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There is no economic reason for the seal hunt. Most countries have outlawed seal products. Canadians dont wear seal furs. For the most part most of the fur isn’t sold. It’s simply to provide work to out of work fishermen.
The Canadian government spends millions trying to find new markets. It claims that the hunt is cultural but the Inuit of Greenland have condemned the commercial seal hunt off Eastern Canada as an embarrassment to sealers. The commercial seal hunt does not employ any Native peoples. When natives do hunt it’s to survive, they kill what they need to. I think there is a clear difference between this and this hunt.
geez up until the last post by Ant, i figured since it was so brutal that it was a long standing tradition of the native people to do this; and thus would explain the lack of use of guns,…
and don’t get me wrong. even then I’d find the practice barbaric.
but for the govt to subsidize the practice for what obviously is not even to the benefit of the local native people ….
shame on the Canadian leaders who are not only allowing this to happen but actually encouraging it.
found an interesting article on this issue
Mr. Mac Leod points out that Paul Watson “has publicly admitted that the seal hunt is the most profitable of all the activist activities and that is how Greenpeace used to raise the bulk of their money” and points us to the 1978 audio of that CBC interview (Watson had resigned or was booted from Greenpeace in 1977 after a dispute with the Greenpeace Board of Directors):Here’s a verbatim transcript of part of the interview:
[ . . . ]
Announcer Beyond the sound and the fury, there’s a lot of hard cash on the line. The seal hunt is big business. It means $3 million a year for several thousand Newfoundland fishermen. Another $2.5 million a year to secondary industries of packaging and processing.
[02:16] And now, the third and fastest growing sector of the seal business: the protest industry, worth well into the millions, and still growing.
While Newfoundland fishermen struggle along at the poverty line, the seal protest business is booming. From all over the world, hundreds of thousands of dollars pour into the offices of the International Fund for Animal Welfare, the Animal Protection Institute, the Greenpeace Foundation.
It comes in so fast the groups just can’t seem to spend it all.
Paul Watson, a former director of the Greenpeace Foundation in Vancouver, was kicked off the foundation’s Board of Directors last June after a disagreement over the tactics for fighting the hunt.
[02:55]Female voice Mr. Watson, how easy is it to raise money against the hunt?
Watson Well, I think that of all the animals in the world or any environmental problem in the world the harp seal is the easiest issue to raise funds on. Greenpeace has always managed to — to raise more money on the seal issue than for the campaigns than has actually been spent on the campaigns themselves.
The seal hunt has always turned a profit for the Greenpeace Foundation. And then other organizations like IFAW, API, Fund for Animals, also make a profit off the seal hunt.
[03:29]Female voice You suggesting that they fight for seals rather than other animals because it’s easy, or easier to raise money that way, or because it’s a profit maker for them?
[03:38]Watson Well it’s definitely because it’s easier to make money and because it’s easier to make a profit because there are over a thousand animals on the endangered species list, and the harp seal isn’t one of them. [My emphasis . . . ed.]
Female voice Did anyone in Greenpeace ever express that aloud, that it was easy to make some hay on the seal hunt so let’s get into that?
[03:55]Watson Well, a lot of people have done that. See the thing is the seal is very easy to exploit as an image. We have posters, we have buttons, we have shirts, all of which portray the head of a baby seal with the tears coming out of its eyes. Baby seals are always crying because — its — they’re always — the salt tears keep their eyes from freezing. But they have this image — they’re baby animals, they’re beautiful, and because of that, coupled with the horror of a sealer hitting them over the head with a club, it’s — it’s an image that just goes right to the heart of — of animal lovers all over North America.
[ . . . ]
And now we have a dozen people this year from Greenpeace California — I mean they’re coming from the highest standard of living region in North America — they’re traveling to the place with the lowest income per year on this continent telling them not to kill seals because they’re cute but not endangered species.
Yet off the coast of California there are three species of dolphin — the spinner the spotted and the white belly — and they’re being slaughtered towards the brink of extinction by American tuna boats. And then the slaughter of (unintelligible) sea turtles in (unintelligible) in Mexico.
Female voice Now what happens within Greenpeace when you raise a point like that?
[05:08]Watson They know they can’t raise any money off of it. They know that if they send a crew down to try to interfere with the killing of sea turtles in Mexico that they’re not going to get any support. And they know that if they — the problem with the dolphins is that there’s so much competition there is so many groups that are trying to raise money to protect dolphins and protect whales . . .
[05:27]Female voice How much money did Greenpeace raise the year you left against the seal hunt?
