Comment by Alex Pappas

February 22, 2007 @ 11:08 am

This is disturbing.

I truly am sorry. Not that I saw this, but that human beings have done this. One doesn’t need to be a tree hugging environmentalist to realize that this is wrong! And yet this continues… Why??

That does it. I volunteer to round up those godforsaken fisherman and give them the same treatment. Ok that would be uncalled for but I can’t understand for the life of me why this happens. For what? For the small cans of shoyu manguro we eat at a combini or grocery store?

Ridiculous… And very sad.

Comment by DeOrio

February 22, 2007 @ 1:28 pm

What gets me is, as I’ve said before on this site, there’s not much of an actual market for whale, it’s mostly the result of orders being placed by institutions such as schools or as part of a campaign receiving government subsidies to increase the market. Why would anyone other than the dolphin hunters themselves seek to increase this trade? Especially since industrial whaling and dolphin hunting are not old traditions.

The video says the dolphin meat is labeled as whale in supermarkets. I’d like to see a citation for that, but, if it is true, it implies that trickery is needed to sell the stuff.

And then there’s the sadism point. The cruelty. If you’re going to kill something, kill it. Be man enough to finish the job. Killing dolphins is bad enough, but hacking halfway through their necks and running away when they go into seizures or dragging them alive behind trucks is cowardly on top of being cruel and unnecessary.

I recently read Hemingway’s classic on bullfighting Death in the Afternoon, in which he emphasizes that, while killing six bulls is the point of the professional bullfight, there is right way and a wrong to do it. The best matadors are those who put themselves in harm’s way - if they are not in range of the bull’s horns, they are cheating - and make the kill cleanly and quickly. Before them, picadors must plant their pics in the large muscle behind the bull’s head, not in the ribs.

Being animals, we have to kill something to eat, but it need not be something with dwindling numbers and a clear ability to understand what’s going on and it certainly need not be done in a cowardly and sadistic manner to satisfy a market that’s artificial if it exists at all.

I’m not exactly an environmentalist nor am I a human rights activist, but what’s done in Taiji every year is a glaring example of the worst kind of human hubris.

Comment by yellowpeep

February 22, 2007 @ 4:14 pm

As Deorio mentioned, the market is not that big. Why don’t they open market and let the invisible hand run? I don’t think the market is going to expand too much. I’m OK with eating a small block a couple of times a year. So are other people. Schools may serve whales once or twice a year, but I’d say it’s a normal interval. Whales cannot be daily diet. We eat grotesque octopus and squid, and they could be more often, probably 3~4 times a year.

What a typical Japanese points out about the criticism of whale or dolphin eating is that European or American happily massacre cow, sheep, and pigs while they protest when it comes to dolphins or whales. Crows are known to have an ability to know what’s going on, too. Tokyo city has been killing thousands of crows every year, but I haven’t heard any criticisms ever. If “intelligence” is the only value for not killing dolphins, crows must be protected as well according to the same reason. But they never criticize it. So we get confused; why only whales or dolphins? My conclusion is that they are so historically brainwashed to have a firm ideology that “dolphins are adorable and intelligent.” We need a logical answer that exclusively requires to protect dolphins or whales.

The more they show those killing scenes, the more I am afraid they get emotional and lose logic. Propaganda always whispers to your emotion.

Comment by Ken

February 22, 2007 @ 4:39 pm

Yellowpeep - I agree to some degree, which is why I don’t like the use of the music in this video. I think it detracts from the message by adding too much sentimentality. The narration is also exaggerated, but the facts are there:

The killing method is inhumane. If people truly do want to eat dolphin or whale, and the species hunted are not endangered, that seems fine by me. But, I object to inhumane killing methods that cause suffering. The same is true for cows, pigs, chickens or crows - whatever animal. I don’t think humans have to cause animals to suffer in order to secure our food supply.

We’ve put people on the moon and developed technology that boggles the mind. Why hack open the aorta of a dolphin (or any animal) to let it bleed out in suffering when we know we can do better and should demand better of ourselves?

