Posts tagged “taiji”
Sea Shepherd activist and Cove Guardian Erwin Vermeulen, who was arrested for allegedly pushing a Japanese fisherman in Taiji, has been afforded a release order by a Japanese judge. This is great news for Sea Shepherd but primarily awesome for Erwin and his family. Congratulations, Erwin!
Captain Paul Watson shares some information about the dolphin massacres in Taiji and becoming a Sea Shepherd Cove Guardian. The production is a mite strange switching from dark music to happy music then back to the dark music again, but it’s an excellent introduction to those interested in becoming Cove Guardians.
Through no fault of their own—and certainly for no lack of effort—it appears that Sea Shepherd is unable to successfully protect dolphins in Taiji. Cove Guardian leader Rosie Kunneke reports:
This week was a brutal, cruel, and saddening week in the horrible little town of Taiji. Three pods, approximately 28-31 dolphins in total, of beautiful Risso’s dolphins were senselessly murdered in the Cove. Two of the pods had babies and juveniles amongst them. After killing the pod members, the dolphin killers took the babies way out to sea likely wanting us to believe that they were releasing them while they were probably murdering them out of sight. Either way, the babies will die without their mothers and pod members because they will succumb to a slow death by starvation or fall victim to predators.
In Antarctic waters Sea Shepherd has some authority to disrupt the murderous plans of Japanese whalers. However, in Taiji they have no jurisdiction to act aggressively.
Their presence there is a thorn in the side of those in the dolphin-captivity industry and their reports back to the world are invaluable. Moreover, while present there is pressure on the Japanese government while the world watches over their shoulder as they hideously slaughter pod after pod of cetaceans.
But in the end this is the extent of what Sea Shepherd can do without significant repercussions to those watching over the cove. It must be devastatingly heartbreaking for the Cove Guardians. They are forced to fight through what they’re seeing every day.
Be brave, Cove Guardians. We’re behind you.
#taiji #cove guardians #rosie kunneke #japan #dolphins #cetaceans #the cove
About an hour ago Sea Shepherd tweeted the following:
Taiji: banger boats busy trying to drive a pod in. Looks like the pod is fighting hard and making it difficult!
That just sounds horrible. There’s some silver lining that the pod is fighting back, but the point is that they’re fighting. They’re instinctively fleeing a mysterious sound without knowing the real horror that awaits them if they make the wrong move into the cove.
Fucking Taiji fisherman. You have no souls. Dolphins are probably smarter than you and they can feel the fear you impose upon them because they’re self aware. They also suffer from depression when you murder off most of their pod before shipping them to an aquarium.
A report by Cove Guardians leader Rosie Kunneke after their first week in Taiji for Operation Infinite begins “if only all weeks were this good.” She sums up the week quite nicely:
The killers stayed in the harbor on four out of seven days due to bad weather and sea conditions. They went out searching for dolphins to hunt on two days only to come back emptyhanded on both occasions, and on Sunday, they all left the harbor but turned around about a kilometer out and came back in.
Now that is a good week. I just hope the bad weather doesn’t spell more catastrophical disasters for the people of Japan. Just enough bad weather to keep the Taiji hunters at bay will suffice, thank you very much.
#taiji #japan #operation infinite #cove guardians #rosie kunneke
Animals never cease to amaze me. The East Coast’s earthquake a couple weeks back was shocking to humans, who weren’t aware of the event until the earth began to shake beneath their feet. Animals in the Smithsonian National Zoo in D.C, however, showed signs of premonition according to Dr. Don Moore, the zoo’s associate director for animal care sciences. He noted:
Red ruffed lemurs sounded a distinct high-pitched barking about 15 minutes before the quake, and then again after the shaking stopped…And just before the quake, the zoo’s flock of 64 flamingoes gathered close together in a “tight, flocking behavior”…We have a rock hyrax whose favorite food is grapes. He had all night to eat those grapes, but didn’t.
Debates about whether or not it’s okay to abuse, enslave, or murder animals typically focus on intelligence and pain. But animals are far more complex then most humans will admit. So while fishermen in Taiji are committing genocide on the second smartest mammal on earth, they’re also slaughtering animals who have powers and senses far greater than humans.
How did we get to be the “smartest” race on the planet? We certainly don’t deserve that quality.
#animals #intelligence #mammals #taiji #dolphins #cetaceans #smithsonian national zoo #dr don moore
And so it begins. Another massacre of cetaceans in the waters of Taiji, Japan. Blood for industry. But Take Part has an action page for The Cove which outlines 5 things you can do to help fight the genocide.
Dolphins matter, people of the Faeroe Islands and Taiji.
Dancing with Dolphins
Photo and caption by Becky Kagan Schott
Its a beautiful thing to have an interaction with a wild animal. This pod of spotted dolphins took up an interest in us! They played and danced with us as we freedove down like part of the pod in the crystal clear water. It was a true adventure and a memory that will last a lifetime.Download wallpaper for: Your Monitor iPad iPhone 4
First dolphins are brutally murdered in Taiji while they are “cherry picked” for ideal slave-trade candidates. The survivors are transported to aquariums and comparable facilities where they are most often tortured and/or demoralized.
One of the ways they are transported is via airplane. And one of the companies who transports them is Cathay Pacific airlines.
A great way to protest wrongdoings in the world is to boycott corporations who support those iniquities. If you are a traveler and wish to ensure your travel budget isn’t falling into the hands of companies who contribute to the cetacean genocide in Taiji, you will want to avoid Cathay Pacific airlines and their affiliates.
Cathay Pacific lists the following companies as their codeshare partners:
And they list the following as bilateral business partners:
You can also contact Cathay Pacific airlines to let them know you will not be patronizing them because of their contribution to the slaughters in Taiji. While their actions are legal, they are immoral. And that’s all that matters.
Man, it just never fucking ends. Report after report about cetaceans being frightened into the cove before being brutally slaughtered by cowardly men. In today’s report from the Cove Guardians:
The pilot whales in the Cove did not quietly go to their deaths. They fought as best they could, churning up the water and dashing on the rocks. Ultimately though, 22 to 25 of them were pushed into the killing Cove…Those pilot whales not killed today had to swim in the blood of their family members and listen to their death cries. They will die in the early light tomorrow.
There’s the unfathomable events of World War II in which millions of Jews were being herded into makeshift prisons, watching and listening to their friends and family members being slaughtered without any means to escape or defend themselves. There’s the horrific enormity of bodies stacking up at rivers’ ends in Rwanda during the massacre of 800,000 people from Hutu/Tutsi tribes in 1994.
People rise up and protest these macabre occurrences; at a minimum they lament them, even from afar. But when the same thing happens to dolphins—debatably the second-smartest animals on earth—few people seem to give a shit. Well there are masses of people who care, but either not enough or not the right people to make a difference.
It must be exhausting for Sea Shepherd’s Cove Guardians to witness this genocide day after day. They are living at the forefront of a disassembly line. And while they’re making a difference and putting the murderers in the spotlight, the butchery continues. Even amid the aftermath of Japan’s recent natural disasters:
We have been asked why we are making noise about whales and dolphins when there is so much human misery in Japan at the moment. The better question to ask is why the Japanese government is allowing this slaughter to happen. Why is the government allowing these two dozen individuals in Taiji to bring shame and dishonor to the entire nation when there is so much misery here already?
Fuck, Taiji—enough already. It’s not worth the money you’re making. Face your conscience and move on to something productive. Something beautiful. Anything.
#taiji #dolphins #cetaceans #pilot whales #murder #genocide #slaughter #the cove #cove guardians #tsunami #earthquake
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