Many Newfie/Labradorians rely on seal meat as a main diet to feed their families. Not only do they eat seal to survive but also wild duck, turr, moose and carribou. So when you go to the store and buy your pork, lamb, beef and VEAL (which is in fact BABY cow) take note of how much you spent on these things. Is it that hard to believe that substituting these meats for wild ones is a necessity for some, rather than a barbaric act. Perhaps, you don’t even eat meat. You think the killing of ANY animal is barbaric. You, with your vitamin supplements and your soy milk. Go down to a small town in Labrador. Look for soy milk and green salads. You’ll be more likely to find carrots, cabbage, potatoes and turnip, because those are the only vegetables you will find. They don’t have the luxury of vegetarian friendly groceries. So, personally people I think you should cut these “archaic, barbarians” some slack, they don’t have much but they do a damn good job with what they do have!

So why do you think I repeat myself?
Might it be because you just don’t get hte point? Mybe you just ignore what I write? If you cam up with something new, I wouldn’t have to repeat myself.

“As in law, when an issue is being debated as to whether or not it violates acceptable community standards, comparative situations are used to make a judgement. You cannot dismiss someone’s arguments simply because you don’t even agree with the comparative situations being cited. In doing so you are simply trying to impose your own personal standards on all of us. If you judge yourself to be at that level then so be it.”

What you really are trying to say is that your argument “if everyone does bad, we have the right to do it too” should be accepted by me as an acceptable and valid argument even if it isn’t. It’s not about comparative situations that are being cited because in your comment you say: “You will note that I’ve not stooped so low as to include photos or videos of the animal’s convulsions and its blood flowing on the slaughter house floor that I mentioned earlier.” and for some reason you are trying to distract the fact that you are killing and making animals suffer with another irrelevant topic as that in your arguments pointing to other animal slaughtering you don’t use videos or pictures. So indirectly you are saying if you where against slaughtering cows, which you aren’t, you wouldn’t have that “low niveou” of showing pics or movies. So what are you really talking about? Is it more yourslef that you are trying to defend or better say to save your reputation? Maybe you just want show you are “better”?

“My point is that the activities of the seal hunters have several socially accepted cmparisons. If you disagree with this then I think you are in denial. If you do agree that there are several comparisons to be made in judging the suitability of the seal hunt then stop avoiding that fact and start dealing with it, in your own back garden first.”

Well yes but it is totally irrelevant to say if they are killing cows we will kill seals, even if it’s for FUR. So if you would use more relevant comparisons instead of… ” in some other country they do that…” (distracting).

And in fact I am dealing with everything you throw at me but I am tired of hearing the same irrelevant arguments over and over and I am being fair enough to answere them over and over again since I like to make things clear, even if many ignore my words.

“Stop preaching to a people and society you seem quick to judge but seem to know so little about. Maybe you should follow Oprah’s lead and take on the Texas beef industry, an industry that I support by the way. Or are the limited numbers, lobby, and finances of the eastern
a much easier and safer target for you, hence the seals first approach. ”

The more I know about your society the less I wanna know. In fact there is no much to know about excuses to what you do.. because if there was you wouldn’t be repeating the same lame arguments over and over again. And I don’t look Oprah. Maybe that’s how your government has brainwashed you.. it seems you watch a bit to much tv. Tv is good for informative reasons but even then you have to filter a lot out, but when you mention Oprah, and all these talkshows, then I guess arguing with you will be similar as being in a talkshow and throwing chairs at each other

And no, the Canadian sealers have never been my target, in fact I guess I am doing more for them than you, since it seems you don’t care that every year they have to risk their lives for some pennys to get more money into the pockets of the rich.

So, to judge from your QUICK answere to my comments, I guess I can not expect more from you… maybe you should participate in a talkshow, I guess there you will find more people going mad, because the more I read from you the more I am sure there won’t come any real argument… you just talk and talk and talk about everything else but the seals… so I guess someday you’ll notice this isn’t a Oprah Talkshow

I guess that makes you a better person?

“That would bring me down to the level of most self-proclaimed environmentalists”

It is up to you what you want to defend or not. And I am not sure if it would bring you “down”. In my eyes you’d go “up”

“I understand the environmental balance which this approach acheives. I’m simply bringing out the hypocrisy that most bring to this debate.”

