Marine Life
The Navy versus the Whales (Again)
Published August 03, 2009 @ 05:30PM PT
From NRDC's Switchboard:
Today the Navy released its Record of Decision to begin construction of an undersea warfare training range right next to the only known calving grounds for the critically endangered right whale. Hunted nearly to extinction, North Atlantic right whales are one of the world's most endangered species, with only about 300 remaining. The North Atlantic right whale remains extremely vulnerable to the continuing threats posed by ship strikes, entanglement and ocean noise - a triple threat that will be exacerbated by the Navy's disastrous plan to build an undersea warfare training range adjacent to their last remaining calving grounds.
Once constructed, the proposed undersea warfare training range will be the site of intensive, year-round exercises employing the same kind of active sonar that has caused multiple marine mammal strandings leading to injury and death. It would effectively transform the waters off the Florida coast into an epicenter of sonar use.
Continue reading here.
"Guilt-Free" Sushi Doesn't Include Bits of Fish
Published July 29, 2009 @ 08:21AM PT
Apparently, between yesterday's post and this one, we have a theme going: foods that require the killing of animals are not greed- and guilt-free just because they don't require the killing or exploitation of some other animals. Yesterday, I wrote about the problem of referring to Fair Trade milk chocolate as free of "greed" and as a win for the "socially conscious" when dairy consumption and "production" involve some of the greediest, cruelest human acts. And today, I'm writing in response to a Christian Science Monitor article titled "Guilt-Free Sushi."
Three Reasons Not to Eat Fish
Published July 07, 2009 @ 01:54PM PT
With a hat tip to the Twitterin' Mary Martin of Animal Person, I give you this smart, short video on the fish issue, which I'd not seen before last night:
New Scientist: Japanese Whaling Activities Are Not Research
Published June 17, 2009 @ 11:08AM PT
Japan has already been widely criticised for its whaling, which is generally seen as a thinly disguised hunting operation. But with the 2009 IWC meeting looming, it is worth rehearsing the arguments against scientific whaling.
The New Scientist article's authors go on to explain just why Japanese whaling is unnecessary for research purposes. Check it out.
On a related note, have you been watching the second season of Whale Wars? I'm missing it because I no longer have cable (actually, I no longer have television service period, given that I've kept putting off getting a DTV converter box), but if you do get Animal Planet, you can tune in on Friday nights; it just started in the last week or two, I believe.
(Thanks go to Alex Felsinger for the tweet about the New Scientist article.)
A Note on the Shark Finning Action
Published May 29, 2009 @ 08:19AM PT
I don't have time to write a detailed post on shark finning and fishing in general right now, but I do want to quickly make a request of you regarding the action in support of a bill aimed at stopping finning, about which you may have receieved an alert. First, for sake of clarity, do understand that no killing of sharks is humane or necessary, and this law will not make killing sharks illegal (unfortunately). But the narrowly focused Shark Conservation Act of 2009 does seek to stop the heinous practice of finning, in which people pull sharks from the water, hack off their fins, and then throw them back into the water--suffering terribly--to die terribly, unable to swim. And this is all for something as selfish and unnecessary as a specialty soup.
Here's what I want to ask of you before you sign the petition:
The default language of the petition remarks that the bill "will help put an end to the wasteful practice of 'finning.'" And I'm sure many of you know exactly what I'm going to request: get rid of that "wasteful," will you? This isn't about "wasting" the remaining body parts of a living being; it's about extraordinary cruelty and the decimation of species. So feel free to customize and personalize your e-mail in whatever other ways you see fit as well, but at least please change that "wasteful" to "cruel" before you hit send. We're not talking about throwing out half a loaf of bread because it got a little stale; we're talking about a sentient animal's suffering.
Cattle Culture, Aquaculture, and Export of the Western Diet
Published March 27, 2009 @ 10:01AM PT
The following is part 3 of a four-part post by guest contributor and former animal farmer Harold Brown. See also part 1, "Animal Ag: Will It Be Our Death? An Intro to Cattle Culture," and part 2, "Free-Range Pasture Systems Not a Viable Solution," from earlier in the week. -S. Ernst
This discussion brings me to another subject, Heifer International. Most people and faith communities believe they are doing good work, feeding poor people around the world. Don't be fooled. Heifer International, in my opinion, is the gateway for cattle culture expansion. There has been a concerted effort for over 30 years to change the diet of the "developing" world. In this case, "developing" refers to anything other than the Western model of affluence. If you look at their website, you would be amazed at how much it looks like any of a number of farm animal sanctuaries in the United States.
Agribusiness sees the global south as an untapped market waiting to be exploited for its potential consumers and resources (think free-market capitalism). Beyond this CAFOs are not going to disappear anytime soon. Sure, they are having problems here in the United States, primarily because of the environmental damage they cause. But to mitigate the problems here at home, they are expanding overseas to China (now the largest hog producer in the world) and places like Poland, where Smithfield has built hog CAFOs, which, by the way, many in Poland are regretting for environmental and ethical reasons.
-Continue reading after the jump-
Yes, Fish Suffer, and No, Vegetarians Don't Eat Them (On Singer vs. Cowen)
Published March 20, 2009 @ 07:03AM PT
Yesterday morning, Ezra Klein posted the below video featuring a conversation between Peter Singer and Tyler Cowen. These days, when I read or hear something Singer has said regarding animals and animal rights, I far more often want to respond (and do respond) with "What the hell, man?" than I want to thank him for it. But in this case, I was glad to see Singer hold his ground on the fact that fish--yes, fish--do suffer terrible deaths, and we don't need to inflict suffering and death on them because we don't need to eat them, while Cowen stubbornly insisted that he just doesn't think it's wrong to kill a fish, with--in my opinion--not very strong arguments to back up that position.
"There's no humane killing of fish," said Peter Singer. For that, thank you, Singer. (And now, please, make that unwavering statement regarding the killing of all other sentient beings, would ya?) And although Cowen wished to just put aside all the environmental and ocean food-web implications in this debate, you can't do that; you can't separate that out. And how does Cowen justify the issue of bycatch, whereby millions of non-target fish, sharks, rays, turtles, and whales are incidentally caught and killed each year and just thrown back? What's Cowen's defense of this?
-More after the jump-
