General Chat

Why thank you, Deb.

This is the intro/overview.

http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/media/seal-phoque/video-eng.htm

For some reason I can't access the videos, but hopefully anybody interested in facts will be able to.



Too bad about those Canucks ...

This series of short videos may shed some light on how communities rely on the hunt:

http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/media/seal-phoque/video1-eng.htm

Deb

Well, I guess there's a reason why Bush invaded Iraq, and why people throw litter on my street.

I'm sorry if I sound facetious, but I don't consider "there must be a reason" to be an argument.

Reasons have been offered here, and can be found in the Hansard I linked to in the first place.


The anti-seal hunt gang / fanatical "animal rights" activists have a lot of money and throw their weight around without qualms.

European Union elections are coming up.

No one in Europe gives a * about sealers and sealing communities in Canada.

Europe, and European parliamentarians, stand to lose precisely nothing by making this move -- and by making it, European parliamentarians ensure they won't be dogged by people whose pockets are lined with money from uninformed / uncaring donors to support the lobbyists in the lifestyle to which they've become accustomed and to oppose political candidates who don't do their bidding.

Canada and Canadian sealers and sealing communities have nothing to offer European parliamentarians, and nothing to threaten them with, to counter the advantages of voting for the ban.


On the one hand, Canada, which offers no carrot for voting against the ban and has no stick to prevent voting for the ban, and Canadian sealers and sealing communities, who have no European vote and don't matter to Europeans and their parliamentarians.

On the other hand, the anti-seal hunt gang, which has a big stick with which to beat European Parliament candidates around the head, consisting of lots of money and lots of propaganda and disinformation, but that's how elections are won and lost.

So it looks like it was a pretty easy choice.


That may help.

Just got back from having a life!
I've read most of your posts Janey, but to be quite honest I can't be bothered trawling the internet for information.
I wasn't comparing seal culling to cock fighting, just pointing out that they are both barbaric in their own way.
I have no problem with bear or deer culling - in fact - amazingly - I've been on a deer cull, Nice quick bullet to the head - of an adult/old/ailing deer -dead - and they didn't even know it!
There must be a reason why Europe has banned the sale of harp seal fur.
I'm sure it's not personal - but if it isn't because the whole process is barbaric, then I'm stumped. Perhaps the majority of Europe is wrong in their belief, I wouldn't know, I can't be bothered googling it, so only speak for myself.

Exactly, SueMaid.

Forests are being destroyed in parts of the world today that we all need, to maintain our oxygen and climate and all that.

They're being destroyed by people who need firewood to survive. And species are being hunted to extinction by people who need "bush meat" to survive.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/864506.stm

We have the luxury of choosing not to do those particular things, but some of the things we do are of course far more ecologically harmful, just not as obvious to the naked eye.

Me, I'd impose the "one child" rule on the entire world, if I were queen of the world. ;)

I remember, on a trip to the UK, visiting a section of Hadrian's Wall and a guide telling us that most of the old farm houses were built of stone from the wall. There was a gasp from a lot of the group but the guide said that conservation is for a more affluent society. If you needed materials for your house you used what you could find.

Sue

Sorry Rose, no can do -- I have my AdBlocker on and firmly on, and will not risk letting anything through that I'll have to spend forever getting rid of again!

I was actually thinking about this thing about how abuses *must* occur because there aren't enough fisheries officers monitoring the hunt ...

Who monitors pet owners? Why, pretty much nobody.

I would imagine that the proportion of dog owners in our countries who neglect / mistreat their dogs is at least as high as the proportion of sealers who violate their licence conditions.

I'll never understand people who acquire animals they evidently don't want. When I was in law school, the people in the other half of my house -- there was a below-grade breezeway from front to back, and both our doors opened off it -- got a German Shepherd pup. It was one of the worst winters on record, and it was left outside. It cried. When I had to go to the corner store, I would take it for the "walk" -- i.e. I carried it there and back.

All my cats are strays (have had a couple from the humane society in the past). We have a feral cat colony on the block that I've turned the garage over to and we feed. (Our Parliament has its own feral cat colony, btw - a set of cat shelters right up against Centre Block, which houses both Houses of Parliament.)

Progress was mentioned. My mother's father, as lovely a man as you'd want to know, drowned kittens during the Depression. Arguably better than allowing the cat population to swell with unfed, unhoused cats -- 75 years ago, working people didn't have pets neutered. My mum used to get sent to the butcher to ask for a bone for the dog ... that they didn't have. But they'd have soup that night. Anyhow, my grandfather eventually said he just wasn't doing that again.

