Japan Whaley Killer
Whales: intelligent endangered leviathans of the deep, or big cows that live in the sea?
That's the question absolutely nobody seems to be asking as Japan and other pro-whaling nations seek a return to whaling following a long lobbying campaign and sneaky techniques such as 'buying' poorer country's votes. Instead, predictably, newspapers are awash with emotive headlines - "The shadow of slaughter hangs over whales", shrieked the Observer a few days ago.
Apparently whales are just too intelligent and rare - even when there's loads of them - and whaling is too cruel for it to even be contemplated. I've got a problem with this. First off - how do we know that whales are intelligent? They could be stoopider than dormice - what tests have environmentalists carried out to empirically prove the intelligence of whales? Swim for a bit? Honk like Enya? Natural constraints would seem to limit whales' ability to show their putative Kasparov-esque intellect.
Natural history has shown that intelligence - or any other resource intensive physical attribute - evolves only when there is a clear evolutionary benefit that makes those with that attribute more successful than those without it. Human intelligence evolved so that we could use tools and work in complex social groups. I can't see the evolutionary pressures that would require whales to develop a comparable intelligence. And the things that whales do - swim, eat plankton and honk - are all done by much of the animal world. We don't attribute geese with intelligence because they migrate in groups; nor thrushes because they sing to each other.
Saying that whaling is more cruel than pig farming is highly subjective. If anything, whaling seems preferable - the whale lives a healthy life in the wild, before spending a few painful hours being harpooned and butchered. A pig, on the other hand, is reared in a concrete stall under artificial light, fed a diet of processed fishmeal, antibiotics and hormones in incredibly stressful conditions. And while the slaughter process for pigs may not be as overtly cruel as harpooning, pigs do not willingly hurl themselves through the abattoir doors and onto the butcher's blade.
As for rarity - if whales were so rare we wouldn't be able to find them and chuck spears at them. There must be a level of harvesting that is sustainable. Environmentalists tend to focus on a few animals that they can sentimentalise or anthropomorphise (seals, pandas, whales) but ignore other equally deserving but less cute species. A third of amphibians are at risk of extinction due to their porous skins which makes them vulnerable to pollution and climate change. But they are of no interest to environmentalists, for obvious reasons. Do you think the average environmentalist is going to be able to get a dippy college chick to rub them off through their hemp trousers if they fix a steely gaze through their dreadlocks and say, "I help out at a newt sanctuary" instead of, "I'm searching for the Orca"?
Anyway, Britain unsustainably harvests dozens of wild species - cod and skate are two. Maybe we should put our own house in order before we start telling other nations what they can and can't harvest. The whole anti-whaling campaign reeks of cultural imperialism. In this country we don't eat whales or dogs and are disgusted by people that do. But Hindus consider cows sacred - how would we react if they tried to ban our beef farming?
Mind you, according to Japanese research, consumption of whalemeat in Japan has fallen so dramatically in recent years that whalers are throwing their catches back into the sea. Unlike whales, Japanese people are intelligent and know full well that whale meat tastes crappy and makes your bum big. As they eat less whalemeat, fewer whales will be caught.
Perhaps Greenpeace could step aside and let good ol' market forces put an end to whaling?
That's the question absolutely nobody seems to be asking as Japan and other pro-whaling nations seek a return to whaling following a long lobbying campaign and sneaky techniques such as 'buying' poorer country's votes. Instead, predictably, newspapers are awash with emotive headlines - "The shadow of slaughter hangs over whales", shrieked the Observer a few days ago.
Apparently whales are just too intelligent and rare - even when there's loads of them - and whaling is too cruel for it to even be contemplated. I've got a problem with this. First off - how do we know that whales are intelligent? They could be stoopider than dormice - what tests have environmentalists carried out to empirically prove the intelligence of whales? Swim for a bit? Honk like Enya? Natural constraints would seem to limit whales' ability to show their putative Kasparov-esque intellect.
Natural history has shown that intelligence - or any other resource intensive physical attribute - evolves only when there is a clear evolutionary benefit that makes those with that attribute more successful than those without it. Human intelligence evolved so that we could use tools and work in complex social groups. I can't see the evolutionary pressures that would require whales to develop a comparable intelligence. And the things that whales do - swim, eat plankton and honk - are all done by much of the animal world. We don't attribute geese with intelligence because they migrate in groups; nor thrushes because they sing to each other.
Saying that whaling is more cruel than pig farming is highly subjective. If anything, whaling seems preferable - the whale lives a healthy life in the wild, before spending a few painful hours being harpooned and butchered. A pig, on the other hand, is reared in a concrete stall under artificial light, fed a diet of processed fishmeal, antibiotics and hormones in incredibly stressful conditions. And while the slaughter process for pigs may not be as overtly cruel as harpooning, pigs do not willingly hurl themselves through the abattoir doors and onto the butcher's blade.
As for rarity - if whales were so rare we wouldn't be able to find them and chuck spears at them. There must be a level of harvesting that is sustainable. Environmentalists tend to focus on a few animals that they can sentimentalise or anthropomorphise (seals, pandas, whales) but ignore other equally deserving but less cute species. A third of amphibians are at risk of extinction due to their porous skins which makes them vulnerable to pollution and climate change. But they are of no interest to environmentalists, for obvious reasons. Do you think the average environmentalist is going to be able to get a dippy college chick to rub them off through their hemp trousers if they fix a steely gaze through their dreadlocks and say, "I help out at a newt sanctuary" instead of, "I'm searching for the Orca"?
Anyway, Britain unsustainably harvests dozens of wild species - cod and skate are two. Maybe we should put our own house in order before we start telling other nations what they can and can't harvest. The whole anti-whaling campaign reeks of cultural imperialism. In this country we don't eat whales or dogs and are disgusted by people that do. But Hindus consider cows sacred - how would we react if they tried to ban our beef farming?
Mind you, according to Japanese research, consumption of whalemeat in Japan has fallen so dramatically in recent years that whalers are throwing their catches back into the sea. Unlike whales, Japanese people are intelligent and know full well that whale meat tastes crappy and makes your bum big. As they eat less whalemeat, fewer whales will be caught.
Perhaps Greenpeace could step aside and let good ol' market forces put an end to whaling?
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