I understand the Hypocrisy argument, but as I said before many people
have been raised up eating meat as the canadians have been raised up killing seals. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t feel bad by eating the meat of an animal that probably suffered in it’s totallity of its life like many cows treated badly. It is no excuse to state.. “since me and my family have been eating shit for thousands of years, we must go on doing it”. And also… if all people couldn’t protest against something because they indirectly suport it then I guess you have no right to change your desicion on voting a president even if you now think he’s an asshole. The same with the millions of cigarett users, just because they smoke it doesn’t mean they can’t protest against companies, since the objective in this protest is clearly to stop the process and this means people wouldn’t mind to go to the store and not find cigaretts or meat since it helps to lose the adictivness our humanity has become without thinking of any consequenzes.

“You will note that I’ve not stooped so low as to include photos or videos of the animal’s convulsions and its blood flowing on the slaughter house floor that I mentioned earlier.”

I am not sure what you mean by that. In fact I like the picture with the cow and I think if they wanted to ad horrible pictures of cow killing then it would be their decission. For me personally I am no activist and at the moment I couldn’t imagine myself using such horrible pictures nor for the seals or the cows or any living species, but as you may have notices there are people trying to articulate this issue and to do this it seems it’s not necessary to show any kinds of pictures since we all KNOW what it’s about. So do you see any pictures on this blog?

This Issue has too sides coming from the activists. One is the horrible side that should be stoped and for that they show you on pictures horrible things that should be stoped. And on the other side they show you cute little baby animals that shouldn’t suffer but more be cuddled and huged by activist where the objective on this is more to talk about a better world that we can provide for all of us and other species, but at the end it doesn’t matter if it’s Pamela Anderson or Paul or a seal or a chicken, because it’s totally irrelevant to bring them allways into your arguments.

In fact I understand that you animal suffering pro’s don’t like celebrities being against you, but that is your personal taste and has nothing to do with the subject.

No animal lover witll go “hey.. look pamela anderson doesn’t eat meat, so we should all not eat it, because if SHE does it then it must be ok!”

So coming back to the real issue on animal suffering, in this case seals, I can’t even count the times I have repeated myself on this that it’s really just about trying to see how things have been in the past and how they can be improoved. It’s no use to simply ignore that there are solutions, but of course for you animal suffering fans this is no problem that need a solution because you don’t think into the future and rather stay by ancient traditions that have in fact nothing anymore to do with a group of natives killing for food.

This sais I guess if it still isn’t clear than I am sure more of these comments will come in future so to do a bit my homework I will start answereing all your future comments since I am sure to have noticed the regularity that they come up no matter what I posted before.

1. Yes I know Chickens and Cows are being killed to. But for the moment let us concetrate on seals, and maybe later we’ll talk about whatever you want.

2. Yes I know celebrities are everywhere and if they poop everyone judges them and to be honest I don’t care if they are pro or contra if it’s just to make publicity, but otherwise is it possible to be against something being a celebrity without having the world watching and judging you?

3. Yes I also know you say it’s important for economy. I think Canada for example has one of the biggest Oil reserves, hasn’t it? And even if not, I don’t think killing seals for FUR is the best you can do. It’s more a solution that has never been improoved, and I don’t know if people are too lazy or just don’t care enought to look for better way in making money. In fact the hunters don’t do that much money, so it is pretty clear that the ones doing money are very pleased how things are going since I am not sure if they would profit the same if seal hunters had other jobs to do where of course they wouldn’t share their profit with the big seal hunt industry heads. Anyways I guess if economy is reason enough for you to kill for fur then you might also have gone to Irak war if you had no oil.. ??? I’m just saying no matter what you say there is no excuse to do what you are doing as there is none for others killing cows and chickens..

4. Yes I also know there are protesters and moneymakers like PETA that probably do more damage as help. I guess if you have the amount of money peta has you could bring up some intelligent heads to propose some real solutions, but at the same time without seal hunt, the protesters wouldn’t have anything to protest about, right? and that means it’s a money thing.. like most of the problems in this world. So to say it easy… There are celebrities that might protest for other reasons as there are organizations and etc… but does that change the real issue? The issue about “evoluted” human race not caring enough about a living thing with a brain and nerves and able to feel pain? I just get tired of your excuses.