30 years later, around 1960, my mum had to take a cat to the pound because we couldn't cope with more kittens, and my dad controlled the pursestrings (at that time - and this was one of the things that prompted my mum to start putting money into what *she* wanted) and didn't want to pay for spaying cats.

Me, I feed the ferals and find homes for strays, and pay for low-income neighbours to spay their cats.

What's the big factor here, really?

Money. A family in the Depression couldn't afford unlimited numbers of cats, and certainly couldn't afford to neuter them. Spaying was an option 30 years later, but an expensive one for an ordinary working family. Me, I can afford it, and I can afford the tests when my cats get sick. Although I question my morals when I pay for cat meds and the money could go to, really, better things. But then so could all my money, apart from what I need for basic eating.

Economic development is where humane treatment of animals - and people - comes from. Poor people can't afford qualms.

sneaking in with an agenda...... don't be too harsh on me Janey....

to the left of here , in the ever changing ads...you will see a dog looking out at you... please look back and take a minute to read even?

Thankyou xx

Hi Janey,
Another Canuck here living out on the West Coast & have read through your entire thread....
Sorry to say, but I'm very happy with the recent
decision handed down by the EU & my sentiments regarding the culling of baby seal pups as a Canadian....Find it both extremely inhumane & barbaric to say the least. Always have & always will, if allowed to continue!
The latter re "extremely inhumane & barbaric" is of my opinion & sticking to it....
AnotherCanuck

I wouldn't dare debate with you, Janey. I would get lost in the words and end up making a complete a**e of myself. I would then leave the thread with my self confidence in tatters and would probably have lost the will to live:)) Sorry I'll stick to the arguments and inane threads with people of similar intellect.

Sue

lol Rose, that was scary!

You know, as well as I, what agendas are pushed via news channels to the general populace. If peoples' views are coloured by the mass media it is understandable that heaps of people will take the news reports as fact!

You only have to look at what the BBC did NOT show during the Israeli bombings in Gaza....says it all!

Yep, Rose, I know the European Parliament is elected. I'm just surprised to see Staffordshire Col being a fan. ;)


Sue, you fell victim to my extrapolation too. There is just so much disinformation about 'baby seals', and so many people repeating it ... I see now what you meant!

oops Sue lol... got there ahead of me... see I knew what you meant :) xx

sticks oar in a minute...and I am really on other debate... janey....

JaneyCanuck Today at 20:20 Request review
SueM first -- I am starting to get callouses on my forehead.

If I'm wrong and you're not referring to the seal hunt when you said this, let me know: "It's the starkness of blood against the pure white which shocks me"

I believe SueM was refering to the 'white' of the ice not the seal fur?

and re elcted members...we do elect MEPs to represent our views in European parliament...which is I think what Colin was refering to?

they will correct me if i am wrong...now back to my own thread lol >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Do stop banging your head!!!

Pure white referred to snow/ice not coats.

I shall perform a very tiny grovel as I did not make myself clear.

Sue

Jac, I shouldn't have extrapolated. I've been addressed by a number of familiar terms in the thread, by someone who did not intend them at all pleasantly.

We return to the common theme of what 'debate' is.

Debate isn't "well I think thus-and-so and if you don't like it you can go suck a lemon" (even if the latter part isn't said out loud).

Debate is an exchange of views *with the basis on which those views are held*.

There's little point in me debating someone who claims the world is flat, unless s/he offers me some evidence to support that view, or some argument against the facts I offer.

Otherwise, the "debate" looks like:

Person A: It is.
Person B: It isn't.
Person A: Yes, it is.
Person B: Well, I don't think it is.
Person A: Well, you're wrong.
Person B: No, you're wrong.

That is *not* what I practise.

Or maybe, as more commonly seen here:

Person A: I think X.
Person B: So do I.
Person C: Well, I don't.
Person D: I agree with you, C.
Person A: You're wrong.

and so on.

I guess some people see a point in that.

Agree with every word Jac

Havent read through the ensuing text - been off preparing cooking and eating evening meal, but will respond to your last reply to me.

Janey - who the heck is patronising you? you do seem to think that everyone is out to shoot you down in flames (I hesitate to use a term of endearment, otherwise you might think that patronising). Not true. Merely trying to have a friendly debate that doesnt end in acrimony.

