Stilgherrian » whaling

Whaling discussion continues

Stilgherrian — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 20:09:14 +0000

My piece about Japanese whaling chief Hideki Moronuki is generating some interesting discussion. I’ve just posted a long comment. Worth a read, even if it’s not about Heath Ledger. Oh, and you can always subscribe to the comments feed to ensure you don’t miss any of the action.

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My new hero: Hideki Moronuki

Stilgherrian — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 22:37:09 +0000

Hideki Moronuki (pictured) is the Japanese Fisheries Agency’s chief of whaling. While I’m reasonably sure I’m not in favour of whaling, and certainly not if people are fibbing about its true purpose, you’ve got to admire his ballsy, direct language.

In a lengthy opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Herald last Monday, Moronuki defends Japan’s “scientific whaling” with the observation that to commercially manage forests, fisheries and other “natural living resources” but not whales makes no sense. He dismisses as a “fallacy” that there must be one [commercial activity] (whale watching) to the exclusion of the other (whaling).

There are enough whales for both those that want to watch them and those who want to eat them.

I fully respect the right of Australians to oppose whaling for some “cuddly” reasons, but this does not give them the right to coerce others to end a perfectly legal and culturally significant activity that poses no threat to the species concerned.

And on Wednesday, with two of Sea Shepherd’s unruly wankers aboard his ship, he said the pair would be given an opportunity to try whale meat while aboard the ship.

Hat-tip on that last quote to The Road to Surfdom.

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Maybe the government knows more than you do

Stilgherrian — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 05:14:58 +0000

The various whinges from the commentariat about the MV Oceanic Viking’s “late” departure amuse me. One, it shows how shallow their “analysis” is. Two, it shows how poorly Australia’s defences have been managed.

The Oceanic Viking is going to monitor Japanese whaling off Australia. But it hadn’t left port by early January, and the civilian charter aircraft also tasked to this surveillance role hadn’t yet received regulatory approval. Newspapers started saying it’s all talk and no action from the Rudd government.

Perhaps. But there are other possibilities.

Perhaps with the civilian monitor ship in port, the Japanese will be lulled into a false sense of security when in fact they’re already being monitored by a navy submarine or a RAAF P-3 Orion. Perhaps the “late” departure is planned according to whatever intelligence we have on the movements of the Japanese whaling fleet to use the ship’s time most effectively — rather than spend weeks on a pointless Antarctic cruise.

Perhaps. Or perhaps not.

But, Dear Armchair Warriors of the Daily Press, if the mission isn’t unfolding as you in your “expert opinion” think it should that doesn’t automatically mean incompetence. It might just mean your part-time understanding of the mission is less sophisticated than the folks who deal with these issues full time.

On the other hand, it does worry me that fisheries surveillance is handled in what appears to be such an ad hoc manner.

The need to monitor our fisheries zone and international waters beyond is hardly new. While blue-water fisheries patrol boats and aircraft aren’t as sexy as jet fighters and main battle tanks — or as capable of generating lucrative kickbacks — they’re a more immediate and obvious need.

Just why, after a decade of so-called effective management by A Certain Conservative Government, do we have to mount this whaling monitoring mission using a leased ship and a chartered airliner? Why don’t we have specific resources designed for the task?

[Photo by Nachoman-au courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.]