Dolphin massacre turns sea blood red

Animal activists have released a video of Japanese fisherman hacking to death dolphins they had trapped at a small port.






The tape, shot by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, graphically captures the end of a hunt, in which fishermen pound on the water, causing waves that confuse the mammals' sense of direction, and then corral dolphins into small coves where they can be more easily killed with sickles.


The mayor and officials in Taiji refused to comment, but a fisherman's union representative said the kills are conducted as humanely as possible and pointed out the hunts have been part of local culture for 400 years. Hunting dolphins is not banned by the International Whaling Commission.

http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_833468.html

Dolphins are such beautiful, peaceful, social animals.
Why do humans feel such a need to destroy?

"Dolphins are such beautiful, peaceful, social animals.
Why do humans feel such a need to destroy?"

dolphins are beautiful and social animals...but i wouldnt say peaceful. dolphins are known to rape and murder each other, in fact its very common.

they are extremely intelligent creatures with a complex social structure. they have a developed language and the ability to use tools.

just because dolphins are friendly with humans, doesnt make them friendly across the board. dolphins are extremely violent creatures within their own circle.

i agree this slaughter is horrible and its practice should be stopped. but i also think that chickens, cows, mice, fish, and rabbits should not be subjected to a similar fate.

given the chance

Dolphins are very powerful and can even defend each other from sharks, but do not make unprovoked attacks on humans. They are glorious to see swimming through the oceans, and much rarer to see than sharks. They have a wonderful sense of playfulness. The photo above of this slaughter is truly sickening.

...either on Animal Planet or Discovery late one night. This doco was on dolphins, and because I have such a great respect and love for dolphins I thought I would watch it.

In this doco they did talk about the violent nature of dolphins. They will become violent towards one another in their prospective pods. It also mentioned how violent they become when feeding and hunting. I was flawed by what I was hearing, and seeing.

As for the rape of other dolphins (ROFL) the doco never said anything about that. Nor did it mention the unprovoked attacks on humans.

As for the picture, I burst into tears when it loaded. I wasn't prepared to see something so graphic first thing in the morning (Australia time.)

they seem to have gone Repug and see our other mammals as the enemy just as Repugs see the Dems. I'm not kidding about that. I had to stop watching because so much is "revisionist biology and behavior" about animal life.

I think it's the corporatists trying to create conflict. They thought shows about animals didn't have enough sports like conflict. Whatever, but I've noticed a change in the last couple of years. Just since the squatter got into the White House.......hmmm. Just like everything else they have to make all a "blood sport."

"When I grow up I'm gonna go to Bovine University!"

What, the female dolphin said NO? The male slipped her a drug? The same for "murder" - male animals of many species may fight each other to the death in competition to lead a pack or herd, or to get access to females. I've never heard it referrerd to as "murder".

Evolution just keeps on trying until she gets it right: we are just another dead end, playing out our string until natural catastrophe or our own degenerating DNA do us in.

Good luck to the Dolphins and the Rats. I think they migh just work it out.

You know the whole reincarnation theory, souls keep coming back until they get it right...

I wonder if that's a microcosmic expression of what actually happens on a larger existential level. Where existence gets tripped up is that we advance technologically beyond what we're able to handle emotionally, and keep blowing the whole thing up. Start from scatch and start all over again. I wonder if we got any further this time.

The jig is almost up for mammals. A few million years down the road, we'll be a long-forgotten exercise in random gene mutations. I wonder what the cockroach scientists will think when they study our fossil remains...

Evolution just keeps on trying until she gets it right: we are just another dead end, playing out our string until natural catastrophe or our own degenerating DNA do us in.

Please support that position.

Good luck to the Dolphins and the Rats. I think they migh just work it out.

Given the story that's the topic in this post, and marine pollution, etc... it doesn't particularly look so great for the dolphins, in any case.

Civlisation is a one-time thing. Humans are using up all the planet's non-renewable resources. Even if another species evolves the same level of intelligence and dexterity, they won't have the raw materials to do anything with that capacity.

... this makes me ill. :puke: I can't imagine any marginally sane human being who's had an 'encounter' with a dolphin who'd not be sickened by this. In my own mind, there's no longer any question that these beings are sentient -- far moreso than any I've had contact with, particularly dogs and cats. I made 'friends' with JoJo, a wild dolphin in Grace Bay off the island of Provodenciales in the BWI. We played and swam together, one-on-one, and I have no doubt JoJo was/is an aware and thinking being with a sense of humor and a sense of his own individuality.

