Posted on 02/14/2010 8:34:03 PM PST by at bay
Sea Shepherd Update: Valentine’s Day in the Southern Ocean
The crews of the Steve Irwin and the Bob Barker celebrated Valentine's Day by painting the Research sign on the side of the Nisshan Maru with red paint. The paint represented the blood of the whales, exposing the bogus nature of so-called research by the Japanese whaling vessels.
The word "research" is in English and not Japanese, because the Japanese fully understand that the whaling is a commercial operation. It is only the West that the Japanese whalers are trying to fool.
The Japanese whalers have not killed a whale for ten days now because of Sea Shepherd’s intervention.
The Japanese Institute for Cetacean Research has accused Sea Shepherd of harassing the fleet each day. Of course Sea Shepherd is harassing the fleet. We did not come down here to hang banners.
Sea Shepherd ships have a single objection - to cut kill quotas inflicted by the illegal poaching operations of the Japanese whaling fleet.
For those who accuse Sea Shepherd of being criminals, Captain Paul Watson has only this to say: "If we are criminals, either arrest us or shut the hell up. I'm getting pretty fed up with whiners who can't back up their ridiculous accusations with the law. Cite a law that we have broken, cite a violation. The truth is that there have been no violations and we have not been charged with a single criminal act or maritime violation in six years of opposing these poachers."
Sea Shepherd, on the other hand, can cite laws, such as: the regulations of the International Whaling Commission, the Antarctic Treaty, the Law of the Sea, and an Australian Federal Court order prohibiting Japanese whaling in the Australian Antarctic Territorial waters.
Japanese whalers are barred from entering Australian and New Zealand waters. Sea Shepherd ships are not barred. Japanese whalers are barred from Indonesian waters. Sea Shepherd ships are not. If a Japanese whaling ship enters an Australian or New Zealand port it will be arrested. Sea Shepherd ships are not arrested.
So who indeed are the criminals? The poachers illegally killing endangered and protected whales inside the boundaries of an established international Whale Sanctuary, in violation of a global moratorium on whaling, and in contempt of an Australian Federal Court order, OR the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, which is simply trying to stop these illegal activities, and doing so in a responsible manner without causing injuries or breaking the law?
Tomorrow marks the 70th day since the Sea Shepherd ship Steve Irwin departed Fremantle to begin Operation Waltzing Matilda.
"This is a long protracted campaign involving three vessels coming from three different countries under different flags and with volunteers from 18 nations. We are navigating the most remote and hostile waters in the world and we are opposing an increasingly aggressive opposition. We have lost one ship and had another damaged. But, we are cutting their kill quotas and costing them their profits and thus Operation Waltzing Matilda has been a success," said Captain Watson. "We will not retreat and we will never surrender the whales of the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary to the poachers from Japan."
Like the Antarctic ocean, the law is a sea of grey.
Watson makes a pretty good case. He also attacked the Sieera Clib for being sell outs to the left and Democrat Party for pushing open-borders etc.
Watson is an arrogant jerk.
At an animal rights convention in 2002, Paul Watson was also quoted as saying, “There’s nothing wrong with being a terrorist, as long as you win. Then you write the history.”
There is another option, blow them out of the water.
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I wish the Japanese would sink them.
This are terrorists and pirates. If the Japanese sank them and refused to pick up survivors, it would be a gray area also, but legal.
Respond to that terrorist sympathizer!
If the hippies want to fight the japs, well, so what? The japs are taking it pretty easy on them so far. I don’t much care for hippies, not that I am overly enamored with japs. Let them have at it down in the really cold waters. Accidents will happen!
I can’t believe that FR is now seeing pro-leftist ecco/enviro-nazi posts.
But I won’t resort to insults.
The Japanese fleet is operating under international law that allows them a strict quota of whales. They are following the rules given to them. What is so hard to understand?
The Sea Shepherd organization not only interferes with legal operations, but engages in intentionally dangerous and provocative attacks (including intentional ramming of their vessels into the Japanese ships, dragging prop-fowlers which can disable a ship. They engage in throwing objects with no regard to safety of the workers on the Japanese ships, indeed hoping to cause physical harm.
