
Japan's commercial whaling to restart July 1 after 3-decade hiatus - Ultramanoid
https://japantoday.com/category/national/update1-japan%27s-commercial-whaling-to-restart-july-1-after-3-decade-hiatus
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mikekchar
Sigh... I blame Greenpeace. Really. Japan was slowly moving away from whale
meat. The only people who ate it were older people who nostalgically ate it
because it used to be in their school lunches 50 years ago. Everyone I ever
talked to said that they didn't like it the few times they ate it. "The Cove"
was aired and it moved public perception of eating dolphin meat and whale meat
into something embarrassing. It was almost certainly going to disappear.

And then Greenpeace decided it would be a good idea to confront Japanese
whaling ships and throw rancid butter onto the decks. It hit all the big news
outlets in Japan. From that point on, all I heard was, "What are these people
children? Why are they doing such anti-social things to our fishermen?" It put
_everybody 's_ backs up. In defiance, a few izakayas started featuring whale
meat. It still wasn't popular but there was this idea of "This is our cultural
identity and it's under attack". So people ate it.

Now whale and dolphin meat are in every supermarket I've been to in the last
few months. It's so incredibly stupid. On top of that, I'm hearing people talk
about tuna stocks and say, "All those foreigners are eating sushi now and the
tuna is disappearing. It's not _their_ culture. Why does Japan have to suffer
from the selfishness of others?" Of course, the average Shunsuke in the street
has no idea that Japan takes 80% of the tuna catch and that it's been
unsustainable for decades.

It is so frustrating when I see people make such hamfisted efforts on such
important issues. If you want to convince Japanese people, you _can 't_ use
the tactics you used in other cultures. You need to understand Japanese
culture and you need to be very careful because if you get it wrong it _will_
backfire spectacularly.

~~~
glandium
You're generalizing a bit, though. IIRC, you're in Shizuoka prefecture, which
has a history of dolphin fishing (I don't know about whales).

I live in the adjacent prefecture, Aichi, and I've never seen dolphin or whale
meat in supermarkets.

~~~
Ultramanoid
I agree. It is not common at all in most of Japan.

My own anecdotal experience, but for reference, I believe horse meat is orders
of magnitude easier to find and consume in EU countries than whale in Japan.
And yet I'd argue most Europeans wouldn't consider horse meat common at all.

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ericdykstra
This seems a little overblown when put into context...

Commercial fishing kills 300k cetaceans annually. [1] For contrast, at the
peak of Japanese whaling, less than 40k were killed per annum[2]

China alone, in 2010, had 8.8 million metric tons of mismanaged plastic waste
came from China with an estimated 3.53 million metric tons of it ending up in
the ocean. [3] What happens when cetaceans lose their only environment to
pollution?

I'm a conservationist, myself, but I feel so much energy of conservationists
is misdirected at things of little consequence (banning plastic straws is an
international debate among first world countries), whereas many of the big
issues (unsustainable fossil fuel use and farming techniques) is ignored.

1\. [http://wwf.panda.org/wwf_news/?281850/Bycatch-is-the-
biggest...](http://wwf.panda.org/wwf_news/?281850/Bycatch-is-the-biggest-
killer-of-whales)

2\. [https://www.organicauthority.com/energetic-
health/commercial...](https://www.organicauthority.com/energetic-
health/commercial-fishing-killing-whales)

3\. [https://www.statista.com/chart/12211/the-countries-
polluting...](https://www.statista.com/chart/12211/the-countries-polluting-
the-oceans-the-most/)

~~~
sametmax
Things like this are more a reflect of a general spirit, and fought as a
symbol.

~~~
stareatgoats
Or outright diversions from the real issues. But more often just plain
ignorance among the public. Among journalists too, but if a narrative is not
rooted in public conceptions then it dies. On a deeper level, probably an
effect of click-chasing web news. Or at least seriously exasperated by.

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SapporoChris
Please keep in mind, Japanese consider cetaceans just another fish. They
simply don't understand all the anti-whaling rhetoric.

The other thing to keep in mind is the demand for whale meat has sharply
decreased. Japanese would rather eat beef. If you want to eliminate whaling,
do so with economic tools. I.e. cheap beef.

Lastly, if you find you are anti-whaling but love a juicy steak, I consider
you a hypocrite. They're both mammals. I've never seen any conclusive evidence
that whales are any better than cattle. All the 'intelligent' behavior I've
ever seen reported of is comparable to other animals 'intelligent' behavior
that most have no issues of eating.

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Ultramanoid
> _Japanese consider cetaceans just another fish._

And Japanese are short, can't speak English, too ?

We don't eat whale at home, never have, nobody we know eats whale, neither can
you see whale on display as a matter of course around you in Japan. Sure, you
can find it if you want it. Also, even children as a rule can usually explain
what a whale is, and how is different compared to, say, tuna or mackerel.
Schools are a wonderful thing.

That said, your other point is quite apropos on the massive hypocrisy in
general when it comes to meat and fish consumption.

The horrific process that brings chicken or beef to people's plates would be
something to consider way before looking at whaling.

( Edit : Not vegetarian or vegan, by the way. )

( Edit 2 : And for clarity's sake : Not in favour of whaling for any reason,
myself. )

~~~
Freak_NL
I've never gotten the impression that a majority of Japanese support whaling.
I don't think I've ever met someone who was in favour of it; mostly Japanese
seem ambiguous about it, and some against.

Environmentalism is fairly strong in Japan though. Is there so little
political opposition to whaling?

~~~
Ultramanoid
There is little political opposition to the present government, which explains
why a leader with such lousy support among the population at large ( Abe's
administration has been riddled in corruption scandals almost non-stop, and
has been hovering between a 30% and at best 50% in polls ) is about to become
the longest serving Prime Minister.

The opposition is fragmented, weak in all respects, hasn't had a plan when in
power, doesn't have one now, was mercilessly attacked when in power because of
their handling of Fukushima among other things, and people have no real choice
when it comes to voting.

Yuriko Koike took Tokyo Metropolis by storm and raised the prospect of a
strong alternative political force to the ever in power LDP and the broken
opposition, but then quickly fizzled out and renounced national ambitions.

This new whaling push seems to be just a political statement from the Abe
administration, in essence.

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ezconnect
The hiatus provided cheap large fishing vessels to other countries, does this
imply a boom in new fishing vessel orders?

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spinach
Paragraph 2: "A fleet of five vessels belonging to six whaling operators from
Abashiri in Hokkaido Prefecture, Ishimaki in Miyagi Prefecture, Minamiboso in
Chiba Prefecture and Taiji in Wakayama Prefecture, who have been conducting
the last round of Japan's so-called scientific whaling around Abashiri port
since June 1, will embark on the mission."

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magwa101
You sick fucks.

