Paul Watson (Sea Shepherd) needs to man up!!!!

[Scott L]

Hmm looks like the moratorium is recognized as law, even by Japan. Unless, of course, the NYTIMES is just a bunch of evidence-less liars too. Japan uses "research" whaling to skirt law.

Yes, there seems to be an epidemic of lab theft break-ins as millions of pounds of "specimens" are ending up in Japanese fine restaurants and street-side fish markets...

 

[Sas]

If it weren't for their so called "stunt" people like you would still be ignorant to
the facts.

Some stunt people do better than others. Sea Shepherd is one of the stupid ones.

I've already addressed the legality questions, so have others, but you only hear what
you want to hear.

Where? Please show me which law.

The articles address Minke whales and sustainability issues that support my claim that there
is not enough information to take unneccessary chances or risk to that species.
I am quite aware there are different kinds of whales - thank you for another stupid comment.

Which Minke whales? What about other whale species that are not endangered?

Were you a naive middle-class young person who thought you could make a change with ill thought-out protest ideas?

I was not middle class but I was naive.

If you were, what made you give up and begin to criticise the only groups that were phsycially doing something?

A lot of reasons. Corruption within the groups. The ego driven leadership. The fact that if anyone raised anything that disagreed with what they were on about they would ignore it or criticise it. The fact that these groups only listen to what supports their own ideas, not anything else and they were wrong on various things.

And overall I do not think many issues can be solved with direct action. If you've ever been up against a police force trying to stop you you realise that what you are doing can be crushed at any moment.

Not being vegan doesn't make me a hypocrite. You dont know how I select my food choices. There are environmentally friendly ways to eat meat. Stopping meat intake doesnt make me more friendly to the environment necessarily.

Ok then. How do you determine if your meat is environmentally sustainable?

Do you eat seafood? Because I don't think people should if they are going to use the reason "better to be safe than sorry". How do you know for sure that the seafood you get is environmentally friendly? How do you know the seafood is sustainable? Where do you get your numbers for this?

Also, I notice you have issues with numbers that are not presented by the anti-whaling camp, but while you quote numbers you dont have any citations for your sources.

Yep. Post your figures and then we can compare. Someone already posted the fin whale figures that I got wrong, and I did not ask for a direct source because I verified it myself.

The movie was to be shown in several Japanese theatres but the pulled it because
of death threats.
Now who are the terrorists here?

Whilst I would not use the word 'terrorist' I agree that Japan is covering up things like this and this is wrong.

Only one city, LA population 4 million +. Mink whales 500,000 in all our oceans. Lets go hunt them

What does this even mean?

Australia growing some nads whlie Japan defies them...

Australia is only doing this to get popular support just before an election. Other than that they do not care. There is no 'growing some nads', it's all political.

Also many people say 'law' when they refer to the IWC (from the article posted). This does not make it law.

Please post the actual law that bans whaling.

HAHAHA yes, only the US kills people in other countries. Riiiiight. Try looking around, all countries do ****ty things, including kill their own citizens unjustly; don't pretend like the US is the worst and that they are the only country with problems.

Back on topic. Whaling prevention.

I never said the US was the worst.

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/5297754-post155.html Yes thank you I covered other countries as well and have repeatedly referred to the West in other posts as well.

And the topic is about how lame Sea Shepherd is

 

[cdiver2]

Originally Posted by Valhalla
Because their numbers are but a fraction of historical levels. The Japanese are destroying their ability to recover.

Originally Posted by Saspotato
How do you know?

Whales on the Net - World's Oceans once Teemed with Whales

by Steve Connor, BBC Science Editor, Washington

Scientists have seriously underestimated the number of whales that lived before industrial-scale hunting began

The oceans once teemed with many more now endangered marine mammals than previously thought, new genetic studies of whales suggest.


So few whales seen these days

Whalemeat samples bought from a Japanese sushi market and analysed by scientists indicate that experts have seriously underestimated the size of the populations that roamed the seas before industrial- scale hunting began more than a century ago. The numbers of some species may have been 10 times greater than previously calculated.

The findings refute suggestions by whaling nations such as Japan that a resumption of hunting is justified by the increase of many whale populations beyond their natural size, the researchers said this weekend.