As far as your comment (perhaps not your comment, what you say the ‘typical Japanese’ says, though I’ve never heard my Japanese family members make this argument and they are exceedingly typical) about North Americans or Europeans happily ignoring the inhumane slaughter of pigs or cows while protesting against the slaughter of dolphins or whales in Japan, I’d say that doesn’t ring true, and betrays a powerful lack of awareness concerning the amount of protest against the inhumane killing methods of pigs and cows that goes on in those places. Far, far more North Americans are active in the protest against inhumane slaughterhouse conditions than protesting whaling (or probably even aware that whaling goes on). Visit any college campus and see for yourself.

Comment by DeOrio

February 22, 2007 @ 9:34 pm

Furthermore, there’s a world of difference between the awareness of just about any bird and any mammal. There’s an undisputed record of dolphins catching onto, remembering, and performing complex tasks, such as recognizing and tagging divers and reporting back to the correct boat. The closest thing birds have been trained to do is remember where they live. There’s also the fairly reliable measure of brain mass as a ratio of total body mass. Humans have enormous brains, great apes have big brains, as do cetaceans. Crows don’t. Furthermore, the parts of the brain involved in cognition are sizable in cetaceans, not so in crows.

There’s also the extraordinarily limited numbers of cetaceans to consider, on top of the gratuitous nature of the hunt.

A “typical Japanese” does not point out the killing of cows or pigs, most people in Japan eat meat. Japan imports and consumes massive amounts of beef and pork as well as having its own beef and pork industries with slaughter methods no nicer than those in other countries.

I also don’t think the idea of whales and dolphins as “adorable and intelligent” is historical in the West at all, at least no more historical than it is in Japan, where whales are frequently portrayed as adorable.

Who considers squid or octopus grotesque? Who only eats them three or four times a year?

Have you been to Japan?

Comment by theanphibian

February 23, 2007 @ 11:56 am

I had already seen this and a number of other dolphin killing videos in chat rooms and the blogosphere before I got to here. The general opinion that I heard (from Americans) included little sympathy for the dolphins on the basis of slaughtering them, but considerable outrage over allegations that Japan

1. Violates international fishing treaties to prevent overexploitation of the oceans in doing this and
2. Sells the dolphin meat as whale because people won’t eat dolphin because they’re cute and will eat whale because they’re ugly.

I’m just an observer in passing so I can’t give much comment to the accuracy of these claims, but I would love to hear your take on them if you don’t mind.

I must admit though, I find your comment that it doesn’t take place in small towns interesting. What I had been told while visiting places like Tsukiji was that the sea life that the city Japanese commonly eat comes from all around the Japanese islands, which leads me to believe that it does take place in somewhat scattered places, though the scale and organization seen in the videos would lead me to believe that it does not happen OFTEN.

Regarding the suffering of the dolphins, I personally think think there is a moral line between killing animals with low cognitive ability versus high ability. But even so, I believe there’s not much president for that. In the US meat processing industry we do things to cows and other large animals that basically amounts to keeping the animal alive as long as possible while being slaughtered for reasons of keeping the meat better preserved or just because it’s easier to do that way. Speaking as a person who has seen the process, what I see happening to these dolphins seems about the same severity. While I agree that dolphins are different from cows, I think that they are not MUCH different. Since the treatment of other animals used for food takes no consideration of their suffering at all, I think that arguing for the ethical treatment of the dolphins is already a lost cause.

That said, I am in complete agreement that this is a despicable act that should be stopped for the reasons stated above.

Comment by yellowpeep

February 23, 2007 @ 1:12 pm

Ken,
Well, all of your comments are understandable. I came across a video clip where a KFC chain was condemned by a protester with a placard. Meatrix was a fun flash I’ve ever ran into. Not knowing these facts, Japanese people, however, are likely to perceive the criticism on dolphin eating as racism against Asian. More discussion may lead to mutual understanding, hopefully.

Deorio,
I completely forgot about Western countries, including Japan, having been hunting whales for oil. There’s no history adoring whales. Haha.

>Who consider squid or octopus grotesque?
Don’t know. I like them by the way. Probably jews don’t eat squid and may consider them grotesque.

>Who only eats them three or four times a year?
That’s me. I want to eat them occasionally, but it’s very difficult to obtain fresh marine mollusca here in US. I’m jealous of you guys! I used to fish squid with small fish as a bait. If fresh, the raw one is exquisite.