...I love 'em dearly....have all my life since seein' Flipper as a wee lass...you're very fortunate through my eyes to have get to experience them so personally....I envy you very much. :)

...as far as this article is concerned....it's horrific that anyone could destroy any of these creatures for any reason...this is sickening beyond comprehension. :evilfrown:

It was one of the more significant experiences of my life. No matter how I might strive to be articulate, words fail to convey the sense of 'connection' I had. That this was not just some imagining on my part was confirmed to me when I spoke with others equally fortunate to have mad friends with JoJo. Some weeks after returning from that dive trip, as I was sitting in a restaurant and describing my experience to a date, a Stanford marine biologist at an adjacent table was able to place my experience in context -- indicating that what I'd experienced in playing 'games' (that I thought merely ad hoc) with JoJo was a known behavior that I'd picked up on seemingly instinctually. The marine biologist was able to confirm that many people who'd had such 'encounters' with wild dolphins had also sensed the same non-verbal 'connection' - a sense of being in communication/rapport but without words or (conciously/deliberately) formal signals.

...my fascination with them knows no bounds...hopefully one day before my demise...my dream to swim with them will be realized. :loveya:

I am truly ashamed and sickened.
:puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke::puke:
:puke::puke:

I used to swim in Floridas Indian River when I was a kid. There was a pod of porpoises that used to hang out with me on occasion. They'd follow me around.....I used to wonder if they were trying to figure out why the silly human swam so slowly.

RC

This link needs to be circulated to both those who care and those who don't yet care.

And the next time someone bashes PETA or other animal rights groups, think again.

...it's their means that irk many of us here.

It makes me sick.... :(

What in the world are they thinking? How can this be stopped? I am so outraged about this.

:bounce:

And I Hunted Deer for many years before giving up hunting...How could someone do that to a Dolphin??????? :(

I'M sorry to all the animals of the earth. I'm sorry for what we big ugly creatures do to you. We're losing any excuse to continue walking the face of the earth.

OH MY GOD

How long will Mother Earth continue to put up with our shit?

:freak:
dbt

humans are not going to make it

That's just sick. I don't mind deer hunting and such, but people who hunt dolphins are fucked in the head. Especially stabbing them fatally like that with a sickle. Disgusting.

Killing by an arrow is just as disgusting as killing with a sickle, is it not?

I have no issues with hunting deer, turkey, ducks, etc, but I and most people draw the line at dolphins, whales, elephants, chimps and gorillas. These are the precious few other species on this planet that seem to have passed a crucial point in their evolution to come within a few degrees of the self-awareness and sentience seen in humans. It's probably not logical or scientific, but its just an emotional feeling. To me, killing one of these species would feel more like killing a small child than killing any other animal.

If it isn't this obscenity, then it is the Minke whales or the drift nets or the 'racist' minority parties or the lack of remorse or settlement for the 'comfort' women or the wholly corrupt corporatism...hell I will through in the bukkake, the ugly sexism and the sometimes 'shocking' anime porn...etc etc

Personally I loathe these people and don't think of Japan as a 'civilized' nation--even have unfortunately. If they were not so protected by their 'special relationship' by the US, they would have been boycotted long ago by Progressives

and the savage photos from Iraq need to be shown more often. Just as the pictures of young poverty stricken families in the dust belt and the picture of the young girl in Vietnam running after being napalmed moved people and made them think, so could these images.

What is the old adage, a picture is worth a thousand words? Probably even more nowadays in our non-literary country.

And this was particularly galling:
" a fisherman's union representative pointed out the hunts have been part of local culture for 400 years."
They might want to consider moving out of the 17th century.
This isn't the year 1603. Farming has advanced. There are no crop shortages in Japan. Funny how "local culture" always includes a social or financial benefit for the men involved.

hope these fishermen drown without aid from a friendly dolphin someday. Things like this make me hate humankind.

Apparently by reading this thread if they had been ugly, or deer, than killing them wouldn't be a big deal.

