Because We Can...

Great toothed whales slowly starve to death, their guts blocked by plastic garbage they have swallowed in seas awash with man's refuse...

Pilot whales strand themselves on lonely beaches, there to die agonizing deaths, their brains fried by Navy sonar...

Killer whales inexorably go insane trapped in confined concrete tanks that are proportionately the same size as prison cells on man's death row...

Baleen whales are slaughtered on the high seas then butchered on blood-covered decks of Japanese, Norwegian, and Icelandic whaling ships...

Adult dolphins are disemboweled alive by uncaring men in a cove in Taiji, Japan, and in the seas surrounding the Faroe Islands...

Baby dolphins die in record numbers in the oil-polluted waters of the Gulf of Mexico...

And on, and on, and on...

Why? Why do we humans do this to the only other creatures that possess a level of intelligence and sentience closely approaching ours?

Because we can, and for that reason this is a sadder planet and we are a lesser people.

1 Down, 128 Million To Go

I have said that the way to end whaling by Japan is not by attacking their whaling ships, or by hurling invectives at them from the far side of the ocean. Neither of these has worked. These actions and words are seen as an imperialistic assault upon their culture and only serve to further entrench the Japanese government's support for whaling. The only voices that pro-whaling politicians will listen to are those of the people of Japan themselves. And to that end, I am heartened to learn that one such voice has now been raised by a former employee of the Taiji dolphin hunt. She was what they call a 'dolphin trainer' and her job was to select the dolphins that would be sold to aquariums. She did this knowing that those she did not pick would be killed and butchered. Now, many years later, after seeing the film 'The Cove', she has spoken out against this barbaric annual slaughter. In her words, (translated from Japanese), "It is just a small group of hardheaded men who continue the practice of dolphin hunting with the excuse of protecting our culture". She added that, "I think it is about time that we Japanese people open our eyes to what we are doing and what the rest of the world is asking of us." Amen! Hers is only one voice out of 128 million, but it is a start. From her lips to God’s ears, and to the ears of those hardheaded men.

The Screams of a Silent Killer

I am compelled to return to a subject about which I have spoken before. It is the ongoing tragedy being carried out by fishermen in the Japanese coastal town of Taiji. During six months each year, beginning in September, tens of thousands of dolphins are rounded up in small groups and herded into a tiny cove. There the Bottlenose Dolphins are separated from the rest to be sold to oceanariums around the world, dooming them to lives of imprisonment. But these are the ‘lucky’ ones. The rest, mostly Spinner and Spotted Dolphins, are then methodically butchered alive by these cold, cruel men who snicker and suck on cigarettes as the dying adults cry out to their young, and the terrified young scream in agony, in water stained red with blood. Ironically, the dolphin flesh, which contains mercury levels 2,000 times higher than what is safe for human consumption, is then sold under the guise of whale meat. In murdering the dolphins, the fishermen are thereby unleashing a silent killer upon unsuspecting consumers. My heart aches for the innocent victims, both dolphin and human, of these evil men and I pray that someday good and decent people in Japan will put an end to this atrocity forever.

Because they always have...

This week, a film titled The Cove was screened at the Tokyo International Film Festival. Directed by Louis Psihoyos, it is an exposé of the annual slaughter of thousands of whales and dolphins by fishermen in the small Japanese seacoast town of Taiji. For obvious reasons, I have not seen it nor will I. However, I am told that the film contains profoundly disturbing footage of the butchering of my fellow sentient and intelligent beings in that dark and bloody cove. Japanese officials defend this barbaric practice because that is ‘what these fishermen have always done’. They say that the world should respect cultural differences. Cultural differences! Are they insane? By that same perverted logic, the world should tolerate all acts of depravity in any nation as long as there is precedent. I thank the God that made you and me, that over the past two centuries, brave and caring humans in Europe and North America have categorically rejected this monstrous argument put forth by tyrants. If they had not, then slavery and genocide would still prevail in the lands where freedom reigns. The only way to stop this dark carnage inflicted upon my kind by yours is to bring it into the light. Good for you, Louis Psihoyos; good for you, organizers of the film festival for allowing it to be shown; and good for you, the decent people of Japan who are horrified by this brutal practice.