Sunday, January 28, 2007
Dolphins are Pests
If you're a farmer, one of the primary challenges you face (besides the weather) is pest control. Insects, birds, mammals... they can all take a toll on your crops or livestock -- and your bottom line. Weevils or crows can consume your harvest; coyotes can raid your chicken coop. What do you do about it? I'm no agriculture expert, but common sense suggests that extermination is probably the most common solution.
But if you are a fisherman, is the issue analogous? Is the bounty you harvest from the ocean yours to protect? Can you call creatures that feed on your primary haul "pests"? Even if, by some stretch of reason, you can answer "Yes" to those questions, does that really justify mass slaughter of thousands of the most intelligent animals on the planet?
In Japan, apparently the answer to that last question is also "Yes." Every year, fishermen participate in government-sanctioned dolphin "drives," whereby pods of dolphin are driven into shallow bays, where they are trapped and brutally killed. In 2006, the Japanese government issued permits allowing up to 21,000 dolphins to be killed in this manner, saying the marine mammals compete with fishermen for limited supplies of fish. The truth is, meat from these slaughtered dolphins also ends up on store shelves, alongside the meat of humpback whales (despite it being laden with dangerous levels of mercury, cadmium and PCBs).
A debate on an issue like this obviously generates a lot of emotion, and cultural differences can make the definition of right and wrong a subjective matter. But there’s no question that dolphins are among the most intelligent animals on this blue planet, along with the great apes (including homo sapiens). And the video posted below leaves little doubt about the brutality of the dolphin slaughters taking place in Japan.
If you find yourself outraged over this ongoing slaughter after reading this post, viewing the video below and doing your own research, please take action accordingly. If you want do know what you can do, send me an email.
[Warning: The video is as graphic as the subject matter suggests.]
Read an ongoing debate on the Oceanblue Divers message board about a similar annual slaughter of pilot whales that, while ostensibly done for traditional subsistence reasons as opposed to commercial fishing, appears equally brutal.
But if you are a fisherman, is the issue analogous? Is the bounty you harvest from the ocean yours to protect? Can you call creatures that feed on your primary haul "pests"? Even if, by some stretch of reason, you can answer "Yes" to those questions, does that really justify mass slaughter of thousands of the most intelligent animals on the planet?
In Japan, apparently the answer to that last question is also "Yes." Every year, fishermen participate in government-sanctioned dolphin "drives," whereby pods of dolphin are driven into shallow bays, where they are trapped and brutally killed. In 2006, the Japanese government issued permits allowing up to 21,000 dolphins to be killed in this manner, saying the marine mammals compete with fishermen for limited supplies of fish. The truth is, meat from these slaughtered dolphins also ends up on store shelves, alongside the meat of humpback whales (despite it being laden with dangerous levels of mercury, cadmium and PCBs).
A debate on an issue like this obviously generates a lot of emotion, and cultural differences can make the definition of right and wrong a subjective matter. But there’s no question that dolphins are among the most intelligent animals on this blue planet, along with the great apes (including homo sapiens). And the video posted below leaves little doubt about the brutality of the dolphin slaughters taking place in Japan.
If you find yourself outraged over this ongoing slaughter after reading this post, viewing the video below and doing your own research, please take action accordingly. If you want do know what you can do, send me an email.
[Warning: The video is as graphic as the subject matter suggests.]
Read an ongoing debate on the Oceanblue Divers message board about a similar annual slaughter of pilot whales that, while ostensibly done for traditional subsistence reasons as opposed to commercial fishing, appears equally brutal.
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