The latest information, reported to the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington DC, is crucial to discussions within the International Whaling Commission (IWC) where some experts are suggesting that hunting minke whales could be resumed because the recent rise in their numbers is unprecedented and is hampering recovery of other whales.

Steve Palumbi, a marine biologist at Stanford University in California, found that the genetic diversity of whales is so large that it can only mean that past population sizes were much bigger than anyone had estimated.

"Genetic variation is related to long-term population size," Dr Palumbi said. "The International Whaling Commission estimates that past population sizes of humpback whales numbered no more than

115,000

before whaling."

His analysis of humpback whale DNA, however, led him to estimate that the past population size of breeding females alone must have been between 125,000 and 250,000 individuals

"Mature breeding females make up about one sixth to one eighth of a whale population, so these numbers suggest a global humpback whale population size [in the past] of about

750,000 to 2 million

animals," he said.

Dr Palumbi also discovered that the Antarctic population of minke whales is now the longest surviving whale population on earth, and was also one of the largest - many times larger than previous estimates for the IWC.

Genetic variation is created by mutations accumulating over many generations. The bigger the population became historically, and the longer it has existed, the bigger the diversity of the DNA within an existing whale population.

"Best estimates suggest past abundance was about 10 times higher than thought for humpback and fin whales, and was about three times higher for minke whales," Dr Palumbi said.

The study also attempted to find out when the dramatic decline in whale numbers occurred. Dr Palumbi said that it was relatively recent - thousands rather than millions of years ago, and probably later than the last Ice Age about 10,000 years ago.

The decline affected many species worldwide.

"We know of one factor that accounts for these patterns - historic whaling,

" Dr Palumbi said.

"Whales have shown remarkable resilience to cataclysmic events, until the last one, which is us.

"Ice ages, sea level change and even loss of local food sources did not interrupt their lives."

Separate research presented to the conference showed that whales sing to one another over hundreds of miles and use their songs to navigate across oceans.

Underwater microphones developed to monitor Soviet submarines have detected cohorts of humpback whales travelling thousands of miles as a group, singing to each other as they go, said Christopher Clark of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.

"Whales will aim directly at a seamount that is 300 miles away, then once they reach it, change course and head to a new feature," Dr Clark said. "It is as if they are slaloming from one geographic feature to the next. They must have acoustic memories analogous to our visual memories."

 

[cdiver2]

After a quick search (Endangered Whales of the World)

Northern right whale 500-1000 Endangered.
Southern Right Whale 3,000 Endangered.
Bowhead Whale 8,000 Endangered.
Blue Whale 10,000-14,000 Endangered.
Fin Whale 120,000-15,000 Endangered.
Sei Whale 50,000 Endangered.
Humpback Whale 10,000 Endangered.
Sperm Whale 200,000 Endangered.
Vaquita a few hundred Endangered.
Baiji about 300 Endangered.
Indus Susu 500 Endangered.
Ganges Susu Unknown Vulnerable.
Boto Unknown thought to be declining.
Franciscana Unknown.
Tucuxi Unknown.
Hector's Dolphin 3,000-4,000 Vulnerable.
Indo-Pacific Humpedbacked Dolphin Unknown thought to be depleted.
Atlantic Humpbacked Dolphin Unknown but depleted

 

[Sas]

After a quick search (Endangered Whales of the World)

Northern right whale 500-1000 Endangered.
Southern Right Whale 3,000 Endangered.
Bowhead Whale 8,000 Endangered.
Blue Whale 10,000-14,000 Endangered.
Fin Whale 120,000-15,000 Endangered.
Sei Whale 50,000 Endangered.
Humpback Whale 10,000 Endangered.
Sperm Whale 200,000 Endangered.
Vaquita a few hundred Endangered.
Baiji about 300 Endangered.
Indus Susu 500 Endangered.
Ganges Susu Unknown Vulnerable.
Boto Unknown thought to be declining.
Franciscana Unknown.
Tucuxi Unknown.
Hector's Dolphin 3,000-4,000 Vulnerable.
Indo-Pacific Humpedbacked Dolphin Unknown thought to be depleted.
Atlantic Humpbacked Dolphin Unknown but depleted

Thanks for posting this. Hopefully conservation efforts against whaling can be focused on these species in particular.

