Canadian Seal Cull and High Sea Piracy

[Camelopard]

How is this for a draconian law:

"Under Canadian law, it is illegal to watch, photograph, or video tape the death of a seal without the permission of Fisheries Minister Loyola Hearn."

It seems that the Canadians don't want the rest of the world to see cute little seal pups being bashed to death and all the resultant bad publicity that goes with it, so thay make it illegal to watch or film it, then arrest ships in International waters.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/04/14/2215705.htm?section=justin

As we watched this on the news last night my wife who is a Canadian citizen said she would phone the Canadian High Commission today and register her disgust at the violation of animal as well as human rights.

[Schultz]

Sounds like China.

[Camelopard]

No replies from any Canadians, maybe this has been censored in Canada, just like China. :D

[schmenke]

No replies from any Canadians, maybe this has been censored in Canada, just like China. :D

:rolleyes:

The law is in place for the safety of the sealers.

[Firstgear]

I find the following line from the article quite amusing:

"Sea Shepherd says it may take legal action against the Canadian Government if the Farley Mowat suffers any damage."

They didn't seem too concerned about damage a week or two ago when they (the crew of the Farley Mowat) intentionally twice rammed a sealers ship.

[Camelopard]

I find the following line from the article quite amusing:

"Sea Shepherd says it may take legal action against the Canadian Government if the Farley Mowat suffers any damage."


Quote from Paul Watson:

"They did this before to me in 1983 and I ended up suing them and they had to pay me the damages, so it looks like we're having another repeat on this."

Just out of curiosity what is the percentage of Canadians in favour of the Seal Pup cull? These days there is always a dollar value put on everything, so again out of curiosity what sort of revenue does the cull bring?

The blocking of filming is a very unusual state in a first world country, something we are more accustomed to from the regimes in third world countries like Zimbabwe, Sudan, China and so on.

I'm presuming that footage of the alleged ramming was shown on television, but not the actions of the sealers themselves when they club poor defenceless seals to death with what looks like baseball bats? State control of the media in a first world country?

[Firstgear]

I have no idea what the percentage of Canadians in favour is, or how much the hunt is worth in dollars. To me, it's no different than killing cattle for beef, shooting deer or geese, or fishing. I would think fishing or hunting deer or geese would be less humane, seeing as the animal would probably suffer longer.

I didn't see the ramming on TV, only heard the story on the radio.

If the seals were an endangered species (like the whales the Japaneese are taking) I'd definately be against it, but they're not.

[Easy Drifter]

Clubbing of seals ended years ago as did the killing of Harp seals (the white ones). That is years old footage. To day seals are shot at point blank range. No worse than other animal harvesting. Picture taking is not banned but there are restrictions on how close to sealers and their ships you can go. A large ship can create problems for sealers out on the ice as it can break up a flow. Survival then is in minutes. The revenue produced by sealing is a large % of a sealers annual income. The # of seals are increasing and Cod and other fish stocks are going down. Canada also claims Watson's ship was in Cdn. waters. How many countries has he had trouble with? Quite a few and the story is always the same.
Canada is not as pure as it claims either but I take Watson's rants with a large grain of salt.

[maxu05]

I think this is similar to the Elephant culls, but, it is something that must be done, to ensure the survival of the species, and other species as well.

[Daniel]

I find it all a bit strange that people get so worked up over cute animals.

I mean whales are endangered and we simply can't allow Japan to go harpooning endangered whales. But if the seals aren't endangered and their numbers are causing problems with fish stocks and so on the kill them.

I'll eat a cute little lamb. Or a cute little cow. As long as it lived a good life and was killed as humanely as possible then that's fine by me.

[SOD]

the real barbaric practices are allowed go on unphotographed.

[schmenke]

Many East coast Canadian fishermen have turned to hunting seals as a means to supplement their incomes due to severe government-imposed restrictions on the catch of cod, salmon and other fish stocks.
The value of seal products is determined by the demand from European markets to where the majority of these products are exported.

Footage of the alleged "ramming" has been aired by the CBC. The Canadian coast guard vessel and the Farley Mowat nudged/scraped, after repeated warnings by the coast guard to back off. Also aired were photos of the Farley Mowat coming dangerously close to the sealers' boats. The Farley Mowat is about 4 times the size.

I'm not certain of the exact location of the incident, but it appears to have been in the Gulf of St. Lawrence which, as far as I know, is entirely in Canadian terretorial waters. Indeed the seal hunt takes place on the ice floes close to shore. The ice floes break up and scatter long before they reach the ~200 mile international waters limit. Claims of this incident taking place in international waters are highly suspect.