>Have you been to Japan?
Yes. Do you not recognize it with my clumsy Engrish?

Comment by Ismael

February 23, 2007 @ 2:45 pm

Do the people here want to ban fishing? Or even that, ban eating fish for food? What seperates a dolphin from being different from a fish? Only how it breathes. How far will people go with this? I personally would not mind becoming a totally vegetarian society. But will you, who complain and cry foul on this? I may disagree with the methods, but I will enjoy a good hamburger any day. Or, better yet, ground beef. Think about how that is done. I watched the video and did not like what I saw. I hate to see stuff like this. But I want to see Joaquin Phoenix do the same video on beef, pork, and other fish. It would be interesting and maybe less biased. :0)… Just something to think about.

Comment by DeOrio

February 23, 2007 @ 5:15 pm

Ismael,
There are enormous differences between dolphins and fish - how they breathe is only one of them. Dolphins are mammals - substantially closer to humans genetically than they are to fish.

Ken is already a vegetarian. I don’t think that cuts it. For me, it’s not about what the animal looks like (grouping dolphins with fish), but what specific animal it is. Cetaceans have been shown to have high cognition - even long memories. Some go far as to say they are sentient, but that gets us into a semantic minefield.

Furthermore, dolphin hunting is financially infeasible.

I support the curtailing Japan has doen of its tuna fishing. I think eating less meat in general is a good idea.

You need a basis for deciding what is and what is not OK, for most people there’s line drawn somewhere. In some cases, it appropriate for other people to enforce that line.

For example, cannibalism, for a host of reasons is banned. Is there something inherently wrong with it? No more than there’s something inherently wrong with any kind of killing.

Most species of cetacean are limited in number. That’s one reason not to kill them, just as you wouldn’t kill a bald eagle.

Then you have the intelligence, awareness agrument.

Then yuo have the gratuitous nature of the hunt - it’s not being done to fill a demand.

As for slaughtering cows, I have some problems with the way that’s done as well, but there are two crucial differences: 1. Cows are stunned, sometimes drugged, sometimes both, first. Normally stunned. 2. The abbatoir workers don’t cut part way in, jump back, stand there, watch the cow for a while, step back in, poke it with a knife, jump back, etc. The dolphin killers are amateurs - they lack the cojones and the skill necessary to do it properly, so the dolphin suffers far more than is necessary just to kill it.
Slaughterhouses don’t toss wounded cows into the back of pickup trucks and drive off, nor do they drag living cows behind trucks.

What makes this dolphin kill especially abhorrent is the ineptitude with which it is done.

As for protests, I don’t know what Joaquin Phoenix has done, but there is no shortage of protests against beef or pork processing.

If you’re agruing that Joaquin Phoenix should not protest the killing of dolphins just because he hasn’t publicly protested the killing of cows, I’d ask how anyone could oppose anything. How can one, for instance, be opposed to the Iraq invasion, but not the Normandy invasion?

No one bites on straw men here, Ismael. Don’t waste your time with that kind of stuff.

Comment by DeOrio

February 23, 2007 @ 5:27 pm

Theanphibian,
Good to see you stop by. Thanks for the kind words on your Livejournal page.

Re: 1. Yes.
2. Could be. My general impression is that people consider whales to be cute, too. I don’t think many people are thinking about what real animals look like. It’s more of an image in the mind. I think that’s true everywhere, not only in Japan.

As far as I know, there’s not much opposition to the idea of eating dolphin per se.
I would guess that it’s just not as widely considered a food stuff, so it’s marked to sell better. More of a “How would I serve that?” issue than an “I won’t eat that” issue.

As for the small towns across Japan thing, the objection Ken and I have is to the “across Japan” part - the hunt occurs almost entirely in the town in the video and the town of Taiji.

Tsukiji does sell seafood from Japanese waters, but they are distressed and largely fished out. Most of what you see there comes from far afield and most larger fish in Japan comes from very far from Japan. Tuna, for instance, primarily comes from the Indian Ocean.

I agree with you on the cognition thing. I’d add a human self-interest angle as well. It’s bad for us when a large mammal species goes extinct. There aren’t many dolphins. There are loads of cows and pigs.

Comment by Ken

February 23, 2007 @ 5:40 pm

Ismael,

Do the people here want to ban fishing? Or even that, ban eating fish for food?

