Japan falsified Whaling data

[Purple]

So people will die because the Japanese are crazies who don't value life like us white western people do?

Actually I was going for something more along the lines of: "People whose lives and livelihoods depend on something will tend to do things to protect it, including dying to defend it rather than let foreign crazies take that something away from them even if they don't happen to be from a culture that glorifies that sort of thing."

And if we (the entire international community through the UN) say "no, we're not going to let you." That's a bad thing because you like the stuff we import from Japan?

It's called a metaphor. We (as in western civilization) value our trade and economic as well as military relations with Japan more than we do whales.

[Thanas]

People who willingly kill endangered and threatened species just to spite others in the name of nationalism do not deserve to receive excuses if they were to kill protestors in the pursuit of them killing endangered species. They also do not deserve to be considered as anything else but sociopaths.

[Purple]

People who willingly kill endangered and threatened species just to spite others in the name of nationalism do not deserve to receive excuses if they were to kill protestors in the pursuit of them killing endangered species. They also do not deserve to be considered as anything else but sociopaths.

Morally sure. But you know as well as I that when it comes to things such as international relations with countries that actually matter morality always does and has to take a back seat to other more practical considerations.

[Flagg]

So people will die because the Japanese are crazies who don't value life like us white western people do?

Actually I was going for something more along the lines of: "People whose lives and livelihoods depend on something will tend to do things to protect it, including dying to defend it rather than let foreign crazies take that something away from them even if they don't happen to be from a culture that glorifies that sort of thing."

It's not a valid livelihood, so who cares? Do you weep for poachers in Africa? I mean who cares if it's illegal to hunt Gorillas, the people that live there have to make a living, right? Never mind that it's illegal, they know it's illegal, and there is ample warning that it's illegal, they've got mouths to feed!

And if we (the entire international community through the UN) say "no, we're not going to let you." That's a bad thing because you like the stuff we import from Japan?

It's called a metaphor. We (as in western civilization) value our trade and economic as well as military relations with Japan more than we do whales.

You might. A ton of stupid people might. I'd rather have Japan get in line with the 90+% of the rest of the world where commercial whaling under the guise of scientific research is unacceptable, rather than the tiny minority forcing the ecosystems of the rest of the planets oceans harm by depleting whale populations. Oh but the PS4 is so rad!

[Flagg]

People who willingly kill endangered and threatened species just to spite others in the name of nationalism do not deserve to receive excuses if they were to kill protestors in the pursuit of them killing endangered species. They also do not deserve to be considered as anything else but sociopaths.

Morally sure. But you know as well as I that when it comes to things such as international relations with countries that actually matter morality always does and has to take a back seat to other more practical considerations.

Like what? What does Japan produce that no other nation can? We can always import cars from China, and most people don't care about Japanese videogames. If America alone told Japan to fuck off their economy would die. And aside from Australia, Japan is surrounded by countries that fucking hate them and Japan hasn't really done much in the past 70 years to make amends with them since America has a gazillion and one military bases there.

[Purple]

It's not a valid livelihood, so who cares? Do you weep for poachers in Africa? I mean who cares if it's illegal to hunt Gorillas, the people that live there have to make a living, right? Never mind that it's illegal, they know it's illegal, and there is ample warning that it's illegal, they've got mouth to feed!

You are either intentionally being obtuse or can't understand what I am saying. I am not arguing the morality of the situation one way or the other. I am arguing the practical fact of the matter. Right or wrong do not factor in when it comes to what is.

Also, for the record I do in fact consider every death tragic. And I do believe that ultimately very few things in this world are worth taking a human life.

You might. A ton of stupid people might. I'd rather have Japan get in line with the 90+% of the rest of the world where commercial whaling under the guise of scientific research is unacceptable, rather than the tiny minority forcing the ecosystems of the rest of the planets oceans harm by depleting whale populations.

That's the thing though. You are arguing what you would like to see. As in what you as a moral and emotional human being would like to happen. And on that level I agree with you. However that is not what I feel this discussion is about. What we want to happen is irrelevant and so is right and wrong. What I am saying is what we can actually expect to happen in the real world. The world where politics and economies are driven at least in part by considerations other than emotional responses.

Like what? What does Japan produce that no other nation can? We can always import cars from China, and most people don't care about Japanese videogames. If America alone told Japan to fuck off their economy would die. And aside from Australia, Japan is surrounded by countries that fucking hate them and Japan hasn't really done much in the past 70 years to make amends with them since America has a gazillion and one military bases there.