The US slaughter just as many if not more using brain hemeraging Sonar in the name of security. Id say that makes me even sicker.

http://www.seashepherd.org

Seems to be down right now, maybe slammed.

I guess humans wont be satisfied until all life on this planet has been destroyed.

:puke:

Amazing, too how his hood is nice and white, as is the entire white boat and the boaters' white shoes and gloves.

incongruities.

Besides blood, which i've explained, what are the incongruities?

So I'm assuming that picture is just a screen capture.

Maybe this is exactly what it looks like but it just doesn't look right to me. Fish are killed in very large numbers all the time without turning all of the water bright red. As a previous poster pointed out, nothing else in the picture is particularly blood stained (including the dolphins in the boat) and there is nothing to indicate that the dolphins had been bled into the water before being pulled into the boat.

Like I said, I could be wrong but it looks like somebody likes to modify their evidence for that extra bit of sensationalism that will get it worldwide exposure.

That there are dead dolphins there. What does it matter how much they bled?

Our wanton cruelty toward the animal kingdom should reserve many of us a rightful place in hell, IF GOD did in fact create the animal kingdom.

Otherwise, we know why seas are turned red and animals screams of pain? For our selfish desires to eat shark fin soup, to put Tiger bones in our bodies to "cure" impotence, to have a fur coat, etc., etc., etc....

It all boils down to two of the worst in human traits: GREED and SELFISHNESS.

To think these magnificent Dolphins (and ANY ANIMAL for that matter) was put here on earth just so we could brutalize it and consume it. And WE DARE call ourselves humane?

the image looks as if it's been modified for sensationalistic purposes. I feel that dishonesty in journalism takes away from the message.

As far as I can tell, the original shot on this thread is the same as one on that site. I'm not denying that it happened or that there was some blood in the water, but THAT amount of diluted blood should have stained SOMETHING, don't you think?

Sea Shepherd does not have a Dreamworks FX budget.

Americans Kill a hell of a lot more mammals than the Japanese when it comes to dinner-time. Our food has historically come from the land, Japan's from the sea. I'm not saying that I approve of the commercial factory-fishing that Japan practices basically around the world, but to them, it's about food.

Because the red you see is blood diluted in the water. Water is not going to stick to rubber gloves.

Blood, even diluted in water, will stain neoprene.

Since Japan was so nice to offer "donation" money for jerkoff's illegal BS war and all.

The next crap that dribbles out jerkoff's piehole will be that whales are no longer endangered and he will lobby to have international whaling regulations repealed. Either that or the cretin will use that same BS line with the exotic and endangered animals. Kill and hunt them MORE to the brink of extinction to save them.

Of course they already have a bad habit of violating international whaling regulations under the guise of science.

I never get over being totally sick of so many humans. Had a chance to go to Japan tomorrow but I passed because of the too often seen blatant bludgeoning of innocent creatures trying to share our planet by the gory Asians, and Americans and Europeans and Latins. Why is it that Asians along with so many other nations massacre the innocent. I prefer to stay in the USA for a few days. What a disgusting reason why.

and can not really bear to look at those pics. I went to the Sea Shepherd site, I couldn't believe what they said about the WWF. I have been a member quite a while and now I'm sending them a letter rescinding my membership and telling them why.http://www.harpseals.org/hunters/index.html
The slaughter of the baby harp seals has always been one of my main issues. The treatment of innocent animals and each other by many of our kind will be our certain downfall, I don't know what else to say about this.http://www.harpseals.org/helpstop/index.html

I thought the moratorium on killing baby harp seals still held. Not
that I agree with killing any seals at all.

I'm not surprised about the WWF - their patron is Prince Phillip,
and he kills birds and deer for sport, and I've always thought his
patronage a bit odd.

:cry:

Get real!

Take a look at the diver's gloves. They're white. Not a drop of blood on 'em.

Reasons for photoshoped hypothesis?

Nice white gloves and hood on the diver (which, being neoprene, would stain with the diluted blod). No blood smears on the boat or the people in the boat.

On the top pic the boat does show smeared blood on the sides. and the guy holding the yellow stick had something smeared on his pant leg.

It would take thousands of completly bled out animals to make that hue and the other hues are overly enhanced too. A very bad attempt at sensational exploitation. Shame on the SS.

I've seen plenty of photos of whaling. The blood certainly turns that color, blood diffuses in water. It doesn't stain his gloves because it's so thinned out.

