Whales Weep – Sir Anthony Hopkins

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Sir Anthony Hopkins (yes… Clarise?) recites from Whales Weep Not by DH Lawrence – asking people to join Greenpeace, and defend the the world’s whales.
Watch it here, on YouTube »
Related stories:
The Solomon Islands and Iceland – two pro-whaling nations, now bedfellows?
US budget cuts endanger North Pacific humpback whales
Denmark isn’t listening to all the people!
Conservative Politicians saving whales? What?

daev
Chief Bottle Washer at Blather
Writer, photographer, environmental campaigner and "known troublemaker" Dave Walsh is the founder of Blather.net, described both as "possibly the most arrogant and depraved website to be found either side of the majestic Shannon River", and "the nicest website circulating in Ireland". Half Irishman, half-bicycle. He lives in southern Irish city of Barcelona.

7 comments

  1. Eh now,
    the Solomons do well out of that deal, and ye cant knock geothermal energy, and they have ben known to consume the odd beached whale like, so if they dont see a problem with it, and the Japanese are actualy contributing to the development of the country – which they are BTW you should see the Japanese Nurse on Taro Mmmm…..- why should people living in comfortable housing with food in their bellies andcash in theirpockets tell them to shaft a perfectly good ‘thing they got goin’ cos ye dont want to see whales get hurt.
    and as for Greenland, well now same as the orkneys init, they go out to sea on 25 foot boats and stick spears in whales, that sort of lunacy should be encouraged, and they do use most of the whale after they catch it.

  2. a nice video, but i wonder if an alternative version which gives some basic facts and figures about who is killing the whales and how many are being killed would have just as much impact? if not more…

  3. Damien, it’s not actually meant as a documentary – it’s a TV advert for the United States – there’s limited information you can squeeze into those few segments.

  4. Podge – *sigh*. No one’s knocking geothermal energy for chrissakes.
    Why should “that sort of lunacy be encouraged?”
    Check your facts. Under the moratorium, subsistence whaling is allowed for people like the Eskimos, Inuits etc. (but Japan OPPOSES allowing small quotas for subsistence whaling). The problem with Denmark being persuaded by Greenland is that Greenland is already allowed to hunt for whales – but Denmark is bowing to the wishes of a dependency over the wishes of its own people.
    Do your homework before you start making daft comments, please.

  5. I didnt say anyone was knockin Geothermal energy, I was making a erfernece to your statement
    ” and geothermal power is a pretty nifty way of making electricity.”
    ” subsistence whaling is allowed for people like the Eskimos, Inuits etc” so that’d be people from Greenland then eh?
    Why should people who are not affected by the Whaling moratorium be alowed to influence the lives of people who do actualy depend on Whale for their ‘Subsistence’?
    the Muslims and Jews dont think we should eat Pork, the Hindus dont think we should eat Beef, People object to the Koreans eating Dog, over here we are the only country in the world to eat both national emblems as they appear on the Passport, I’m sure lots of people think Kangaroos are cute too.
    I still dont fully understand your objections, you are still a carnivore, so why make distinctions between different sources of meat, why do some species deserve salvation while its perfectly fine to rear cattle for dinner.
    and as for encouraging that kind of behaviour, I admire that kind of thing, going out to sea in an open boat half the size of the animal you’re hunting, I’d like to try that someday, I’d say it’d be quite the adrenalin rush.
    but then there are only 2 extermes left in the whaling industry, that and the Japanese etc with their whaling fleets and exploding harpoons, as a PR exercise it would be much easier to wax lyrical about the subsistence method.
    And again I will ask you,
    if these people live in the Greenland, frozen n all that as it is, I would guess that farming is difficult, and fishing is seasonal, so Whale becomes a staple of thir diet,
    what do you suggest that they eat?

  6. Podge, you’re still missing the point and you’re putting words in my mouth that I didn’t say. AGAIN – get your facts right before you point the finger and start moaning.
    I’m not against subsistence whaling at all – in fact, I *support* it. What I’m against is industrial whaling – the kind of “hunting” that has reduced some species of whale down to 5% of its projected original populations. Some affected species show no sign of recovery. We’re not talking cows in a field here, we’re talking about 30m long animals that breed very slowly, and have to find each other over vast amounts of ocean.
    I’ve eaten all kinds of meat – I love eating fish, that’s why I work on fisheries projects to help protect fisheries. I’ve eaten reindeer meat, given to me by Sami herders, while we were working with them to protect the forests they do their herding in from destruction. I have no problem with the meat of whales, per se. I have a problem with the complete disregard for the ecosystem displayed by the Japanese and Norwegian whalers, and to a slightly lesser extent, Iceland’s whalers.
    Animals like fin and humpback whales are on the IUCN’s Redlist of threatened species for a reason, you know.
    Cows, dogs, kangaroos (I’ve not eaten dog myself) are not endangered species. But if you wiped out 95% of kangaroos, something else may fill the gap – either a plant or another less cute animal. If you kill 95% of cats in a city, then you have the potential to be overrun with rats and mice. It’s not a direct correlation, but there’s a relationship between the various species in an ecosystem.
    Read this on Whales and biodiversity »

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