then, let me guess, lets start "farming" whales, and the momment ppl start doing that, ppl
wont bother anymore about the whale killing....

-_-

@ Vale's pictures of cows:

Now, yes, that may seem "barbaric," but those pictures represent the most efficient
way of removing meat from a cow. The difference here, though, is that the cows
were bred for food, unlike whales.

I am on the fence here on this subject. I think its wrong that the Japanese use
smoke and mirrors to whale, but I support them whaling in small numbers.

While I dont agree with what the Japanese are doing, its sadly not going to change
any time soon.
The crew of the SI cant do crap to stop them, and the Japanese know it...thats why
they just said to hell with them and started whaleing in front of them. All they can do
is cry on camera and try or get pissed off becasue they have nothing better to do.
Some say thay are willing to die for whales(yeah right).
What do they say when they go back home knowing that they failed in every way to
help portoect those whales.
They can raise awareness, but thats about all..sadly.

I personaly would like to see that entire Japanese Whaleing Fleet go down in those
waters. The end will come much quicker for them..then it does for the whales they
murder.

I don't agree with the whaleing, but I also do not agree with the way that SS goes about
stopping them. I mean, the man that founded Green Peace was once with the captain of SI,
but he feels so bad about the way he works that he wont have anything to do with him!

The way they ram the ships and throwing tear gas and stuff could be perceived as an act of
terrorism. I'm surprised that they haven't been picked up for terrorism or piracy.

I'm not saying "forbid the japanese to keep hunting whales", I'm saying lower their quota.

As I said above, the cultural heritage is there, they've hunted whales for hundreds of
years, it's not something you can take away from them, but with a population of about 130
million people, the cultural heritage must be ignored a little bit because not even all
whale species on the planet can feed all japanese.

The point is, how much damage will they have to do to the whale population before the
authority with the power to do something actually does something?

i dunno much about that thing of "whale wars", but i can be sure of one thing
hunting whales in Japan is smth that s on their culture, what they do can be wrong, but
its a part of their culture. Basicly, telling and trying to stop them from hunting smth
that belongs to their chain food, is like telling some1 from europe to stop eating sheeps
or cows. If whales is one of the animals they can hunt for their own survival, then i
believe they have all the right to do it....
but then again, in not so "in" about that matter. If you told me now that they were
killing whales for the purpose of "sending the meat to other countries" or "totally
exagerated hunting", then i would be aggainst the whale killing.

and then i find it amusing that ppl that "cares so much about ppl killing animals that
live in the wild", and totally forget about animals, pretty much known to us all, like
chickens, cows, sheeps, pigs, and other farm animals, where nowadays they are
"mass-produced", living on small-containing jails, where the max movements they do is:
lowering the head, eat the grains/drink the water, and then elevate their heads... while
the animals they try to protect live in the wild most of the time, those spend most of the
time simply "fattening". in one side, animals that are valued by the hunters, in the other
side, animals that are treated just like.... a beef!

well, sry for this out-of-thread moment, but i think it kinda inserts in the topic ^^'
btw, wht i said is not supposed to be directed at some1.... dont flame me by that lol

"Since the original argument was with my GF, I already started off as being
wrong :P"

^lol

i dont really know much about whale populations or if the japanese whalers are
harvesting species that are endangered but i get the feeling the captain of the SI is
just another peta-type fanatic with a big boat and a tv show. if these whalers are
out trying to make a living, and in their country they are perfectly allowed to go out
and harvest whales, i dont see a problem. if i were the whalers and i had a crew full
of guys that arnt getting paid because of some yuppie fanatics, i would be highly
motivated to defend my operation. But honestly, the whalers dont even try to
retaliate, they just want to be left alone.

tho it is funny watching the SI people screw up and i also applauded the whalers
using the sound gun thing...

@Kenobi

The Japanese are indeed abusing the 'scientific research' defense- I couldn't agree with
you more. But in the end it is still technically legal, and Japan found a loop-hole in an
international sanction. I think working to close said loophole would be far more
productive that petty vandalism and hypocritical attempts to stop the whalers (i.e. "We
can drop prop lines all we want, but the Japanese are sneaky, conniving assholes when they
do the same").

I also agree with cultural exceptions, and wonder as to what size a group of people has to
be before this right is taken away (AFAIK the Japanese have been eating whale for as long
as whaling has been conducted, so it could be argued as a cultural harvest). At the level
of industrialized nations, I think that something must be done as any one nation is fully
capable of irreversibly harming an ecosystem. They could at least be decent enough to
follow my country's example and ignore some international sanctions altogether :)

@Jake
I like the analogy of basketball players to rugby players, as it shows the cultural
differences quite well. The problem arises when one side of the debate is influential
enough to horribly alter this planet for everyone else. I don't think the Japanese are at
risk of doing this (IIRC they harvest numbers around 1,000 of a population > 600,000), but
they are quite capable.

Let's polish this turd: if whaling upsets you, remember there are still places on this
planet that practice cannibalism, incest, child sexual exploitation, slavery, and ethnic
cleansing. Let's sit back, relish our TV and ability to freely trade our thoughts, and
find something else to gripe about...

...before Naki comes and posts more whale porn.

/end walloftext

Yall will probably flame me for this, but I really don't mind.

I love watching Whale Wars.. It cheers me up when the SI gets in trouble/screws up/things are broken. The
way I see it regardless of how "wrong" whale harvasting is, the way it's done is legal. The SI operates like
nothing more than filthy pirates. I actually xlcheered when the sound weapon was used on them..

We as a society do not have a right to dictate what is morally rigtbor wrong to a completly different culture. It's
like a basketball team trying to tell rugbynplayers whatrheh can and can't do...the two just don't mesh. While it
may be viewed as wrong in our country/society, it may be commonplace and normal for another.

Don't we have bigger issues to worry about than whales!?!? Disease, starvation, war, famine, Cancer,
heallthcare, these are just a few things a thousand times more important than whales... Seriously people..

On another note, if the SI attacked a ship I was in, I would reply with deadly force if need be. It is an act of
war for a flagged vessal to harras or attack another nations ship. Where's rhe outrage about this?

Ugh.. I'm done. Flame on if you wish

"Japan should make a stand on sovereignty and say that the IWC does not dictate their laws
therefore they can do whatever the hell they want. "

I'm sorry but I don't support that.

It's ok when native communities are allowed to hunt certain protected species because it's
a part of their culture and they are small communities, for example the native indians
(don't know the exact word, correct me if I'm wrong) in the USA, but Japan is abusing from
that same criteria and worse: they are lying, saying it's for scientific
investigation..well guess what..where are the results of those investigations?
Nowhere!

I vote for allowing them to hunt even less whales.