The whole video is a fake? If there's any issue here at all, it could be more simply explained by color/profile calibration, instead of an attempt to exaggerate.

Bloody water is a common sight in marine mammal massacres. See, for example, the Faroese "grind" hunt:

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

But even if it weren't, so what? If you want to see blood red, why not put a camera in the drain on the killing floor at a slaughterhouse...?

At worst, the film was scanned with a not-very-well-calibrated scanner. That water, is, in fact, blood red.

or are you just going by the photos?

BTW- my sister does graphic design for a living(for the past 20+ years), and she said that it was obviously photoshopped the moment she saw it.

They did not photoshop the images for effect.

Try winning in 2004 without us mister 1000+ posts.

A low-post-count member who starts useless spamming or attack threads might deserve a callout. One who expresses an opinion on whether a photo was altered? Please...

I suspect you'd see as much horror in any porcine slaughterhouse, and pigs are also very intelligent, sensitive animals.

Nobody is suggesting that the killing of animals is ever pleasant to look at...........so I think we need to think long and hard about where we draw lines and what we eat before we rush to judge.

P.

Put away the Eurocentric moralizing for a moment and look at from the other side. Let's not be so quick to to judge.

As another poster has mentioned, their food supply has to come from somehwere. The Japanese don't have the luxury of abundant land to grow their food on as we do here in America. Hence, it comes from the sea. They can ill-aford to be too picky about their food practicies.

The Japanese don't even get a chance to defend themselves before we pass our ill-informed (some might say racist) judgment on them?? If groups like Sea Shepard were interested in practicing fairness, they would at least point out the perspective from the other side on their website.

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

so their food supply doesn't have to come from somewhere? :shrug:

The Japanese in no way require dolphin in their diet.

but there it is.

which side has moral superiority on their side?

I'm pretty unhappy about slaughterhouses, too.

But industrially farmed animals are not in danger of extinction. Multiple, recent peer-reviewed reports say the oceans are in danger from overexploitation.

That is the crucial distinction between "wild" and "domesticated."

So...when someone suggests that we THINK before we condemn, according to you they should "go back where they came from" i.e. "freeperville".

Nice liberal thinking there.....

As it happens, I tend to consider the statement "They can ill-aford to be too picky about their food practicies" as naive and uninformed (it's not as if the Japanese are starving and forced to eat whatever they can get their hands on).

On the other hand, suggesting that we don't rely for 100% accuracy on a clearly biased source is a sensible and intelligent observation.

Although I disagree with the practice shown (if it's a genuine pic) I would always side with someone who suggests THINKING and investigating BEFORE making moral pronouncements. I would also consider that equal barbarity could be witnessed in any Western slaughterhouse, and that the debate is wider than just one incident in Japan.

This is a place for debate, and IIRC I believe it's against the rules to accuse someone of being a freeper.

On edit: thanks to MercutioATC for pointing out that you even managed to totally misread the post in your haste to rant.

Republicans want to send us all back to the 1920's and 30's
Ahh the good 'ol days !!
The world's resources free for the exploitation!
Elephant hunting--Tiger hunting for the elite.
Human rights only for the wealthiest!
Racism sure!--Womens rights--naaa--
Rape the land, exploit the less fortunate.

See the parallel?
thinking it's ok to wipe out species?
Thinking suffering is ok if the ends justify the means.

Freeeeeper style mind space.
It's not against the rules--
-- when I see it I call it like it is--

Slaughterhouses are so very cruel-
Doesn't make killing dophins with sickles ok.
Dolphing hunting is Barbaric
I love and respect all animals--
I will not eat them.
EVER.

A DUer suggested that we shouldn't make snap judgements, but rather we should consider all the evidence and form opinions based on more than one highly emotive image. They didn't even say that they supported the hunting of dolphins, they just said that we shouldn't make knee-jerk reactions.

You see, that's what democracy and debate is all about - thinking before reacting and having a DEBATE with someone using FACTS to back up your opinion. One thing that separates us from hard-core Repugs is our willingness to at least consider someone else's position, even if we intuitively disagree with it. Unfortunately you seem unable to take part in a rational discussion with anyone who is prepared to consider an opinion that differs from your own, and you equate a willingness to debate the ethics of dolphin hunting with being in favour of wiping out species and a rejection of women's rights.

