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Urgent: Please Sign the Enclosed
Petition to the President!
Whales are still being hunted and
it’s just as cruel as ever!
Whales are still not safe!
Since a global ban on whaling in 1986, Japan has continued to
kill whales in the name of “scientific research.” Yet legitimate
scientists agree: there’s no need to kill whales to research
them.
Whales are being
slaughtered by Japan in horribly cruel fashion so their meat can
be sold in gourmet restaurants. And now they are dramatically
increasing the slaughter: doubling the number of whales killed.
Unless they are stopped now. Japan
could launch a return to full-scale industrial whaling: a
horrific practice that drove many whale species to the brink of
extinction.
Only the tremendous
resources and clout of the United States has a chance to stop
Japan from destroying the world’s whales
—
if the President acts now.
YOUR SIGNATURE IS
REQUIRED ON THE enclosed Petition to the President. Sign now
to stop the cruel and unnecessary practice of whaling
—
before it’s too late.
I want to share with you the following
description written a half century ago in the Antarctic by a
physician onboard a whaling ship:
“If we can imagine a horse having two or three explosive
spears stuck in its stomach and being made to pull a butcher’s
truck through the streets of London while its blood pours into
the gutter, we shall have an idea of the method of killing
whales. The gunners themselves admit that if whales could
scream, the industry would stop for nobody would be able to
stand it.”
But tragically - I can’t.
Harpoons using the same explosive
grenade heads employed fifty years ago are being used by
Japanese whalers to slaughter whales illegally.
Often, the first blast isn’t enough to kill the poor
whale. Japanese whaling ships were recently filmed hoisting live
whales up the side of their huge industrial ships by the tail,
leaving the whale’s blow hole underwater. The helpless whale can
only thrash against the side of the ship, desperate for air,
until it slowly drowns.
Perhaps even more shocking, this unsanctioned killing is
happening in the protected waters of Antarctica’s Southern Ocean
Marine Sanctuary, blatantly defying international law.
Here’s why you don’t have to kill a whale in order to
study it.
Japan is able to continue hunting
whales in such a sickening fashion because it is
abusing a loophole in the international ban that permits killing
whales in order to conduct scientific research.
But the painful slaughter of whales does not benefit
science, whales or people. Why?
Because non-lethal methods to study whales already
exist. Japan claims that scientific whaling is necessary to
determine if whales are hurting commercial fish stocks. Yet some
of the whale species killed by Japan do not even eat fish!
In fact, the International Whaling Commission (IWC) has
clearly stated it does not need the data obtained from killing
whales: passino resolutions critical of Japan’s research
whaling program forty-one times!
So if it’s not for science, why does Japan really defy
international law to inflict pain and suffering on the world’s
most majestic creatures?
I’m about to let you in on the real reason.
The ugly secret of Japanese whaling you’re not supposed
to know
Under IWC
rules, any meat that results from research whaling must be used.
I’m sure you can see where this is going.
Japan openly sells the whale meat it obtains from its
“research” in markets and restaurants: despite the fact that
whale meat is often extremely toxic from pollutants and
dangerous to eat. Some whale meat is even being used as pet
food.
So it turns out that whaling isn’t about science at all.
It’s simply commercial whaling in disguise. Over two
thousand tons of whale meat came back from the Antarctic last
year, and it ended up on restaurant tables and store shelves,
not labs.
The sad fact is that this ongoing tragedy has been going
on for some time now. It may come as a surprise when I tell you
that more than 25,000 whales have been hunted and killed since
the ban on whaling was imposed.
And yet, this number pales in comparison to the
global devastation for whales that will follow if the
events that are unfolding right now aren’t stopped immediately.
Whales need your help right now more than ever before
REASON NUMBER ONE TO ACT RIGHT NOW: Japan
recently announced plans to double the number of whales it will
kill in the next several years in the waters of the Southern
Ocean Whale Sanctuary, adding two protected species, fin and
humpback whales, to its target list.
The humpback’s song is one of nature’s greatest wonders.
These magnificent, endangered creatures are meant to be
witnessed in their natural beauty and be heard for generations
to come, not eaten until they vanish forever.
REASON NUMBER TWO WHY YOUR HELP CAN’T
WAIT: Japan is on the verge of destroying more than
thirty years of whale conservation by buying its way to a
majority at this month’s International Whaling Commission (IWC)
meeting, offering multi-million dollar fisheries grants to
economically developing countries in exchange for pro-whaling
votes.
If we don’t convince the President to use the United
States’ resources and clout far more aggressively to stop
whaling, then Japan could possibly buy its way into a
pro-whaling majority at this month’s IWC — setting an
irreversible course that will be certain disaster for whales.
REASON NUMBER THREE TO SPEAK OUT WHILE THERE’S
STILL TIME: Whales and their ocean habitats already face
real and growing threats from human activities such as ocean
noise, global warming, ship strikes, and entanglement in fishing
gear. Killing whales for profit as part of an illegal whale hunt
when such magnificent animals already face such difficult odds
for survival is not only completely unnecessary, it’s criminal.
IFAW
411 Main Street, Yarmouth Port MA
02675-1843 800-932-4329
I have
included this page to again provide evidence of the extent of
our savagery upon the animals kingdom, and not to solicit
donations. To use the petition select, copy paste and sign, and
mail to President Bush. JBS
Petition to President George W. Bush
Dear
Mr. President,
WHEREAS, the cruel killing of whales by Japan continues in the
internationally protected waters of the Southern Ocean
Sanctuary, despite official U.S. opposition and a global
moratorium on whaling, and
WHEREAS, Japan is using
international aid to buy votes at the International Whaling
Commission in order to legalize commercial whale hunting and
sabotage the sanctity of an international decision-making body,
and
WHEREAS, Japan’s claim of killing
whales for scientific research’ is an obvious ruse. There is no
need to harm whales in order to study them, as scientists on
IFAW’s own whale research vessel, Song of the Whale,
repeatedly demonstrate. Japan’s scientific research’ is a cover
up to sell whale meat on the open market as part of a commercial
whaling program, and...
WHEREAS, whales already face real
and growing threats from global warming, ocean noise,
entanglement in fishing gear and ship strikes,
I THEREFORE PETITION YOU to oppose Japan’s bid
for permanent membership on the United Nations Security Council
until the nation complies with international laws for the
protection of whales.
ACT NOW to stop Japanese whaling BEFORE Japan takes
over the IWC and changes the rules of the game to legalize
commercial whaling; dooming the world’s whales to gradually
disappear.
Signature Date
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