Just because one many not agree with what the Japanese whaling fleet is doing, does not automatically give anyone the right to cause harm or damage (or endanger human life) to try to stop the action. What if an enviromentalist nut job decided that he didn’t like the kind of car you drove? He decides to run you off the road. You think that is ok?
Or the crazies who burn down new subdivisions because their view was that it stepped on mother nature...
Or if some crazy decides to run me off the road on the way to go deer hunting - because I am going to shed that poor innocent creature’s blood... Or maybe they just hurl butyric acid or some other irritant or caustic material on me. Or maybe they just slit my tires. Or...
Even the extremist groups like Greenpeace don’t like to associate with the Sea Shepherd organization for a reason - they are WAY outside the law.
The resource being utilized is monitored by the international community. The quota set is well below what the population can endure.
Let one of those crazies try to stop me next time I go to the grocery store after some steaks...
Oh please...assaulting the Japanese ships with butyric acid, ramming the japanese ships with the Steve Irwin, boarding a vessel at sea without permission (season 1), interfering with the search and rescue operations of a Japanese sailor who fell overboard, putting the lives of his incompetent crew at risk, wanton endangerment, the list goes on and on. Australian officials have boarded the Steve Irwin more than once in port and are hopefully building a case against these eco-terrorists.
The Japanese whaling is legal and within reason. The species they hunt are already overpopulated. They do research then sell the rest of the whales for food. Big freaking whoop.
I don’t like the idea of whaling, but I don’t really like aligning with hippies either. Quite the moral question
The ICR also makes a good case...
http://www.icrwhale.org/gpandsea.htm
“I can’t believe that FR is now seeing pro-leftist ecco/enviro-nazi posts.
But I won’t resort to insults.”
you just did, so back at you, you ignoramous:
“The Japanese fleet is operating under international law that allows them a strict quota of whales. They are following the rules given to them. What is so hard to understand?”
The quota is zero, except for research. It is the Japanese government, specifically the Fisheries Depaetment that has set this quota, allowed FOR RESEARCH ONLY.
The Japanese are conducting commercial whaling, banned over 20 years ago, under the guise of “research” which almost everyone agrees is a sham.
What part of that are you unable to comprehend?
Accidents Will Happen
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1f3jK0p18M&feature=fvw
Before he got fat and lefty.
Maneuvering to obstruct a working fishing vessel is a violation of maritime law. Boarding a vessel without permission is a violation of maritime law. Maneuvering to collide with another vessel is a violation of maritime law.
Capn Watson makes a big deal of being a “pirate”.
He should be treated like one.
I haven’t spent any time arguing that the Sea Shepherds are breaking the law, but it’s great fun to watch the incompetent hippies try to get themselves killed.
What proof do you have that “research” is not being conducted? Who’s definition of research?
Even if we were to assume that the Japanese fleet was doing nothing but commercial whaling (and I am no conceding that point at all - just for argument sake) - would it not be in their best interest to study the whales, to understand both their health, condition, population, breeding success, and other factors? Thus some form of “research” would then be part of the hunting, for the preservation of the resource.
But that being said, I have seen absolutely zero evidence presented that there is no legitimate research going on. Only brazen accusations to inflame nasty leftists who think more highly of the animals that God gave us dominion over, than other human beings.
You say it is the Japanese government that set the quota “for research only”, yet it is the same Japanese government that is screaming mad at the Ecco-terrorist Sea Shepherds.
And for the record - I am no fan of whale hunting. I would prefer to see them. I don’t have any interest in eating them or killing them. But that being said - many people feel the same way regarding my own desire to hunt wild game (and I always engage in that activity within the laws I am given to abide by).
I am glad, though, that the Japanese fleet chooses to actually put the whale carcass to good use, instead of gaining whatever research information they are looking for then disposing of the carcass. I’m not one to believe in wasting the animal. If you are going to kill it, then use it.
“Almost everyone agrees is a sham”... sounds dangerously close to the language used by the Global Warming/Climate Change alarmists who also use terms like “in unanimous agreement”, “all concur” or the more base “those with half a brian can clearly see...”.
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