This is very, very disturbing.

Here's the rule, just for your info, and it explains why your original post was deleted:

"Do not publicly accuse another member of this message board of being a disruptor, troll, conservative, Republican, or FReeper. Do not try to come up with cute ways of skirting around the spirit of this rule. "

...as in trying to enforce our European-derived morals on an Eastern culture.

You might want to actually READ the posts before you start throwing around that "freeper" talk...

And Americans kill 100 million pigs a year. But I guess they don't look as cute in the supermarket as dolphins do in the sea.

The distinction is crucial.

Even if you don't make that distinction, there are plenty of people who are just as horrified of industrial slaughterhouses. We had some horrific footage of a cattle slaughterhouse in Eastern WA a couple of years ago: cattle being hung alive for hours, tortured with prods down the throat, etc. Awful.

Are wild animals hurt any more by their death? At least the dolphins have had their entire lives to roam free. As you mentioned, American animals are tortured their entire existance.

And, even among wild animals there is a double standard. Why do you think the animal right activists talk about baby seal clubbing all the time? Hundreds of animal species go extinct every day, but we never hear about the vast majority of them. Only tigers, elephants, dolphins, eagles, the ones that people like looking at.

But perhaps several do. But we have to start somewhere. Why not with dolphins and baby seals?

More to the point, your argument seems to lead toward vegetarianism, which isn't a bad thing.

Because we need to improve ourselves before telling others to change their culture to fit our views.

Animals deserve just as many rights as fetuses.

...to hell with the TUNA they catch, we only care about the dolphins...

Millions of children dying worldwide from easily curable diseases, or hunger, but naked starving black kids don't look half as good as dolphins either.

n/t

You're not seriously saying that it's O.K. to catch tuna in nets and not dolphins, are you?

"their food supply has to come from somehwere"
That has to be this week's winner for the "lobotomy' award.
Like they need to eat some dolphins.

Sushi bar on every corner and this world goes down and soon.
We now have a world with 6 billion people and the "old" rules do not apply.
The rate of extinction and the destruction of natural food chain is out of control. The days of thoughtlessness and recklessness are over.
The freepers think that we can live by the "old " rules.
But we can't.
At the rate we're going we're likely to run out of clean fresh water by 2030. It's been said that it's being consumed at a rate 30 times faster than it's being replentished.

The way of thinking that justifies these types of actions is obsolete.
It is the republican platform.
It has to go.

World has gone mad!!!

These murderers should be punished to the fullest extent. I'm not sure where that should end in this case.

Murderous, evil sub-humans.

Look at that picture.

EVIL shit like this makes me reconsider my opposition to the death penalty!

when I look at the picture, I see an image that has been photoshopped to falsely stir people's emotions.

:wtf:

What the hell kind of question is that?!

Are you against Slaugher Houses, you know, places where living things are slaughtered! ?

HELL YES, I'm against that!

Good Lord.

"Look at that picture" is very revealing. The shock tactics of the animal right activists are equivalent to the anti-choicer's use of fetal pictures to advance their cause. Appearance really doesn't matter, in either case.

We are obviously on two different levels. Come up and visit sometime.

For the love of all things holy....

I don't like it. I'd rather it didn't happen. But it's legal (locally and internationally) and not really much worse than the slaughtering pigs in an abbatoir. Pictures of death and killing really never are attractive....And you want to impose the death penalty for this?

So.......I'd recommend trying to get laws changed to protect dolphins (and any other animal you deem worthy of protection) and raise slaughterhouse standards in the West, rather than labelling people "sub-human" and "evil".

IMHO of course...

Peace.

P.

For the love of God.....

"Legal" does not equal "ethical." Is that news to you?

"Pictures of death and killing really never are attractive....And you want to impose the death penalty for this?

Well, I guess we just shouldn't look, eh? Let's just pretend we don't know about it, let's just pretend they're stupid animals (dolphins, pigs, ALL animals) and that its not really worth getting worked up over or emotinoal about. Its just mad slaughter, and, hell, its not like they're slaughtering us. Jesus - the arrogance, the inhumanity.

If anybody deserves the death penalty, the monsters responsible for that bloodbath do.