No, not at all. As I’ve said in my previous comments, I don’t care what anyone eats. That’s none of my business.

But, all I ask is that the animal be killed in a humane manner. Slitting its throat and letting it bleed out while convulsing is cruel and inhumane. I don’t care if it’s a dolphin, a pig or a chicken. Human beings have the technology to do better. Let’s put that technology to work.

Comment by Ken

February 23, 2007 @ 5:45 pm

Theamphibian,

Thanks for your comment. I should clarify what I meant by my comment about Joaquin Phoenix’s ’small towns acrosss Japan’ line. You wrote:

I must admit though, I find your comment that it doesn’t take place in small towns interesting.

I agree with the conclusion you came to in that paragraph. It does not happen often. Actually, this particular style of dolphin hunt, as far as I know, happens in this one particular small town, once a year.

Thus, I feel it is irresponsible of Mr Phoenix to refer to ’small towns across Japan.’ We often see this sort of sad slandering of the Japanese, which I don’t like to see because it’s inaccurate and detracts from the force of the argument behind the video.

Comment by Ken

February 23, 2007 @ 5:49 pm

Ismael,

But I want to see Joaquin Phoenix do the same video on beef, pork, and other fish. It would be interesting and maybe less biased. :0)… Just something to think about.

So, then why don’t you get that video? He has made videos denouncing the beef and pork industries. He’s a very active PETA member with strong views.

Found on Google.

Comment by Ken

February 23, 2007 @ 5:56 pm

Yellowpeep,

Japanese people, however, are likely to perceive the criticism on dolphin eating as racism against Asian.

I don’t see what makes you think Japanese people would conflate eating dolphin as a race issue. The two issues are entirely unrelated, as I’ve confirmed in conversations with Japanese co-workers, colleages and family members today.

Again, as far as I’m concerned, eat all the dolphin you want: but the animals should be killed in a humane manner. The criticism is not whether or not they are eaten, but how they are killed.

Comment by theanphibian

February 24, 2007 @ 12:17 am

Ken,

The reason I asked about where it happens is because I couldn’t make full sense from the numerous videos in floating around the internet. Here is one that I think might have been what Phoenix’s cut originated from:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvlOqgP9gIU&mode=related&search=

Just from browsing around you can see that this is getting a lot of blogosphere attention for one, but also coverage, as there does exist some footage that was clearly taken separately. Weather this is from another year, another month, or another perspective I cannot say. From what I’m hearing, I think that it is not another town. I’m currently under the impression that this is done once a year in the town of Taiji.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98RMmGtGpzU&mode=related&search=

I haven’t found much else that isn’t just a cut of either one of these for the sole purpose of showing more dolphin blood. I really don’t know what was the chicken and what was the egg, but of course the important thing is to shed light on what is happening.

Again, as far as I’m concerned, eat all the dolphin you want: but the animals should be killed in a humane manner. The criticism is not whether or not they are eaten, but how they are killed.

Regarding this statement, I can’t say I’m of the same opinion. I see little room for altering the process to make it more humane in all honesty. I think the most important issues to stress to the Japanese is that they can sell the meat labeled as something else and that supposedly aquariums are supporting this activity. Simple consumer awareness of what meat they’re eating would lessen economic incentive to do this and I would think publicity regarding the dolphin captures associated with this practice could cause support to be withdrawn from aquariums. If people want to enjoy their dolphin meat then someone’s got to catch and butcher them, that’s one issue. If dolphin hunting really is economically infeasible as DeOrio says, then it seems like it should be a no-brainer for society to shut this down.

Someone also brought an interesting point that the Japanese don’t want to eat dolphins for the reasons we think of. I’ve been often surprised by the Japanese take on preparation of food. One time I went to a ‘cooking party’ with some friends in Tokyo, got a squid, cleaned it, cut it, threw it on the frying pan and squirted some soy sauce in there. The Japanese kids were so excited like “my mom taught me how to cook this!” and the westerners were about to throw up. I think that the idea of eating animals is just not as taboo in their minds. In the US, we have to have stuff processed and pulverized. Anything that clearly resembles some part of an animal is typically gawked at, but not so in Japan. Anyway, I’ve gotten far off track.