Watson Well, last year, I had submitted a budget for $60,000. We spent $55,000, and I believe we raised well over $100,000. And I do know that . . .
[ . . . ]
Watson Well, Greenpeace protesters in the last two years were not paid a salary. They were all volunteers.
This year, the crew members are paid volunteers. Their salaries, I would believe — I would think that the amount of money spent on salaries for the Greenpeace organization right now is about a quarter of a million dollars a year.
There are other groups too, like API — Animal Protection Institute —
Female voice How much do they spend to fight the seal hunt?
[06:49]Watson I don’t think they spend anything. They put their money into advertising, which they say makes the public aware, and also it has their address on the corner which has people send in more money. So, in fact every time they invest money in advertising, they make more money back in return.
Female voice Any idea of total sum of all the money raised every year, to fight the seal hunt?
Watson Well, I would estimate between API, IFAW, Greenpeace and any other groups that’s three to four million dollars.
Female voice Are these funds collected from individuals who feel badly, or are there corporate givers, do you know?
Watson No, mainly they’re from . . .
Female voice So two and five dollar customers?
Watson Yeah. A lot of school children, a lot of pensioners.
Female voice Your fear then is that it isn’t just money that people can easily spend, that it’s coming from people who you think would be better off keeping it.
Watson Well, I think that a lot of the money is now being abused.
Female voice In addition to their salary, I assume that there’s a lot of money to be used from the group for your personal living expenses — traveling, money raising . . .
Watson Oh certainly. The people in additional to getting a salary — Greenpeace people are flying around the world all the time. I mean Australia, Japan, Hawaii, California, Norway, England. There — at any time there are a dozen people that are on their way to or from these countries. Right now we have Dr. Paul Fong is in Hawaii on his way to Japan. People are in Europe. You know. So there’s a lot . . .
Female voice And those are all business expenses.
Watson Yeah. I think that the problem that is happening, and that it deserves criticism, is that the organization becomes more important than the issue.
So there you have it . . .
Though the interview dates from 1978 and Skipper Paul was talking mainly about Greenpeace, the logic certainly works for the SSCS: the organization becomes more important than the issue, which makes money all-important, as it must be if the organization is to thrive. Any capitalist will tell you that . . .
The non-endangered harp seals are the focus of attention, rather than endangered species like dolphins and sea turtles which really are on the brink of extinction, because the harp seals appear cute and cuddly and are therefore very useful levers for prying money out of pockets — if mainly from the pockets of kids and pensioners, so be it. The harp seals are also useful because, at least at the time, there were so many groups championing dolphins and whales that it would have been hard to compete with them for funds . . .
Assets — like a good reputation that will help raise bucks — are to be nurtured. Liabilities — like Board members who advocate assassination and might jeopardize fund raising — are to be discarded . . . but only if absolutely necessary.
Let me make this ethic crystal clear: good = anything that benefits income; bad = anything that jeopardizes income.
Did you know tobacco companies pay agencies to discredit health organizations? This is the same thing here.
I would like to see the source of this article. Paul Watson founded Greenpeace and later moved away from it because he was sick of the ‘peaceful’ protests. This was mainly because fighting whalers by filming the hunting was not being productive. He bought his own boat with his own money and sunk a whaling ship. This is what caused him to move away from Green Peace and to form the Sea Shepheard society. Greenpeace didn’t agree with this hardline tactic.
He now has several full time boats. One patrols the galapagos fighting illegal fishing . The main ship is 180ft long, do you have any idea how much fuel a boat of this size eats?
As for the sealing raising money. Most of it goes back to the Canadian government. Each time someone tries to film the hunt without a permit they are inprisoned and fined by the Canadian government.
In Canada you have to pay to film the hunt and sometimes they refuse the payment. If they do you are considered to be unlawfully approaching a seal hunt closer than one half nautical mile without permission of the Federal Minister of Fisheries and also with violating the Seal Protection Act. Many people have gone to jail because of this. It’s funny how the seal protection act protects sealers and inprisons those protecting them, but that is the hypocrisy of this government.
Also, Sea Shephard society is registered in the USA and the IRS has found no wrong doings.
Newfoundlanders seem to think that organizations that fight the hunt are all taking money. I’ve personally had emails sent to me accusing me of making money with my website. Here’s one example:
‘It would be nice if you got your facts right on the Canadian
Government. This just goes to show that all you are in it for is the money
that you can scam from people who just don’t know the difference.’I would like to know how this person thinks I am making money. Some people just cant seem to realize that some people do things that are not for money. Maybe I make money my listing charities and he thinks those charities kickback potential donations…
As someone who grew up in Eastern Canada I can tell you first hand that there is a lot of hog wash being thrown around regarding this issue.