 

[cdiver2]

Saspotato
Whales eat a lot, a lot of fish and things like that, which harms fishing stock actually.

Cdiver2 LA one city in the world population 4 million + Mink Whales 500,000 in the whole world

Saspotato
What does this even mean?

I think you should rethink who is harming the fish stock.

Saspotato
Whales eat a lot, a lot of fish and things like that

And things like that?

 

[Sas]

Cdiver2 LA one city in the world population 4 million + Mink Whales 500,000 in the whole world

I think you should rethink who is harming the fish stock.

And things like that?

I still have no idea what point you are trying to make. How you are linking LA's pop to fish stock?

The whale comment was a joke... it is an argument used by people who support whaling, as well as people who fish for other types of fish.

Most countries are harming the fish stock. I won't eat seafood myself personally and I no longer fish.

 

[D_B]

cd, thanks for more info on the subject
although he should have said at least one of the factors , not of one factor

The study also attempted to find out when the dramatic decline in whale numbers occurred. Dr Palumbi said that it was relatively recent - thousands rather than millions of years ago, and probably later than the last Ice Age about 10,000 years ago.

The decline affected many species worldwide.
Quote:
"We know of one factor that accounts for these patterns - historic whaling,
" Dr Palumbi said.

"Whales have shown remarkable resilience to cataclysmic events, until the last one, which is us.

Quote:
"Ice ages, sea level change and even loss of local food sources did not interrupt their lives."

 

[cdiver2]

I still have no idea what point you are trying to make. How you are linking LA's pop to fish stock?

The whale comment was a joke... it is an argument used by people who support whaling, as well as people who fish for other types of fish.

Most countries are harming the fish stock. I won't eat seafood myself personally and I no longer fish.

You have hit the nail on the head. You said.
"Whales eat a lot, a lot of fish and things like that, which harms fishing stock actually."
How many times Have I heard this, something to blame other than ourselves. The way the human population is going and our improved fishing methods the seas will not be able to sustain us, even with no whales in the world.

I do support SS. I do think the Capt is past his prime and should hand over the rains to someone more competent. I also think there is a place for them and Greenpeace, kinda like the IRA and the Sinn Fein. The Brits would not talk to the IRA (SS) but would talk to Sinn Fein (GP) but it took both of them to bring peace

 

[ACT651755]

I was not middle class but I was naive.

Are you still young and naive? I just noticed you were female. Sorry, couldn't resist.

A lot of reasons. Corruption within the groups. The ego driven leadership. The fact that if anyone raised anything that disagreed with what they were on about they would ignore it or criticise it. The fact that these groups only listen to what supports their own ideas, not anything else and they were wrong on various things.

But this is the same with any similar organisation. I've spent ten years in the military and apart from being all-but free of corruption (that all happens at Ministry of Defence and Government level!!) most of that is true. Different leaders adopt different leadership styles. In the military you offer an alternative idea but if your leader decides against using it, you just do what you can to make their idea work. The chain-of-command is there for a very good reason. This is the same as Sea Shepherd, and this is why Sea Shepherd are so effective. They really are, by the way.

And overall I do not think many issues can be solved with direct action. If you've ever been up against a police force trying to stop you you realise that what you are doing can be crushed at any moment.

You and I (I think it was you anyway) have been over this already, five or six pages back. I disagree that issues can't be solved by direct action. Anyway, you're definitely right about police/military being able to quash any movement in seconds. Look no further than the Tianamen Square massacre or the recent comandeering of an aid ship by the Israeli military. Unfortunately, without whole populations behind such movements, you're always going to be up against overwhelming odds. This just makes organisations like Sea Shepherd look even more impressive. Of course they could turn up with guns and grenades like the whalers do, but then people are definitely going to die.

Whilst I would not use the word 'terrorist' I agree that Japan is covering up things like this and this is wrong.

This is as much terrorism as anything Sea Shepherd have done. Sea Shepherd have not once threatened to kill anybody. Ever. It wasn't you who suggested SS were terrorists, I believe it was Fire Diver or something.

Australia is only doing this to get popular support just before an election. Other than that they do not care. There is no 'growing some nads', it's all political.

Absolutely. It happened a year-or-so ago too, with a potential MP promising action which didn't materialise upon his election.