It would be more interesting, maybe, to see them try to live in the real world but without the "wolfpack." I think the youngest daughter, Rain, is the only one with any potential.

If any of them escape to live a truly free life it's going to require years of therapy. Shame on Billy and Ami and shame on Discovery. Exploit idiots much?

The first two episodes were somewhat believable, but when daddy Brown was so ill and recuperated within hours, to find that the town's people he had just met came and completely built the cabin they filmed (for five grand, ha)...well it was just too much.

That's when I decided to do a search and found their official website. To say the least I was a bit surprised to find out they own their own publishing company, and that Billy Brown has written dozens of children's books and several others on his adventures (and to think I was suckered into feeling bad that his kid had a toothache).

This last episode that closes with them grieving over their capsized boat, while several of the boys are trying to poke inside of it with sticks to salvage anything they can find, including a poor, sopping wet pink teddy bear takes the cake. As they close the episode the patriarch of the family announces "we have lost everything we own" and "now we are homeless". It made me question why anyone would chose to live like they do.

Now I know why. THEY DON'T. They have a mountain home with a greenhouse, and each of the seven kids has their own bedroom, the mother is getting ready to publish her cookbook.

And they bartered some salmon for a tooth filling? They lost everything they own? The brand new generator that was sitting in the junk yard pretty much gave it away.

Like I said, I feel like a sap.

I am a 4th generation Alaskan out of the Southeast, that grew up in a remote logging camp. I've logged, commercial fished, and worked jobs all over the state. I have even actually seen the Brown Family in local communities. First off, this show is completely staged. I get that many Americans respect and admire their way of living but this is completely fake. Do people in Alaska live successfully in the bush?... Yes, I grew up doing it. Currently, the Brown family is all over local Alaskan news because they are wanted for Perma Fund Fraud (Collecting State Resident Benefits) when in fact they are not officially state residents. Yet, court dates have been pushed back due to the power of the Discovery Channel and the media. Last I heard they are set for court in July on Felony charges. I know the Browns were living in a cabin in Craig during part of season 1 according to the local community/family friends out there and filming episodes in the bush temporarily. I know the also resided in Myers Chuck before being kicked out. This leads to where they now. Among the Alaskan community they have little respect. After all the they tried to barter fish with my local dentist who claimed the show was fake. To state it simply for those Alaskans out there... who sets crab pots in Alaska without knowing the proper depths and sinks their own pots?? And then goes out at dusk to pull them... later to be rescued. Seems idiotic, clueless, and staged. This is a money hole show that is allowing this family to thrive.

I am very interested in this way of life, not to live it but I find it interesting. I am very disappointed that they are not being honest with us. They pretend that they do not have or need technology but they've had a website for years as well as a Youtube channel. They have a boat & I don't believe they lived in a 1 room cabin, It might have been their hunting cabin but if you read the descriptions on their website they say things like "Birds bedroom is a typical teen girls room" & that Rain has lots of Barbies etc. How can she have a typical girls room in a cabin? I also find their accents to be forces as only some of the kids have them. If they were so isolated wouldn't they speak more like their parents? 2 of them Bear (real name Soloman) & Gabriel have a very put on accent like they are copying a movie. I don't doubt that they hunt their own food & live off the land but they do have a home & technology. The father has published books etc. The intro to the show makes it sound like they found this family living this way. Very deceptive.