We destroy everything…
I’m not a crazy, vegan, crash-my-environmentally-unsound-protest-boat-into-yours, tree hugging hippie, but this story makes me fairly sick. I’m all for the base slaughter of innocent chickens and cows for my gastronomic pleasure. Somehow, the following story just made me feel more than a little sad about the state of things.
From: Boing Boing: Ancient weapon discovered in whale
Cory Doctorow: A 115-130-year-old “bomb lance” fragment was found in a 50-ton whale killed in Alaska last month.
The bomb lance fragment, lodged a bone between the whale’s neck and shoulder blade, was likely manufactured in New Bedford, on the southeast coast of Massachusetts, a major whaling center at that time, Bockstoce said.
It was probably shot at the whale from a heavy shoulder gun around 1890. The small metal cylinder was filled with explosives fitted with a time-delay fuse so it would explode seconds after it was shot into the whale. The bomb lance was meant to kill the whale immediately and prevent it from escaping…
The 49-foot male whale died when it was shot with a similar projectile last month, and the older device was found buried beneath its blubber as hunters carved it with a chain saw for harvesting
Link (Thanks, Jennifer!)
Why? According to the Yahoo! article, “Whaling has always been a prominent source of food for Alaskans[...]“ Is this still true? Are there people in the world who *rely* on whale as a direct food source. I’m not a traditionalist, I respect it but there has to be a better source than to kill something older than us for food. It does not seem to be a easily renewable resource. Plus, if there is a traditional precedent for the harvest, shouldn’t traditional methods be used? Using a warhead (by definition it is) against a whale hardly seems like tradition. Yes, I know. The original “bomb lance” found in the whale was over a hundred years old. It still does not feel like tradition to me.
So, lets drop the food and tradition as an excuse. The real fact is that it is all about the money. For the people hunting the whale it is most likely buying them their meals. The person on the bottom is not getting rich, ever. Next is the middle-man. He is making the real profit in taking the labor and the (largely free) product and moving it up the “food chain” while charging a much higher rate per capita. Finally, we have the consumer. We, the consumer, drive the need with our consumption. We devour and destroy until everything has been laid waste. We consume whether we need it or not. We squander because we can. Our return for the things we use is cold hard cash, which is a figment of an electronic balance sheet at this point, and the enormous amount of non-biodegradable garbage. I am making many gross generalizations here, but boiled down this is the truth.
God, I sound like a damn hippie.
Turn it around. This whale was large enough to bother with around 1890. It was large enough to warrant using what must have been an experimental and very expensive device at the time. It was large enough to be attacked and survive when such a weapon was used against it. It was large enough to continue to survive, despite the wound for over a hundred more years. Given this, it still could have survived longer. We have killed whales older than it and judged their age by taking samples of their eyes. But thanks to our technological prowess, we can make improvements to our weapons. We can make them stronger, faster, more deadly and more accurate.
We learned from our mistakes. Eventually we killed it. We are persistent.
As an aside, I chose to refer to the whale as “it” rather than “him”. Change that around in your head and see if it makes a difference when you strip away that little bit of objectivity. He was a “49-foot male whale” according to Yahoo! He “hearkens back to far different era.” What else can we learn from his dead body that hasn’t already been consumed by us?
I would like to thank my mother for disrupting any possibility in living a completely complacent American™ lifestyle.
technorati tags:whale, warhead, hippe, depressing
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June 13th, 2007 at 6:08 pm
May God Bless your mother. A conscience (or the capacity to have one) is a terrible thing to waste.
I’ll wager there may be a few remote, indigenous persons out there in the great white north who rely on whale as a primary food source – there ain’t a whole lot of biomass out there to choose from. I’m pulling this out of my ass, but there may be an energy output/input consideration for indigenous persons’ hunting habits. Puffins may make great eating, but a pain in the arse to catch in sufficient quantities. Whereas a whale may be even harder to catch, but just one or two may tide them over for a season.
But I’ll grant you their numbers (the indigenous people who actually rely on whale as a food source) are grossly out of proportion to the number of whales slaughtered. I wonder if there’s an analogy to the African ivory trade hiding in there somewhere? Either way it’s a disgrace – unless we don’t have any more honor to lose… in which case I’ll have to come up with another noun.
October 10th, 2007 at 7:27 am
If I may weigh in on this topic in terms of Indigenous hunting practices…
I’ll try to encapsulate my thoughts as this topic is complex and difficult (for me anyway) to put down in a few words.
It has never been Indigenous peoples who have harmed populations of any species through their traditional hunting practices. As animal stocks have fallen off, however, Indigenous peoples have been the groups who have beent told they have to stop hunting or fishing. This has been done in order to allow white fishers and hunters to continue hunting and fishing until stocks have been so depleted that further harvesting is impossible.
As Indigenous peoples fight for their rights promised to them under treaties (too bad they have to fight for something given to them contractually and in exchange for a heck of a lot of land, but they do) they have begun to reconnect with the old ways. Is this an out-dated conceit or a silly idea that’s out of place in the 21st century? I don’t think so. It’s a way for them to regain pride in who they are. A pride that was striped away after years of indoctrination and abuse.
In addition, while I can’t speak for Alaska, I can speak for Canada’s North, and can say with conviction that there are serious dietary concerns for Inuit as they consume quantities of processed foods. Diabetes, dental health, and obesity have been a few of the results of eating diets high in processed sugars and flours. (Diabetes and tooth decay are far greater concerns in native communities than in the mainstream population.) As governments moved communities from traditional locations, and encouraged people to eschew hunting and fishing, health problems have become rampant. Now the government is encouraging Inuit to return to the land for sustanance. Diets high in fat — like those from whale and seal — served them well in their cold climate.
I don’t think we need to worry that small commercial businesses or self-sufficiency is going to hinder stocks or species survival. It’s the large international fleets that have done the damage — and in many cases continue to do so.
Thanks for letting me rant.
October 10th, 2007 at 8:31 am
[...] I am writing this post thanks to a well written comment that appeared this morning. Thank you for reminding me that if I start something, I should at [...]
October 10th, 2007 at 8:47 am
Thanks for the rant! Thank you both for commenting.
I’m painfully aware that I am in no way indigenous and that through both my actions and inactions I am disastrously contributing to the decline of our biosphere. Our world is changing faster than many of us can comprehend. At the same time, my own complacence is ingrained and I find it difficult to leave my comfort zone. While I want what is best for the environment and the world community, I still enjoy my vices. While I don’t have AC in my car (or my house for that matter) I still drive nearly everywhere. Even when my office is four blocks away. (I do have to drive to clients at a moments notice, but still…)
As individuals, our actions (consumption) and our inaction (lack of vote/voice) is allowing governments and (large) business to do what they want without any regaurd their consequences. Money is king. Both for the little guy (I want cheap gas and toilet paper) and for the big guy (they want more).
In the end, even after the human race has consumed it’s way out of existence, the planet will still be here. It may not be in great shape, but it will eventually right itself and go on without us.
(sorry for being a little dis-jointed…)