Yeah, it would help to get the laws changed, and we should work for that. But you will excuse a shocked human's uncontrollable repulsion at the sight of a mass murder, and his resistance to the ever fading drumbeat of "everything's alright, don't think about it," won't you?

I'm just suggesting that just MAYBE it is an over-reaction to say things like, "If anybody deserves the death penalty, the monsters responsible for that bloodbath do."

I don't like what's happening in those pictures, but I'm afraid that horrible things happen to humans and animals everywhere in the world every day. Does that make it OK? No, of course not, but the large majority of people on the planet eat meat and all countries (I believe) permit the killing of animals for food.

"Jesus - the arrogance"

Nope, not at all. Not from me. I would consider it more arrogant to look at the behaviour of people from another culture (or my own) and make moral pronouncements based solely on a single picture and my own personal beliefs.

I share your shock and revulsion, I really do, but you'll have to excuse me if I refrain for advocating the death penalty just yet, and I'm afraid there'd be a long list of crimes that I consider more serious before I got to this one.

Please try to accept that saying "This is bad but it isn't the worst thing in the world" doesn't mean that I advocate the wholesale slaughter of anything that moves.

Peace.

P.

All I can say is that I really hope that is photoshopped.

This is Brooke McDonald's interview with the Toronto Star. She refutes the "photoshopping" allegation directly.

Dolphin slaughter in Japan `most shocking thing I've seen'

...

McDonald said that she, Whorwood and a third Sea Shepherd activist were fingerprinted and photographed before being released after nine hours. They were not charged.

McDonald then had her film developed in a lab next to the police station. When McDonald she saw the results she thought the pictures were "surreal."

"They really did represent very well what we'd seen with our own eyes that day. I just experienced the same shock all over again" looking at the processed photos, she said.

"And that colour is 100 per cent accurate and true," McDonald said. "It was just as horrifying as it looks. It truly is the same most unnatural colour I have ever seen. It was one of the most deep crimson reds I had ever seen — and to realize that it came from a living organic being was shocking."

(more)

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1067469009802&call_pageid=968332188854&col=968350060724

If she says so, it must be true.

AP seems confident of the authenticity of these images. Or are you advancing the "liberal media bias" argument?

but everything I see points to color manipulation to me. Again, I could well be wrong.

However, asking why a...shall we say "very committed"...animal activist with an agenda would lie to support that agenda is rhetorical.

I'm not questioning her honesty, but she actually has a better reason than almost anybody to tailor images to present a specific picture.

killing something graceful is sickening, while killing something disgusting is just

Right on Zen0 !!
So now, come on all ye vegan haters!!
come one come all!!

Let's hear about how it's "stupid" to love animals
after all they're "just animals"--
killing them and eating their dismembered body parts is ok because "we've always done it this way"
yeah right!
I'll jump off the bridge when everyone else does too !!!

Denial --willful ignorance--it "tastes good"
fact: Burning human flesh actually smells like bacon---hmmmm goood--


Anyone can know right from wrong-
it 's obviously absolutely wrong to harm defensless creatures.
My mom didn't raise no fool.

these poor japs have to git their grub eh?
I'll have such sympathy for mass murderers too-
They have to act out their mental illnesses--what's wrong with that?

However, you need great quantity of open grassland to enjoy the wide variety of livestock/cattle meat that we gorge ourselves on everyday here in America.

With a population half the size of the US squeezed into a tiny land mass the size of California, the Japanese don't have that luxury.

The Japanese don't slaughter dolphins for fun or for sport. if they did, it would a different matter. They kill these animals for food.

I take solace in the fact that human population growth in Japan has been negative in recent times. As time goes by, the Japanese are also being exposed to a greater variety of food. For example, they are importing more beef and grain from the US.

These are factors that help to lower the demand for dolphin meat in Japan. It won't completely eliminate it, but far fewer dolphins are getting killed than would be otherwise. Japan's taste for dolphins might not even be putting a dent in the world's dolphin population. I'd only be concerned about the hunting if or when it puts a species on the endangered species. And if it makes the endangered list, try to put a curb in the hunting rather than try to outright ban it would be a much more realistic goal.

Let's not get so emotional that we overreact (an easy thing to do after seeing those graphic photos). Just because hunters in America hunt deer doesn't mean the US deer population is in danger of becoming extinct.

edit: sp.