We blogged about the "shot that never was" a few months ago.A lie sent forth by Sea Shepherd so egregious, so fantastical, that we were pretty sure people would see through it's blatant transparencies and demand action.
Alas, as Shakespeare once pointed out, "all the world's a stage and we are merely players". It would seem that Paul Watson's media people read Shakespeare.
As Sea Shepherd flounders around in the Southern ocean (once again) searching desperately for television ratings under the guise of saving whales let's pause for a moment and perhaps listen to the other side of this issue. The points they bring up are important.
Real conservation is goal and result oriented. What Sea Shepherd is doing with the hard earned millions of well meaning eco donors is tantamount to creating a floating version of the Moulin Rouge...except at the end of this bacchanalia of poor judgement, made up press releases, and missed opportunities there remains next years whale hunt.
Sea Shepherd is as ineffectual this year as it has been for the past ten when it comes to stopping the hunting of whales. The addition of a 24/7 film crew from Discovery Channel's Animal Planet adds to the dangers and unnecessary hubris that is Wagging The Conservation Dog.
Press Release JWA
“Last season in the Antarctic, the presence of the Animal Plant film crew pushed the Sea Shepherd extremists into committing more and more dangerous actions, all for the benefit of the camera,” said the President of the JWA, Mr Keiichi Nakajima.
“Paul Watson even orchestrated a fake event to make it look like he was shot, all of which was aimed at denigrating Japan and boosting the ratings of the Animal Planet un-reality TV series.”
Mr Nakajima said JWA was even more concerned this season because there is now the added expectation that the Sea Shepherd-Animal Planet crew will take even greater risks and perform even more serious criminal acts for the second series for Animal Planet.
Note: Whaling has no place in today's oceans, we have always said this. But profiting from the death of whales as Sea Shepherd and Animal Planet are doing with their new show Whales Wars is, in our opinion, worse.
5 comments:
I watched Whale Wars. They started off the whole thing with the shot and you had to wait for 6 more episodes before they came back to Paul Watson being shot.
In the end they (Animal Planet) pulled waaaaay back from the incident, basically saying that it "might have happened".
Bullshit is bullshit anyway you slice it. I will not be watching the show next year and your blog post is right on target unlike Watsons.
Liked the video by the way.
Sea Shepherd is proving Darwin right, evolution is a fickle mistress.
They are dying a horrible media death and do not even know it.
He was shot they have a video how do you explain that!?
there is no evidence of him being "shot" all the video shows is a video of a shirt with a hole and a vest with a lead bullet. If you are so stupid that you do not understand the real velocity of a riffle bullet is that no bullet proof vest will protect you. First and foremost for someone to hit him in the chest would require the best sniper in the world and second the bullet would easily pass through a silly vest regardless of a stupid badge. The whole thing was a silly media blitz and he should be cited for wasting peoples time. I had the whole series recorded and have not watched any of them until yesterday, I just erased all of them after watching a few episodes. what a pathetic group of environmentalists that could be using the money that it takes to run the "Steve Irwin" for better causes...........
The biggest problem being caused by Watson and SS isn't the lack of results. That might sound odd, but it isn't. Japan still goes out to hunt every year, they just kill less than they would have because they have the sense to run away from people harrassing them like bullies.
So, the biggest problem is SS is alinating the Japanese public to the idea of stopping the whale hunting. They are the fastest route to halting the hunt; they are ones the whaling companies advertise and sell to, they are ones who work for them and the ones that support them. Turn the Japanese public to your cause you have a weapon better than rotten butter or soap.
Instead Watson's actions are turned to an attack on Japanese culture and way of life. He can be seen as an enemy of the Japanese working class; the men who serve aboard the whaling ships to earn a living for their families. He can be seen as a terrorist by, well, everyone really. In the end it's not really helping. Some whales escape thanks to him, yes. But in the end the hunt will go longer, and body count higher, because he exasperated the issue.
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