As has been mentioned, filming of the seal hunt is permitted as long as an "observation permit" has been granted by the Ministry of Canadian Fisheries. This permit is required for safety reasons. No request for such a permit was ever made by Watson.

Comparisons between Canada and countries like China are ludicrous :mark:

[Daniel]

Many East coast Canadian fishermen have turned to hunting seals as a means to supplement their incomes due to severe government-imposed restrictions on the catch of cod, salmon and other fish stocks.
The value of seal products is determined by the demand from European markets to where the majority of these products are exported.

Footage of the alleged "ramming" has been aired by the CBC. The Canadian coast guard vessel and the Farley Mowat nudged/scraped, after repeated warnings by the coast guard to back off. Also aired were photos of the Farley Mowat coming dangerously close to the sealers' boats. The Farley Mowat is about 4 times the size.

I'm not certain of the exact location of the incident, but it appears to have been in the Gulf of St. Lawrence which, as far as I know, is entirely in Canadian terretorial waters. Indeed the seal hunt takes place on the ice floes close to shore. The ice floes break up and scatter long before they reach the ~200 mile international waters limit. Claims of this incident taking place in international waters are highly suspect.

As has been mentioned, filming of the seal hunt is permitted as long as an "observation permit" has been granted by the Ministry of Canadian Fisheries. This permit is required for safety reasons. No request for such a permit was ever made by Watson.

Comparisons between Canada and countries like China are ludicrous :mark:

What a bunch of idiots.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=_dx4hwmQU8A

I'm all for conservation and I'm very much against killing endangered whales. But if the seals aren't endangered and are killed in a humane way then what's the problem? I'd even eat seal meat if it was tasty and I knew the animal was killed properly.

It's people like this who harm the image of true environmentalists who are happy to look at the big picture and understand that stuff has to die for people to eat and to make money. We should work to conserve endangered species and not waste time, money, effort and endanger people's lives just for a few cute baby seals.

[Camelopard]

Many East coast Canadian fishermen have turned to hunting seals as a means to supplement their incomes due to severe government-imposed restrictions on the catch of cod, salmon and other fish stocks.

The reason that quotas were placed on the taking of fish is that the cod were nearly wiped out by stupid people, hey if I take as many cod as I can now, I don't care if there is none left to reproduce for future generations,

When you fish a species to commercial extinction, it may never recover." - Brian Tobin, former Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, April 2003

http://www.hsicanada.ca/seals/seals_and_cod.html

The collapse of northern cod stock has been called the greatest resource management disaster in history. Following a twelve year moratorim on the cod fishery, there are no signs that the stock is rebuilding. And with northern cod at one percent of their historic population, scientists are beginning to grasp that the ecological damage caused by decades of overfishing just might be irreversible.

[Camelopard]

Comparisons between Canada and countries like China are ludicrous :mark:

In my opinion, I don't think so, I'm sure if I turned up at the Ministry of Canadian Fisheries and asked for a permit to go out and photograph these acts I would not be given a permit :confused: .

State control of media is a bad thing regardless of whether it is in a third world country or a first world country.

[schmenke]

The reason that quotas were placed on the taking of fish is that the cod were nearly wiped out by stupid people, ...

Yep, the Asians and Europeans who continue to consume the Atlantic cod are stupid...

The Canadian government was the first nation to impose limits on east coast cod fishing. Indeed they did the same with salmon stocks years earlier.
Since these limits were imposed, European countries continue to fish cod in that area, just outside the Canadian 200 mile terretorial limit. Yep, stupid.

[schmenke]

In my opinion, I don't think so, I'm sure if I turned up at the Ministry of Canadian Fisheries and asked for a permit to go out and photograph these acts I would not be given a permit :confused: .

State control of media is a bad thing regardless of whether it is in a third world country or a first world country.

The Canadian government is not controlling media. There are no laws that restrict in any way the distribution and airing of pictures/video of the seal hunt.

[Gibbsy]

An animal being cute is not a good enough reason to hand it a status that sees it become more protected than any other animal.

One day perhaps Watson and his band of merry idiots will realise this.

[Daniel]

An animal being cute is not a good enough reason to hand it a status that sees it become more protected than any other animal.

One day perhaps Watson and his band of merry idiots will realise this.

Agreed :up:

[Valve Bounce]

:rolleyes:

The law is in place for the safety of the sealers.

Why?? do the seals attack the sealers while they are being clubbed to death?

[Daniel]

Why?? do the seals attack the sealers while they are being clubbed to death?
Yes. The seals are bloodthirsty creatures.

Having boats sailing nearby can break up the ice which the sealers are on killing them.