The celebrities so strongly against the “clubbing of seals” definetly do not have a full understanding of the issue. In fact, when Paul McCartney and his wife Heather came to Charlottetown, PEI to be interviewed for the Canadian national news he thought he was Newfoundland :nono:
9 out of 10 seals are killed with guns. The seals have many uses and many families rely on the seal hunt to put food on the table. An over population of seals will also results in a scarcity of fish, an industry vital to the Maritimes.
Fergie, although the seal hunt may not sit well with you & others – do you not agree that there are more important issues in our world today? If all these people making a fuss about the seal hunt in Eastern Canada donated their time and money to boosting the agricultural infrastructure in Africa, more humans, many of which are kids, would be saved then seals die from clubbing in a given year.
There are definitely more important issues than the seal hunt in the world today.
I am involved with other causes, one of which is sponsoring people from Bosnia, Herzegovina, Croatia.
The thing with the seals, though, is something we can do something about. Let’s remove the cute, saltly-teared seals from the equation and take another look:
The seal hunt:
– subsidized by the government.
– used by various organizations to encourage worldwide boycotts against the entire Canadian fishing industry.
– Whether the facts used are correct or not, sealing is used to smear Canada’s reputation around the globe.Given the above points, is it reasonable to assume that the seal hunt is not economically viable as a whole, and not worth the shame?
I’m in transit on my way to Amsterdam so I will make this short.
1. We cannot look at a case and dismiss it because there is worse in the world. Do we leave a child in an abusive home because there’s children starving in Africa? Yes there are many problems in this world, but working on a solution for one problem does not mean that we have to exclude other problems. At the moment I donate to Doctors without Borders, and in the past I donated to the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund. There are many important causes in the world and the seal hunt happens to be one that I am working on. Furthermore it is in the developed world, so to end the cruelty does not inflict any poverty, which brings me to my second point.
2. First world countries condone unnecessary cruelty and killing, but only when this applies to third world countries. In the third world an actual fine line has to be drawn between a persons livelihood and the welfare of the animals. For example in Africa we try to prevent the killing of elephants, even when those elephants at times destroy farm land. Unlike the first world, this is subsistence living where people live on less than $1 a day. But even with a huge population, scarce resources, and very little money, the government, the locals, and the world as a whole work together to prevent this killing and to minimize it. If this is the case in a poor country then why can the same not be said for a developed country like Canada. This isn’t the only thing that Canada does. Canada sells licenses to wealthy americans to hunt polar bears. This is even while they are endangered. There are other examples but I would have to look them up.
Canadians have very little excuse for this. No one will starve if they dont decide to kill. We live in a socialist country, welfare is accessible. Environmental organizations have offered to pay sealers $16 million dollars (which is what they reported was earned last year) to stay home. This offer was not responded to.
Everything in Canada is subsidized to one extent or another :laugh:
As for the idea that the clubbing of seals smears Canada’s global image , I’m honestly quite fine with that. Some countries are hated for starting wars… other countries are hated for harbouring terrorists, cultivating illegal substances, or testing nuclear bombs. Hell, some countries are hated because of their political system. Canada can be hated for hunting animals once a year and I could really care less. Now if they were hated because they produce more garbage per capital then any other nation I’d be a little more upset :lookaroun
Seeing were getting a little of topic here the seal hunt doesn’t sit well with me being Canadian.
But yes there are worse things going on in the world. One that I never get over is the annual “Big Game Hunt” in the U.S. Hunters gather annually a pay upwards to $10,000 to shoot big game animals, such as a Grizzly, Cougar, Lion, ect…
The area is fenced off, the hunter picks the animal to shoot. Say a bear, the bear is let out and begins to run around the small closed in fenced area in a panic. The hunter may decide too take his time with the animal, perhaps shooting off the back legs or maybe shooting it in the head. Afterwards the hunter has his trophy, must take alot of skill.
Whatever the case I find this pretty cruel as well. greek39
I think politicians who start wars should have a private shootout to settle it. Or a spelling bee or chessgame or poker tournie or something.
I haven’t read the thread, only the last two posts, and that only because the thread has been around so long.
I get very, very angry at animal abuse. I equate it with child abuse and senior abuse – abusing the innocent and the helpless.
I am not going to revisit this thread because I will only get seriously pissed off.
