Recently, I’ve been seeing a lot of articles about the cruelty of dolphins. In one that Ms. McWilliams posted, dolphins were stabbed and slaughtered during a coming of age ceremony. In a recent article, Caroline Kennedy, the U.S ambassador to Japan, mentions the cruelty dolphins endure in Japan. They have an annual dolphin hunt where they round up about five hundred dolphins in an unknown bay. They either kill the dolphins for meat, let them back into the oceans, or sell the to a marine park. Kennedy tweeted, “Deeply concerned by inhumaneness of drive hunt dolphin killing. USG opposes drive hunt fisheries.”
In 2009, a documentary called “The Cove” showed animal activists fighting against Japanese police to find the location of this dolphin hunt. This reminded me of the documentary “Blackfish” which I have previously posted about. However, the reception was much different. Unlike “Blackfish” most Japanese criticized the movie because they thought that this dolphin hunt is part of the Japanese culture. I think it’s interested how reception to documentaries about very similar topics, in this case animal cruelty, can be completely different in different cultures. I think this is true for many major issues in the world, including climate change. Many people have different opinions and believe some things to be much important than others. I think these issues can be hard to overcome when everyone is on a different page.
I am not very knowledgeable about dolphins, so it would be very interesting to learn about their role in our ecosystem.
ReplyDeleteThere's been a lot on animal cruelty lately and it's a shame that we take these magnificent creatures for advantage. Too bad we can't figure out how to properly treat other organisms.
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