Well for a start america will newer disown Japan because they need to keep their bases in Okinawa. So there is that.

But there is more than that. The real danger is what would happen to the world economy if we are to set this very dangerous precedent of rich 1st world nations turning on one another. Who do you think wants to be remembered as the political figure that started that avalanche?

[Grumman]

Like what? What does Japan produce that no other nation can? We can always import cars from China...

How is that an improvement? You're going to the country behind traditional Chinese medicine because you're angry about Japanese whaling?

[Pelranius]

Like what? What does Japan produce that no other nation can? We can always import cars from China...

How is that an improvement? You're going to the country behind traditional Chinese medicine because you're angry about Japanese whaling?

You could go for Korean cars then, I suppose.

[AniThyng]

Like what? What does Japan produce that no other nation can? We can always import cars from China...

How is that an improvement? You're going to the country behind traditional Chinese medicine because you're angry about Japanese whaling?

You could go for Korean cars then, I suppose.

They have a controversial dog meat industry though.

[Ralin]

They have a controversial dog meat industry though.

Controversial how?

[Flagg]

Like what? What does Japan produce that no other nation can? We can always import cars from China...

How is that an improvement? You're going to the country behind traditional Chinese medicine because you're angry about Japanese whaling?

Fine, we'll import from Europe Mr. Whiney pants. Or just you know, buy the ones we produce here. Bitch at Purple, anyway he's the one claiming America can't survive without Japanese imports which is hilarious. And if you're dead set against buying from China, don't buy anything ever.

[Purple]

Bitch at Purple, anyway he's the one claiming America can't survive without Japanese imports which is hilarious. And if you're dead set against buying from China, don't buy anything ever.

That's not what I said. I said that the "western capitalist world" considers the convenience of international trade sufficient to permit its members to get away with all sorts of things including massive human rights abuses. They do not need to do it. But in the real world greed > morality.

Well that and that this is such an established fact that it has become in essence a law of nature as much as gravity. And that the precedent of members of the "western capitalist world" turning on one another over things that they have tolerated for basically a century now would be devastating. America can live without Japan easily enough. But can they live with a world where anyone can denounce anyone and greed is no longer safe? I think not.

[Simon_Jester]

It's not a valid livelihood, so who cares? Do you weep for poachers in Africa? I mean who cares if it's illegal to hunt Gorillas, the people that live there have to make a living, right? Never mind that it's illegal, they know it's illegal, and there is ample warning that it's illegal, they've got mouths to feed!

Just out of morbid curiosity, if you or someone you cared about were starving, would you kill a gorilla to feed them?

Would you kill a gorilla for money to buy shoes and clothing for your children, if the alternative were for them to go barefoot and dressed in rags?

I mean, I strongly support efforts to maintain wildlife preserves in Africa, but there is a cold reality here that I'm not sure you're facing: a lot of Africans are really fucking poor. A lot of them- tens if not hundreds of millions- can't even live in the kind of basically sustainable subsistence-farming Iron Age lifestyle that their ancestors used to survive for thousands of years. Because the population's boomed so much that they're up to their eyeballs in teenagers who have minimal education and nobody can think of anything economically productive for them to do for the lack of infrastructure and resources.

So they do weird, dangerous shit in an attempt to have any kind of job, regardless of whether that weird, dangerous shit is bad for their environment and in some cases regardless of whether it destroys their long term prospects in the future.

This is why you get, in Third World countries, fishermen using dynamiting to bring up fish from coral reefs. They're not too stupid to know that dynamiting will kill the fishery and the coral reef, so that in ten or twenty years there will be no more fish to harvest. They're not too ignorant or sociopathic to understand this.

But they live in such a marginal, impoverished, overpopulated place that they knowingly choose something which will mean economic ruin twenty years from now because the alternative is to experience the consequences of economic ruin (starvation) right now.

You might. A ton of stupid people might. I'd rather have Japan get in line with the 90+% of the rest of the world where commercial whaling under the guise of scientific research is unacceptable, rather than the tiny minority forcing the ecosystems of the rest of the planets oceans harm by depleting whale populations. Oh but the PS4 is so rad!

And on this part I am totally behind you because Japan is waaaay too rich to have any need to do ecologically damaging things for the sake of survival. So they can go play hopscotch in a minefield for all I care.