5. Just because you think there are eough reasons to do what you do doesn’t change the fact that you do it. And another thing I have noticed very often in forums. Scientific forums to be exact. There seem to apear very often extremists of religion that start arguing with god. Mostley of the time people respond and argue a small time but when the fundamentalist doesn’t stop saying: Every aspect of the bible is hundred percent exact and has never been prooven wrong, then many just don’t even react anymore to those comments.
What I am trying to say is, that if all people in favor of sealhunting would really believe that it’s ok and they would have NO doubt in it… then why do they keep responding on such “infantile armchair protesters” like we?
Ok, I guess one answere to this could be because they care? But about what? Maybe about their reputation because they live in a country where this has been going on for ever and it has achieved a cultural acceptance? I am pretty sure no seal hunter would try to protest against cow killing if he wasn’t in a religion that makes cows godlike. But what I mean is that everybody has the right to make a change or even try, as for many this issue is more about saving reputation as the USA government would NEVER acept it is doing wrong unless it’s in the past and it is absolutley evident that they did wrong. So as I said, for some it is a reputation issue, for some it is a chance to get more publicity, to some it’s for money, but the more people protest, no matter what I think it will be possitive in one or the other way for the seals since my concern are them at this moment. And yes I know chickens and cows suffer too! And maybe when I have time I’ll do a chicken and cow blog!
But for now I hope no matter what is your reason for complain, that we stop arguing with celebrities, or organizations or pictures, and focus more on the real issue that will allways be “Is seal hunt ok?” If yes, what can be done to spread it in the world so every living species on earth can have seal FUR clothing, and if no what can be done to stop it? It’s that simple. No celebrities, No chickens, No excuses without real arguments.

6. I know it could be another issue to talk about what is evolution and who is behaving more barbaric, the ones who kill seals or the ones who are against it.

Many argue with the fact that there aresome agressive activists and because of that they put all avtivists in one box stating they are worse then the poor sealhunters that do it for money cause they are unable to practice any other work. So if you are defending the seal hunters, DEFEND THEM! You are not doing any good by looking at the wron side of the problem which isn’t the seal hunters.. but more the heads over them who do the real money! How many seal hunters die every year? It’s not the big heads who risk their lives. THE SEAL HUNTERS ARE BEING EXPLIODED and if your argument is to defend them then think about what you are saying because I don’t think it’s in the best interest of them as I also think that if they had a chance to do other work for the same or more money that they would do it! Of course they would!

7. And for those trying to save your reputation, I can only say there is no way to ignore you are doing wrong. Just because it’s a tradition and you love your country doesn’t mean you can do it better. It’s not like you need it, so why defend something just because it’s tradition? And if you are serious about defending it, why don’t you get some real arguments and stop crying about celebrities and video of YOU killing on tv.

The truth is that the truth will allways come out, sooner or later and you can’t hide it with silly arguments, I really hope to hear some better stuff from you guys because I am really really getting tired of repeating myself.

-see? this is what i mean

I’ve been reading your debate for some time. Surprise, surprise, in my opinion both of you are wrong about the seal hunt being wrong.
It seems to come down to this, based on what I’ve read. The killing of animals for clothing and human consumption is politically correct if:
- it is done behind closed doors with no cameras around to show the ugliness of the animal’s convulsions and their blood flowing over the floor
- the animals are held in capivity for every hour of their lives
- the meat comes neatly wrapped in a clean grocery store
- the leather is seen in the form of a coat and not as the skin of a dead animal
- the majority in your society partakes in the wearing and consumption of products from the killing of these out-of-sight, out-of-mind animals
- the cuteness of these animals do not reach the level of a seal
- CNN does no cover the killing of these animals.
This is not a debate about seals only as some wish it to be (sorry if I’ve again violated the reason for this blog). This is a debate about consistency in personal and political policies and beliefs. This debate is only self-serving when standards are applied in a very selective way.
I recently saw a study which revealed that the vast majority of those in opposition to the seal hunt are urban dwellers (hopefully I can provide the url if it is available on the web). These are people who live in an energy guzzling concrete world which is totally intolerant of most wildlife. In fact, in these people’s world wildlife is viewed through steel bars or plexiglass at zoos. And we are suppose to listen to the preachings of these people who believe they are at one with nature. Give me a break! Since when was avoiding the direct personal killing of wildlife the standard for being at one with nature? Since when did the killing of wildlife for food and clothing mean not being at one with nature?
I have no problem with the very principled people who truly and totally boycott all animal products, if any of these people really exist. For those who do not, change your lives, do not be selective with your values, boycott all business and regions which violate those values, and preach with true authority. In other words, stop finding scapegoats like my people to make you feel good about yourselves (at our expense). Clean up your own act, your own family, your own community, your own country first. Lead by example. If you don’t, then be prepared to debate the total picture, not just the blood of a cute seal on the white ice.
Those of you against the seal hunt based on selective reasoning, there is a thread which runs through all of your writings and thoughts, it’s called hypocrisy.
I truly wish you all good well and reasoned thoughts!

