Tuesday, April 05, 2005

The peaceful Canadians?

How come the Canadians are so peaceful and internationalist and loving of all the world community except fuzzy baby harp seals?

Have you ever seen footage of a seal hunt? The little buggers wander over toward the hunters at first because (1) only BABY harp seals have furry pelts, (2) they're curious and friendly little fluffballs. The hunters walk quietly over to them and BASH them on the heads with clubs.

It's disgusting. Here are some details on the hows and whys of the seal hunt from a conservation group that does not seem like a bunch of screechy Luddites (I've seen others SCREAMING to stop the hunt on their websites). The US Humane Society is calling for a boycott of Canadian seafood products, and a couple of notable customers have joined the boycott (see link at top).

And if anyone gives you a line of rubbish about how quashing the seal hunt hurts indigenous peoples in Northeastern Canada, debunk it thusly [from the FAQ linked in the body of this post]:
Q: Who kills seals?

Paul Watson: There are no indigenous peoples involved in the East coast Canadian seal hunt. Seals hunted by Inuit or Native people in the North are taken in the arctic and are primarily ringed seals. The Harp and Hood seals are hunted in the Gulf of St.Lawrence by residents of the Magdalen Islands in Quebec. These are French speaking people. The other location is called the Newfoundland Front in the Atlantic and this hunt is conducted by Newfoundlanders. As a point of interest there are no native people in Newfoundland. The last member of the Beothuk nation, the indigenous peoples of Newfoundland, died in 1912. The Newfoundlanders had a bounty on the Beothuk and most were slain by MicMac Indian bounty hunters from New Brunswick and Quebec. Newfoundlanders also drove the Newfoundland wolf, the walrus, and the Labrador duck to extinction and extirpated the polar bear, and the pilot whale from Newfoundland territory.

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