Anti-Whaling: Events in California and Facts from HumaneSpot.org

Today animal protection advocates will gather on beaches along the California coastline to ask President Obama to oppose a new whaling regulation proposed by the International Whaling Commission (IWC). The proposed law would lift the ban on commercial whaling that it originally instituted in 1986, introducing instead a law allowing countries to hunt whales for commercial purposes, within the limits of specified quotas.

----------------------

The initial 1986 whaling ban had a few “loop-holes” that have allowed three countries, Japan, Norway and Iceland, to continue commercial whaling. To try to reduce the number of whales these three countries kill, the IWC is proposing this new law to tighten the “loop holes” a little. However, it will also make it legal to hunt whales for commercial use, as long as it remains below certain quotas. Many animal protection advocates oppose this new law, favoring instead a complete ban on whaling.

In light of the current attention to whaling, we think it is a good time to highlight some of the research we have in the HRC research database. Research on knowledge of and attitudes toward whales find that young adults in the U.S. lack knowledge about whales and policies regarding whaling and attitudes about whales and whaling vary by country.

While whales were the face of the animal and environment protection movements through much of the 1970’s and 1980’s they seem to have faded into the background. Young people today lack knowledge about whales. A 2008 study of university students by E. Parsons, Patrick Rice and Laleh Sadeghi found that fewer than a quarter of students surveyed had ever heard of the IWC. Further, students were generally uninformed about the United States’ policies toward commercial whaling.

Attitudes about whaling vary by country since countries have different economic ties to and histories of using whales. Yale University researchers found that survey respondents in non-whaling countries differed from respondents in whaling countries in their attitudes to whales in general, whaling in particular, and the use of whale products. Interestingly, a survey by International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) and Greenpeace found that in Japan, the country that hunts the most whales, there are more citizens who oppose the practice of whaling (14%) than who support it (11%) and most respondents didn’t have a strong opinion about whaling in one direction of the other.

If you can’t join your fellow advocates today in the California coastal cities, dig through your drawers, find your old “Save the Whales” T-shirt and wear it in solidarity. If, like me, you were born after 1980 and the study above by Parson’s et. al humbled you, spend the day reading up on the whales!