I was taking my coffee this morning, when I noticed a rather odd letter in the Herald. I don't have it with me, so I can't quote it verbatim, but the gist of it was that Japanese see nothing wrong with whaling as it is a 'traditional practice,' and as the Japanese army appealed to 'traditional practice' when they slaughtered half of Asia, we must assume that culling whales is comparable to Japanese war crimes.

Somebody needs logic lessons. The Herald must've had a slow letters day.

The Japanese Government is not even going to come to the negotiating table if western nations keep ramming the notion that whales are our 'intelligent, caring, cuddly friends of the deep' down their throats. The Japanese regard whales as a kind of fish that blows water - cute, maybe, but definitely also delicious - and I don't think this is likely to change any time soon. The best whale lovers can do is convince them to restrict the hunt to Minke whales, which aren't endangered. At least Jim Eagles has something sensible to say on the issue:

'if whales are protected on conservation grounds then at some point the population of some species is going to reach a level at which all parties agree that it can sustain a harvest.

But if whaling is banned on some semi-religious basis, then no matter how large the whale population grows it will always be sacrilegious to consider killing them, and that's hardly a basis for negotiation...


Similarly, the view of the anti-whaling lobby that there should be an absolute moratorium on whaling for all time, regardless of the circumstances, is unrealistic. The fact is that minke whales are not on anyone's endangered list and are now thought to number more than a million so a sustainable harvest is clearly feasible.
Similarly, the view of the anti-whaling lobby that there should be an absolute moratorium on whaling for all time, regardless of the circumstances, is unrealistic. The fact is that minke whales are not on anyone's endangered list and are now thought to number more than a million so a sustainable harvest is clearly feasible.'

The herald also quotes this from the New Scientist:

'Anti-whaling groups are running out of scientific excuses for an across-the-board ban. Minke whales, in particular, seem to be far enough from the brink to allow at least a limited take. But if members vote to allow whaling ... they should follow through on the plan to set conservative catch limits that take account of the uncertainties over how many whales there are.'