It's partly business - harvesting seal pelts & meat - and partly controlling the seal population.
The latter is important because seals eat cod. North Atlantic cod stocks were devastated by over-fishing by Spanish & US trawlers in the '80's & early '90's. A moratorium on north eastern Atlantic cod fishing went into effect to allow cod numbers to recover but uncontrolled numbers of seal make it hard for cod to reestablish themselves.
There are currently over 6 million Harp Seal in the wild, and allowing uncontrolled growth beyond that means running a real risk of causing North Atlantic cod to go extinct - which in turn will cause millions of seal to starve to death.
I have no doubt that it's not a "sport", and that of it is actually helpful. I just think they could do something different than use a club. Even a gun would seem more humane.
Clubs are actually the fastest method, which is why they've been used for generations. The animals have so much subcutaneous fat that they're really hard to kill.
I understand why animal rights activists might object to the seal hunt, it's certainly not pretty. My biggest problem with the anti-sealing campaign is that they always use the pics of fluffy white newborns with the big brown eyes, and animals that young are never hunted. You'll notice the animals in the pictures of the actual hunt have the grey adult coat, but that doesn't upset people as much as pictures of newborn babies.
I don't like selecting which animals to campaign for on the basis of which ones will manipulate the strongest emotional response. I'd like to see people pay more attention to preserving animals that are actually pushing extinction and are maybe less pretty to look at.
I think all animals should be pushed for in their own way. For dogs & cats, pics of them looking all sad and lonely work best. Harp seal pups are adorable, so they're more likely to generate a response than pics of the adults. Sad that people would rather help cute things first.
I appreciate the information, and I know that the images are supposed to shock, but perhaps people could put the more graphic images under a cut? Some of us have PTSD from firsthand experience with real gore in a horrible situation, and the seal images are triggers.
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It's partly business - harvesting seal pelts & meat - and partly controlling the seal population.
The latter is important because seals eat cod.
North Atlantic cod stocks were devastated by over-fishing by Spanish & US trawlers in the '80's & early '90's.
A moratorium on north eastern Atlantic cod fishing went into effect to allow cod numbers to recover but uncontrolled numbers of seal make it hard for cod to reestablish themselves.
There are currently over 6 million Harp Seal in the wild, and allowing uncontrolled growth beyond that means running a real risk of causing North Atlantic cod to go extinct - which in turn will cause millions of seal to starve to death.
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I have no doubt that it's not a "sport", and that of it is actually helpful. I just think they could do something different than use a club. Even a gun would seem more humane.
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I understand why animal rights activists might object to the seal hunt, it's certainly not pretty. My biggest problem with the anti-sealing campaign is that they always use the pics of fluffy white newborns with the big brown eyes, and animals that young are never hunted. You'll notice the animals in the pictures of the actual hunt have the grey adult coat, but that doesn't upset people as much as pictures of newborn babies.
I don't like selecting which animals to campaign for on the basis of which ones will manipulate the strongest emotional response. I'd like to see people pay more attention to preserving animals that are actually pushing extinction and are maybe less pretty to look at.
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:(
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Personally, I think it'd be nice if animal rights activists would get as riled up about human rights.
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I think so too.
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