Saturday, October 11, 2008

*What Right Do We Have...

The fishermen of Taiji have been conducting drive hunts for close to 4oo years. Only a select few fishermen, about 25, are allowed to participate in the hunt every year. This is a very noble position, and they take it with honor. To them, this is not an animal rights issue, it's tradition. Who are we to deny them the right to carry on what has been passed down from generation to generation?

They want you to feel guilty.

They are trying to justify the killing of dolphins by saying that the hunt itself has a deeper meaning for their culture. This is a lie. Some 400 years ago, when the drive hunts first started, the fishermen only hunted for whales. They would utilize every part of the whale, both for food and for supplies. It became tradition to pass down the knowledge of whale hunting from generation to generation. The inclusion of dolphins has been a recent addition to the hunt and they are now the primary species that are targeted and killed every season.

Don't listen to their guilt trip about "culture". The methods of killing that are utilized are inhumane, and must be stopped. There is obviously something fishy going on (no pun intended) if they go to such great measures to hide what they are doing.

It's not about culture. It's not even about whose culture is right or wrong. It's about our responsibility as global citizens to see this atrocity and its negative effects and to know that something must be done to stop it.



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