The London Sunday Times Tabloid Displays Pro-slaughter Bias Commentary by Captain Paul Watson It is difficult these days to find journalists that actually do some research and who have the integrity to verify the facts before they publish them. However I did expect a higher degree of professionalism from a reporter for the London Sunday Times. I had always viewed it as somewhat more professional than the sensational tabloids that the British are famous for. Today The London Sunday Times published an article by Josh Glancy who had just returned from the Faroe Islands. The title of the article “Pammy’s here to harass whalers in Faroes Baywatch” was simply juvenile. Calling Pamela Anderson. “Pammy” was rude and the kind of title to be expected from the Sun or the Mirror, but the fact was that she was there to give her opinion about the slaughter of whales. She did not harass anyone and there was no bay in the Faroes that she was there to watch. She did not come to the Faroes in a private jet nor did she come from California. She flew on a scheduled flight from Copenhagen and she was in Europe doing business on other matters and taking the opportunity to come to the Faroes. But I guess it fits better for the writer to broaden the gap between what he considers a privileged “jet-set” person and the people he describes as “knowing where they belong.” Sea Shepherd was not formed in America in 1981, it was founded in Canada in 1977. And we all did not grow up in privileged sheltered communities. I was raised by a single mother, the eldest of six in a poor family in an Eastern Canadian fishing village. Rosie Kunneke was raised in apartheid South Africa and Lamya Essemlali was raised by a single Islamic mother in France. Even Pamela Anderson who is Canadian and not America as described by Glancy, was raised in a small town on Vancouver Island in British Columbia. Glancy’s description of these passionate volunteers who have come to the Faroes on their own time and at their own expense as “a motley collection of international misfits” reveals the bias of a reporter who quite simply does not understand the concept of marine conservation and the laws of ecology. He seems to view any perspective that does not embrace an anthropocentric foundation as not fitting in. I certainly don’t recall growing up in a place of ease and plenty, sunshine and supermarkets. In fact the standard of living in the Faroe Islands is much higher than the conditions of my childhood. Pamela Anderson was not roped into the campaign. Like all the other Sea Shepherd activists she is a volunteer and a longtime supporter of Sea Shepherd’s efforts to defend life in our Ocean. Glancy quotes the Faroese as saying the pilot whale is not endangered yet ignores Sea Shepherd’s observation that no one actually knows what the numbers are and thus it cannot be said with any authority that the species is not endangered. There is no scientific validation of the number 800,000 that the Faroese throw around. The Canadians said the same thing about pilot whales in Newfoundland right up until 1966 when the pilot whale populations crashed and the pods stopped returning to the coast. Glancy did not even get our history in the Faroes right. Saying we have had five campaigns since 1985 when in fact we have had seven campaigns since 1983. We were there in 1985, 1986, 2000, 2010, 2011 and now in 2014. Because the whalers told Glancy that I “suggested Japan’s 2011 tsunami was Neptune’s retribution for its annual dolphin slaughter, he reported it like it was a fact that I had said such a thing, when in fact I did not. He also reports that I drew a comparison between Faroese whaling and Anders Breivik, the Norwegian mass murderer. What he neglected to say was that statement was in response to an accusation by a Faroese whaler that I had inspired Breivik, and my response was that most serial killers began by torturing and killing animals thus Breivik would have been more inspired by the slaughter of the whales than by my opposition to the slaughter of any animal. Glancy knew how to get in touch with me to verify any of the accusations made by the whalers. But he could not be bothered. I mean why ruin the slant of his story by bothering with verification? The Catalonians have given up the bullfight. Cock-fighting, dog fighting, bear-baiting and the fox hunt are no longer legally practiced in Britain and the people of the Shetland Islands are not exactly thrilled with the Faroese having decimated the puffin populations. In other words British sentiment is not pro-cruelty, nor pro-slaughtering of whales. I guess that Glancy just liked the taste of the free whale meat he was served by the whalers, which most likely was the real cause of his vomiting behind the shed. What I find most contradictory about Glancy’s story is that whereas he lauds the hearty tough Faroese whalers, it was the “coddled, rootless and privileged misfits” that braved the rough seas to defend the whales, the same seas that not even the Faroese Vikings dared set forth on. Sea Shepherd supporters can contact the reporter directly at: [email protected] [email protected]> Sea Shepherd supporters can express their views directly to the London Sunday Times at: THE SUNDAY TIMES Sunday Times News: [email protected] Sunday Times World News: [email protected] Letters to the Editor*: [email protected] * for publication only; please include postal address and contact telephone numbers
Posted on: Sun, 03 Aug 2014 10:26:04 +0000
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