[Flagg]

It's not a valid livelihood, so who cares? Do you weep for poachers in Africa? I mean who cares if it's illegal to hunt Gorillas, the people that live there have to make a living, right? Never mind that it's illegal, they know it's illegal, and there is ample warning that it's illegal, they've got mouth to feed!

You are either intentionally being obtuse or can't understand what I am saying. I am not arguing the morality of the situation one way or the other. I am arguing the practical fact of the matter. Right or wrong do not factor in when it comes to what is.

Also, for the record I do in fact consider every death tragic. And I do believe that ultimately very few things in this world are worth taking a human life.

No, you're arguing that we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and that we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo. It's called circular logic and it doesn't work.

You might. A ton of stupid people might. I'd rather have Japan get in line with the 90+% of the rest of the world where commercial whaling under the guise of scientific research is unacceptable, rather than the tiny minority forcing the ecosystems of the rest of the planets oceans harm by depleting whale populations.

That's the thing though. You are arguing what you would like to see. As in what you as a moral and emotional human being would like to happen. And on that level I agree with you. However that is not what I feel this discussion is about. What we want to happen is irrelevant and so is right and wrong. What I am saying is what we can actually expect to happen in the real world. The world where politics and economies are driven at least in part by considerations other than emotional responses.

Exactly, if we change the status quo, then the status quo will be changed and we shouldn't do that because it's the status quo and we shouldn't change the status quo...

Like what? What does Japan produce that no other nation can? We can always import cars from China, and most people don't care about Japanese videogames. If America alone told Japan to fuck off their economy would die. And aside from Australia, Japan is surrounded by countries that fucking hate them and Japan hasn't really done much in the past 70 years to make amends with them since America has a gazillion and one military bases there.

Well for a start america will newer disown Japan because they need to keep their bases in Okinawa. So there is that.

But there is more than that. The real danger is what would happen to the world economy if we are to set this very dangerous precedent of rich 1st world nations turning on one another. Who do you think wants to be remembered as the political figure that started that avalanche?

Yeah, and we can't move those bases to South Korea instead, because that would upset the status quo, which shouldn't be changed because it's the status quo, which shouldn't be changed because it's the status quo, which shouldn't be changed because it's the status quo.

That's your argument in a nutshell.

Here's mine: Fuck Japan. They want our bases gone? Try to make them leave. But it's never going to come to that because when push comes to shove Japan needs the US and the international community far more than the US or the international community needs Japan. And since Japan knows what it's doing is illegal, they pretend they are doing something that is not illegal. So we set up an international armada of ships that routinely boards and inspects Japanese "whale research ships" and if they are in compliance they go about their merry way. If they are doing illegal whaling, the cargo goes into the drink and the whaling ship gains an escort for the rest of its journey.

The whole "sinking their ships after giving them 20 minutes to abandon" is if they refuse boarding and act aggressively towards those attempting to board their ship. Something I honestly doubt would ever happen, but not something I would cry about because if it reaches that point, then they are the equivalent of the Gorilla Poachers that hack anti-poaching activists to death with machetes. They are just doing it to international law enforcement who can do more than throw rotten eggs at them (which never made sense to me since I don't imagine rotting whale blood, meat, and fat smells any better).

As for your "taking morality out of the equation"? Since when have we ever done that except when it's convenient for us to do morally abhorrent things like torture, indefinite detention, and internment of people based on former nationality?

And "rich first world nations" have disagreements all the time. Or weren't you old enough to recall pretty much all of Europe telling the US and UK to fuck themselves in 2003?

[Elheru Aran]

Regarding Korea and dogs-- they tend to soft-pedal that a fair bit. It got a lot of publicity during the Seoul Olympics and as a result it's kinda-sorta officially frowned upon. It still exists, but it's not exactly something you can just walk into a restaurant and ask for. Sort of like trying to find a restaurant that serves fresh chitlins in the South.

[Flagg]

It's not a valid livelihood, so who cares? Do you weep for poachers in Africa? I mean who cares if it's illegal to hunt Gorillas, the people that live there have to make a living, right? Never mind that it's illegal, they know it's illegal, and there is ample warning that it's illegal, they've got mouths to feed!

Just out of morbid curiosity, if you or someone you cared about were starving, would you kill a gorilla to feed them?

Would you kill a gorilla for money to buy shoes and clothing for your children, if the alternative were for them to go barefoot and dressed in rags?

