Chasse aux phoques: Un point de vue intéressant

[Animal 0]

Seals - negative Canadian media + the need for a long term plan
15 mars 2005


Hi all,

Global TV in Vancouver, as an example, downplayed everything about
the worldwide concerted action in genenral and the Vancouver demo in
particlular. Their headline in their 5 pm segment was "The protest
action against the Canadian seal hunt is widespread, but is it
effective?" The 6 pm news did not cover the event at all, and the
11 o'clock news cited only 30 participants in the Vancouver demo
when there were over 50, using the word "weak" in the same breath,
and even that it was karma that damaged and disabled the Sea
Shepherd ship.

The karma reference puzzled me momentarily, until I came to the
fitting conclusion that Global was less than global at least in this
case, but merely national. I think Canadian media are generally
taking the nationalistic stance and a defensive attitude against
what they subliminally portray as a foreign invasion against
Canadian economic sovereignty. Cruelty was not mentioned once that
I've heard.

It is up to us Canadians to support the foreign boycott, to uphold
the planet above the nation, and of course compassion over economy.

This year's International Day of Action is the first major assault
and concerted action against the seal hunt for years. Before it
bears measuarable fruit, of course the initial reaction of the
opponent is mockery.

Conventional wisdom has it that we should not deliver a threat
unless we are willing to carry it out. We delivered the threat
publicly. If we do not carry it out, or fail to do so, our next
threat will be without credibility - to the sealers, to media, to
the public, and to ourselves. And the only way for the boycott to
succeed is to maintain the heat and pressure year-round, not just a
flash in the pan in March every year. The DFO closed its door in
Vancouver on March 15, at that only for a few hours. Some Canadian
consulates closed their doors on March 15, perhaps for the day. But
it is business as usual the rest of the year. We spend weeks and
tons of energy organizing the March 15 demos, while the sealers
expend no energy at all, then come March 15, they watch TV news with
amusement, then come March 16, all pressures and off, and they
concentrate on killing more seals than the next sealer.

I'm not talking about holding weekly demos in front to the DFO and
the consulates - it would be stale after three weeks. What we must
do is to keep the issue alive in the outside world as it is in our
hearts, year round, whether it was a seal-killing month or not, as
innovatively as possible without trivializing the process. It
doesn't have to be media events every time. It could be simply to
work quietly from supermarket to supermarket to make them refrain
from stocking Canadian seafood products. To have them do this, a
media blast on March 15 once a year is not enough. We must make
professional multi-media presentations to them one by one and to
their associations. Same to the US fisheries industries; I'm sure
they would welcome a boycott of their main competitor. And from
school to school, because children could and do influence their
parents on various issues, in this case, their seafood buying
habit. And where this year we have 27 countries and 55 cities, we
should make it 50 countires and 100 cities next year, and even more
the year after next.

In a March 15 demo one year, I heard a demonstrator say to TV, "We
want to stop the seal hunt THIS year." A sealer hearing that would
just snicker and say, "Go ahead, make my day." Over-stating our aim
is counter-productive. It is obvious to anyone with common sense
that it is a practical impossibility. But if we say, "We want to
have the seal hunt terminated NEXT year, and all work furiously and
incessantly on it for twelve full months, it could make the sealers
sweat for a whole year, though in the end it still might not cut it.

Personally, I think it would take longer than a year, no matter how
hard we work. Which brings forth this point. Our true weakness is
in our total lack of a long term strategy that that all can
subscribe to, spanning years. If we reasonably conclude that to
annihilate the hunt would take five years of structured and
progressive action, then we should form a five-year-plan. Do we
have one now? Not that I can see.

In my humble opinion, this long term strategy must not be just one
of repetitive actions year after year, which would make us merely a
thorn in the side, and at that only for a day a year. Whar we need
is an ever escalating movement spanning several years, decades if
necessary, culminating in an inevitable and crushing termination of
the seal hunt.

This year's international action to me is not an entity unto itself,
but it is a good start. If we say, "We shall terminate the seal
hunt by the year 2010," and have a workable plan to back it up, and
the concerted effort to carry it out, the sealers will sweat for
five year, then succumb.

Anthony