To be honest I personally find your never ending text to be rather labouring the point, but hey - you obviously believe what you quote, and I believe what I believe. Fair is fair isn't it?

I dont think that attempting to shove your "opinion" down the throats of others by copying and pasting text prepared by others is actually a formula for a friendly debate. But there you, you obviously think it is.

We have reasons to disagree I think: no big deal, it's what makes the world go around and at the end of the day, I will willing cross the Ocean and join you in spitting on Mac Harb, because I think I do trust your judgement on that subject.


Jac xxx

Staffordshire Col: I wonder why you would wonder whether you are allowed a view, when I said, quite clearly:

"If someone, knowing the truth, still finds the seal hunt yucky (while continuing to eat commercially slaughtered animals?), that's their choice and they're welcome to it."

I have no idea why people would choose to EXPRESS a view in public *unless they were trying to influence someone else*, in which case, as I said, they have a responsibility to offer a true and accurate foundation for that view ... but whatever.

"Hmm we have decided to (as Europeans through our elected Parliments)"

Actually, no, it was the European Parliament, not your elected Parliaments, that made this decision. Odd. Ordinarily, I wouldn't have thought of you of a fan of all that Europe stuff.



maggie winchester: "Unfortunately if anyone dared to post as much 'anti' as you have posted 'pro' they would be deemed to be 'anti' simply because in your and Eldricks opinion they don't know the facts - as it appears only the 'pro' facts on the internet are true, and 'anti' people have all the wrong 'facts' as they are (just) 'fluffy animal huggers', vegetarians, or don't know what they're talking about!"

I guess there was a purpose for posting that.

Hmm. Perhaps to persuade someone to your views because people who hold opposing views are just not nice and so nobody should agree with them? I believe I have addressed this phenomenon ...

Why would somebody spend time composing screeds like that, when they could use the same time to produce facts and/or arguments to counter the ones someone else has produced?

I have addressed the facts and arguments produced in opposition to the seal hunt and in support of the EU ban. Everyone else is entirely free to do the same in reverse.

The fact that facts appear on the internet doesn't actually make them false, you do know?


"As for it beng traditional - many things that are/were traditonal are/were barbaric - that's why many of our wonderful traditional 'sports' - bear baiting, cock fighting, dog fighting etc are banned!"

I absolutely agree with you -- I am a firm believer in progress, and I believe that measures taken to reduce cruelty to animals are progress indeed.

I was not claiming that the mere fact that a practice is traditional is sufficient ground not to oppose or even ban it. The onus is on the party who wishes to ban to provide justification for banning. The fact that a practice is one that people depend on for a portion of their livelihood, and the fact that a practice is part of a culture, can place a particularly heavy onus on the ban-seeker.

That really is how things work in the real world. Nobody gets to say "ew, I don't like what you're doing, we're going to outlaw it."

You, however, appear to be comparing the seal hunt to cockfighting. In fact, it was part of a culture, and some people may have depended on it for a portion of their livelihood. But I'll bet you can see a distinction between that practice and seal hunting. Just as you see a distinction between that practice and slaughtering cattle. In fact, I find it hugely disingenuous to compare the two, **when it has not been proved that the seal hunt is inhumane or cruel** and we know that cockfighting is.

I like the Star Trek universe, at least the part where nobody eats meat anymore. I'm sure they found some way of dealing with deer overpopulation and bears roaming around human settlements and what not.

But the fact is that at present, people eat and wear animal products. I do. And animals die, just like we do, of all sorts of causes. As I was saying in Rose's thread: if I were stranded on a desert island, would I eat my cat and possibly survive, or die and let my cat live to eat me and then die of starvation? Being killed is just one way of dying, as all animals must do, and being killed by a seal hunter could actually be less unpleasant than other manners of death seals experience. I mean, it really isn't as if all the seals culled would otherwise be immortal, or die peacefully in their beds surrounded by their great-grandchidren ...

I am sorry Janey...I can tolerate the '' I missed the entire point acusation'' jibe but Hmm we have decided to (as Europeans through our elected Parliments) to ban seal products and quite rightly in my own view. ( I am allowed a view I hope)....and erm the vast majority of those questioned (in UK polls) said 'yes ban the results of the seal cull, be it mean, fur, meat, or whatever because they are not acceptable