I have heard that universities and other research centres spend money on some interesting point of the world as it could be the cold north. I am not sure what exactly there is to research, but I guess, besides the snow, ice and ocean you have the seals which might have some interesting part to study. I hope this doesn’t sound ridiculous, but creating a small comunity of young researchers that have the possibility to go to Canada and study things with help of the government could build a total new place. Great turistic atractions could be built with ice like those Ice hotels in Finland or other parts of the world… they could have Icebuilding competitions and be atractive to tourists, while the same people living there for a temporal time on research will need food, clothing and places to go, so somehow it would be a comunity who has a lot’s of needs and all these needs can be provided by the unemployed seal hunters.

Well… since I really have no idea of what could and what could not be done I think the first step is thinking of it and coment it to people in high positions.. maybe they can bring the government on a idea how to create more jobs and make canada more interesting, since I am sure there is much more about canada than the seal hunt!

From what I understand, the money they do make (on an individual basis) is not terribly high. Thus if we can implement a plan that can make these former hunters what they would have made hunting (or ideally more) then the issue would seemingly be solved… Or at least much improved.

And I totally agree with you that the government plays a big role in this, since somehow it’s their responsability to decide in benefit of all of us and not just in benefit of the rich ones. I am pretty sure there are ways to make money with seals without killing them. As I read on one blog, tourism is a very big thing.. here in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico we have Walewatching every year and it’s for a good cause since the money goes to investigation companies that study sea life and environment…

So I hope to hear more such good comments!

And lets start coming up with solutions to this problem. First and foremost, I feel as if the provincial and perhaps even federal government branches of Canada must play a major role in a financial solution for these “now-jobless” hunters. Whether it is to invest in an infrastructure allowing new occupations for people of the area, or simply via social welfare programs.

I think the main problem is that anyone can voice opposition to an event such as the seal hunt, yet few if any suggest any viable solutions. This is why I agreed so with the whole armchair protester suggestion. Especially in the case of these celebrities, they are so quick to act bold and proclaim an injustice, yet for the most part they don’t even attempt to suggest a possible solution.

Until we take it that step further, the protests and complaints are useless.

Anyways.. I think you understand me.

So if I call somebody Ignorant because they don’t know better it gives you the right to say I am an american ignorant? Even if you don’t know what Country I’m from? I don’ know what you have against american, but to bring this into talk is ridiculous.

“Furthermore I think that your primary argument against the seal hunt seems as if it is because we are killing innocent animals, and we shouldn’t have the right too.. (I may be wrong..)”

It is not only that I don’t favor killing for fun, but also that killing in an unhuman way doesn’t have to be if they’d spend a bit more money on equipment.

“I agree with you. But I think it is difficult to make this argument, because as I said before, you, I, and everyone contradicts this notion daily in our consumption habits…”

I do perfectly understand you and I must say that this is a problem. But as I compared before an Diction to food can be like to cigaretts, and this does not mean that because you did wrong in the past you may not change to a better human by complaining about cigarett companies or mass food productions. You know as I do that adictions may control many people that in real have a small decire to stop it.

“Now I understand that seal hunting is different then those who slaughter cows, as one is arguably more necessary then the other but if you asked me if one was more compliant to the whole “What the POINT is is that they are LIVING SPECIES with FEELINGS and a right to live” argument, I would have to say no.”

Well maybe you’re right because this is more complex than only ONE point. For example the feelings and right to live states only that all species become a right to live and die. Lions eat sheep for example, for a living. And here in PUEBLA, MExico there is the largest chicken farms on the world and I can tell you there isn’t one town here where they don’t sell chicken. But its food and I still hope someday these chickens won’t have to suffer if they are damned to die. But the thing is.. what’s the problem of killing? The way you do it and the reason. Painfull killing for FUR isn’t ok.

“At the end of the day, I feel that people should absolutely have a right to disagree with the hunt, but I feel that the whole event is misrepresented by the media, and the result is a “fanatical” theme that I disagree with. Furthermore media representations illustrate McCartney, and apparently now Pamela Anderson as so-called figure-heads, yet Anderson probably has a fur wardrobe that could rival a zoo… The contradictions are endless, which makes my cynical to the notion that someone can credibly dispute events such as this, while they are consumers of similar ones.”

The media is only one part of all. And if you read my coments you will se I don’t like taking in celebrities or organizations in a simple opinion blog where I am talking from my side of view of things. Anyways I am glad some celebrities do make wind.. if not we wouldn’t be sitting here and talking on this blog

“I do however feel that an apology is owed to you Oli… Although I disagree with many of your points, the personal attacks on you were unneccessary.”

This is a very unexpected statment which I am happy to read. I guess we disagree respectfully and hope someday one of us will convert to the other side:)

Take care…