Some have heard about the movie, The Cove,
but many who haven’t don’t realize the problem the marine environment is facing
today. My writing class has been assigned to research and blog about
corporations and their effects on the environment and I will talk about the
many morally corrupt ways corporations go about getting food and the quickest
easiest ways to make a buck, starting off with the annual killing of dolphins
for the Japanese food industry discussed in The Girl Who ‘Broke the Cove
Story’, by Steve Casimiro.
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| Photo by: Fabulous Terrah |
First people should know, if they don’t
already, how unbelievably amazing these creatures are. Dolphins are far from
just fish. They talk to each other just like we talk to each other each day.
They teach their young how to do everything where most animals leave their
young to fend for themselves. When females are pregnant the rest of the pod
protects them and shields them from harm. They feel too. All the things we feel
they are capable of feeling as well. They can be happy, or grieve, or be
terrified. Their pods are their families and they love each other.
So, The Cove, what is it all about? In a
small town called Taiji, in Japan, there is a cove, and in this cove every year
there is a killing spree of dolphins including some small whales. Approximately
thirteen boats go out to sea and round up dolphin pods of about sixty or so and
heard them back to the cove where they hold them until they’re weak from
attempting to escape. As I mentioned before they’re very protective of their young
and pregnant females and they are in the center being protected by the rest of
the pod. Unfortunately, this isn’t enough to save them. They send out distress
signals to each other just as humans would call out to one another if they
feared for their lives. They watch each other be slaughtered and can do nothing
but wait their own turn. After they’ve been worn down one by one they’re
stabbed so that they eventually bleed to death from their wounds. We’re talking
thousands of dolphins total. There is so much blood that the water turns a
vivid red. The color is so unbelievably crimson that when a reporter, Brooke
McDonald, released photos of the incident to the press they were believed to
have been digitally altered. However,
tests done on the prints proved that there was nothing exaggerated about this
nightmare. When all the dolphins are dead, men in scuba suits go in and bring
them out. Some carry the baby dolphins under their arms because they’re
obviously smaller and not as heavy so they don’t sink to the bottom as fast.
This is the horror that takes place in this town each year.
Why? These beautiful, brilliant, innocent
creatures are being tortured and mass murdered for food that will be sold on
the black market to people who don’t need this “delicacy.” Yes, food is vital
for us to live and yes that means some animals must die, but not like this.
This was not what mother nature intended. This is not the circle of life. It’s
flat out slaughtering. The saying that there are plenty of fish in the sea is
quite true and it should be applied here. Dolphins are not ignorant animals and
they greatly contribute to the marine environment. There are millions of other
fish that could be consumed so that even if one species must die at least they
wouldn’t be targeted and then mass murders wouldn’t be necessary in the eyes of
food corporations. Dolphins can’t keep going through this. It has to end, but
nothing seems to be strong enough to over power the food industry and tell
these corporations where to draw the line.
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