Kim:
decimate North Atlantic tuna stocks etc etc etc.....
At least it's not something like clubbing baby seals to death so their fur can be sold on 5th Avenue, the Champs Elysee, or Bond street while their bodies are left behind staining the ice with a pretty red colour.
Okay.
I've been lurking on this one for a bit, and just to keep the facts straight, and keep the stones from flying into the various glass houses I've got a few things I'd like to say. For the record, I have never been a supporter of the whaling industry nor am I in the anti-whaling corner either. I am not an environmentalist,'I'm a conservationist...which by the way includes almost all of my hunting brethern.
Firstly,
I live in Canada. Over-fishing on the Grand Banks -- read North Atlantic -- was the fault of a combination of some of my countrymen, and a whole gaggle of foreign fleets. The primary species is not tuna, its cod and there's darn few of them left (historically speaking). Poor resource management was to blame.
The U.S., Portuguese, Spanish, Japanese, Norwegian factory ships managed in a very short time, less than fifty years, to decimate the fishery. This was not a single county's initiative, in fact we, Canada, have had our hands filled attempting to reverse the damage caused by man's (and I mean every contributing nation including some Canadian fishermen) foolish notion that there would always be fish on "The Banks".
We put an off shore limit of 200 miles in an attempt to protect both the fishery and our fishing interests, and to this day, despite the fact that we have closed many domestic season, in an attempt to recover the fishery, foreign factory ships still break their treaties and continue to hammer a delicate fioshery that cannot afford the predation.
Secondly,
While the taking of seals historically speaking, was all about the fur trade, it's not the only reason we still take seals today. Before you all get bent out of shape, the taking of baby harp seals, (the cute ones with the white fur that Greenpeace loves as a poster child) is illegal. Mature seals are taken in the modern hunt. Slot numbers are monitored, and one of the prime reasons is an attempt to relieve predation of the much diminished fish stock. Seals eat fish. Fish are scarce. The more the seals eat, the less fish remain. Rememebr the base stock at this time is hyper sensitive to predation of any kind.
As barbaric as it sounds, the seal hunt is a necessary cull in an attempt, albeit probably vain, to try and reduce natural predation of the remaining cod stocks. Yes, to the hunters, the cull is still very much a monetary thing, but one should remember, the same man in the ice with the rifle (to the best of my knowledge clubs are not used anymore) is the same man who is dropping his net on ice-out.
It is unfortunate that, in this modern day, we still have neighbor fighting neighbor all for the sake of being able to say they stand but a few inches higher than another.
As to the
gangrel441:
100% agreed...but once you factor the intelligence of individual creatures and the amount of suffering caused to those individuals, doesn't this become much more a humanitarian issue than an environmental one?
I do not commercially fish for a living. I do hunt both large and small game for food. What I have found, from 30 years of hunting and fishing, is that we tend to anthropomorphize inanimate, and animate objects far too much.
I can make an argument that deer are intelligent animals. They exhibit many of the social behavior, yes including primitive vocal communication, which whales do. (Albeit it at a far more advance level than that of the deer. level). They are as majestic, depending on one's point of view, as any other creature on the planet. The main difference is their range is limited to, usually, one location that generally fall under one jurisdiction. Therefore they can be managed to the benefit of both the species and the hunter.
The problem with whales and whaling is that the animals do not fall into this same type of category. Thus cooperative endeavors to bring these create back from the brink, are seriously hampered by each nation's self interest.
This is short sighted. If a complete global moratorium on whaling was adopted for a period sufficient to bring the numbers back to a sustainable fishery, followed by a limited predation season, with quotas in place and followed, that again would allow the population to not only survive the cull, but flourish, then everyone, except those who would put animals over humans in the rights department, would benefit.
A small example.. In Ontario, the last wild turkey was shot in around the late 1800s. Domestically speaking, the species was extinct. Less that 20 years ago, hunters and conservationists worked together to re-introduce the species (which was still flourishing in northern New York). After the hunting moratorium was lifted, (10 year ago) a limited hunt was allowed. Today, there are more than 300,000 birds in the province, the hunt is still going on, and the species is flourishing.
Bringing a species back from the edge is possible. It just takes time, effort and commitment. In the end we all win.
As to the issue in the minkies, IMHO if the cull still allows for a sustainable stock, despite the environmental issues affecting these animals; it should be allowed to continue. Monitoring of the stock should be done, and as long as the base fishery is sustainable, it should be allowed to continue. If environmental impacts drop the fishery below sustainable levels, the cull should be stopped.
To those who would ask the Japanese people to alter their food preference, this is an arrogant request. Put the shoe in the other foot, and then ask yourself how you would respond. PETA has asked everyone in the US to stop eating beef….MacDonald’s still serves a billion Big Macs a day.