I just wanted to bring attention to the aquarium issue among others. Maybe I’ll write a Wikipedia article about it or something.

Pingback by » “I’m So Ashamed” and “Why Won’t I Eat That? It’s a Moral Issue”

April 9, 2007 @ 10:45 pm

[…] Man, I’m such a hypocrite. Every day I get shivers when I pass the horse butcher and silently say goodbye to whatever poor hapless equine or two is being led off the truck. Every day. And yet, about once every month, I look and see, not horses, but cows! And I think, “why do I favor one animal, and yet not the other? My god, it’s being butchered just like the other animals, and yet I hold no moral qualms about eating it!” It will be a long time coming before I give up my omnivorous lifestyle, and that includes cows and the like, but instead of feeling sorry for the cows and chickens and such, I should just feel glad for the horses and whales, ’cause I just won’t go there. Why? As far as horses are concerned (I know this answer because people are always asking my why I won’t eat basashi *raw horse*), it’s because they are my friends, and you don’t eat your friends (I have to tell them that it’s the same as asking why they don’t eat their dogs). As for whales? Though I know that slaughtering methods for land-dwelling creatures still have a long ways to go before being totally “humane”, I just can’t imagine how you can humanely kill such a large creature. Did you know? Some places even eat dolphin (dolphin!!!) here. They don’t die all that humanely either. Watch this vid (good thoughtful discussion on it, too, in the comment section of this person’s blog) if you’re not squeamish (I pity the fool who thinks I’m joking), but keep in mind I only got through the very beginning before having to stop so as no not see anything that would make me too distressed. No, I didn’t make up my mind because of this video. I’ve known about it for awhile. I only just now searched for an article or something to direct you to. Lucky me to find it. […]

Comment by M. Brown

August 16, 2007 @ 7:17 am

Hello,

My daughter and I just finished this fantastic book from the Gaia Girls Book Series. We had no idea this happens. Killing of the dolphins horrified us.

Gaia Girls Way of Water is a FANTASTIC book that touched us deeply and we are now going to work hard to STOP this action. We took action on your site.

Have you guys heard of the books or the author? We are HUGE fans of the series and wanted to let you know we came to your site because of this thoughtful book series. These book feature Girl ECO heroes. Book one deals with earth girl and factory faring, book two, deals with the Water Gaia Girl and the horrible dolphin hunts.

I would recommend you guys featuring the author and the book series. I think if we get kids as involved as my daughter is now, they can change the world!

Publisher
www.chelseagreen.com

Gaia Girls by Lee Welles.
www.gaiagirls.com

Mary and Rachel Brown

Comment by Shricket

November 10, 2007 @ 8:44 pm

I think that this is rediculous.

I agree with DeOrio, it is just cowardly to do such a thing and not actually kill the animal quick and swift.

Its incredible how much the human mind can take. I do not get squimish at this video, yet I believe it is disgusting and we (as in ‘humans’) should be able to use our adapted minds to put an end to such abuses of animal rights.

How can a Japanese person watch a dolphin die like that? Then again, a question of the same frame of mind pops up. “How can an SS soldier from Hitler’s Polish camp Auschwitz-Birkenau throw young children and babies into the air to use as target practice?”.

This is not a question of stopping them on a minimal scale, but finding out wat drives the Japanese to such ferocious killing. First you must understand their point of view, their TRUTHFUL point of view before trying to solve the problem.

~Babylon-Rising~ ~Shricket~ ~Simone~

Comment by DeOrio

November 10, 2007 @ 10:40 pm

Shricket, I’d be careful of referring to “the Japanese” in such a context, which implies that the dolphin hunts in Taiji and elsewhere are some kind of national sport or are something in which “the Japanese” as a people engage. Some Japanese people do this. Others vigorously oppose it. Always be wary of painting with a broad brush, especially when issuing condemnation or describing a behavior as “ferocious killing.”

I’d also be awfully careful of equating the slaughter of dolphins in a less-than-humane manner with the intentionally brutal, sadistic, and torturing practices of the Nazis at Auschwitz.

All of that said, yes, I agree that one has to find out why those who hunt dolphins do so. Berating, belittling, and lambasting are not effective ways of changing behavior.