I mean, I strongly support efforts to maintain wildlife preserves in Africa, but there is a cold reality here that I'm not sure you're facing: a lot of Africans are really fucking poor. A lot of them- tens if not hundreds of millions- can't even live in the kind of basically sustainable subsistence-farming Iron Age lifestyle that their ancestors used to survive for thousands of years. Because the population's boomed so much that they're up to their eyeballs in teenagers who have minimal education and nobody can think of anything economically productive for them to do for the lack of infrastructure and resources.

So they do weird, dangerous shit in an attempt to have any kind of job, regardless of whether that weird, dangerous shit is bad for their environment and in some cases regardless of whether it destroys their long term prospects in the future.

This is why you get, in Third World countries, fishermen using dynamiting to bring up fish from coral reefs. They're not too stupid to know that dynamiting will kill the fishery and the coral reef, so that in ten or twenty years there will be no more fish to harvest. They're not too ignorant or sociopathic to understand this.

But they live in such a marginal, impoverished, overpopulated place that they knowingly choose something which will mean economic ruin twenty years from now because the alternative is to experience the consequences of economic ruin (starvation) right now.

I'm not going to argue over the plight of the poor (literally, not sarcastically, I know what conditions they live in and it's horrible that first would nations like the US, for one, would rather pay farmers to destroy food stocks to keep food prices artificially high so that mega-farm corporations rake in billions in subsidies under a program that only made sense when you were dealing with smaller, family owned farms that required the subsidies to make a living) gorilla poacher with you, and even if I were this wouldn't be the thread to do it in. What I will say is that if you're in a survival situation where you are out of "civilization" and part of the food chain, anything goes when it comes to endangered or threatened animals if you have to eat them to survive. But that's a gazillion miles away from what we're actually talking about. I would suggest that land gorilla's have been driven out of due to poaching would probably grow some wicked reefer and if first would nations go their heads out of their asses on such matters they could make more money than they ever could poaching intelligent and sapient, species.

You might. A ton of stupid people might. I'd rather have Japan get in line with the 90+% of the rest of the world where commercial whaling under the guise of scientific research is unacceptable, rather than the tiny minority forcing the ecosystems of the rest of the planets oceans harm by depleting whale populations. Oh but the PS4 is so rad!

And on this part I am totally behind you because Japan is waaaay too rich to have any need to do ecologically damaging things for the sake of survival. So they can go play hopscotch in a minefield for all I care.

It's a Christmas Miracle!

[Purple]

No, you're arguing that we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and that we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo. It's called circular logic and it doesn't work.

No, I am arguing that the ones with the power to change the status quo have no incentive to do so and every incentive to do the exact opposite and preserve it. And that thus this is what will happen. And that any presumptions of the opposite are wishful thinking.

[Flagg]

No, you're arguing that we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and that we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo and we shouldn't change the status quo because it's the status quo. It's called circular logic and it doesn't work.

No, I am arguing that the ones with the power to change the status quo have no incentive to do so and every incentive to do the exact opposite and preserve it. And that thus this is what will happen. And that any presumptions of the opposite are wishful thinking.

Then you're incredibly unobservant because cultures and nations change all the fucking time. If you don't believe that, talk to a newly married homosexual couple that got their marriage license from Mississippi, Texas, or Utah. Sometimes if a country, like say... Japan, acts in an immoral manner on an issue, other countries (with seats on the UN security council) can force morality upon them through the use of perfectly legal means. And if that country doesn't like it, and tells the UN to fuck itself, well then the UN may decides to penalize that country and can do so in a number of ways.

I'm kind of lost as to exactly what your argument is at this point. Since it's not impossible to force a country to behave itself (Iran just recently and Iraq over 20 years ago in Desert Storm), what, is it "It's hard so waa?"

[Purple]

Then you're incredibly unobservant because cultures and nations change all the fucking time. If you don't believe that, talk to a newly married homosexual couple that got their marriage license from Mississippi, Texas, or Utah.

And how exactly does the homosexual marriage issue affect the world market and the mechanisms that keep the rich political elite rich? This isn't about cultures changing.

Sometimes if a country, like say... Japan, acts in an immoral manner on an issue, other countries (with seats on the UN security council) can force morality upon them through the use of perfectly legal means. And if that country doesn't like it, and tells the UN to fuck itself, well then the UN may decides to penalize that country and can do so in a number of ways.

And when is the last time this happened?

I'm kind of lost as to exactly what your argument is at this point. Since it's not impossible to force a country to behave itself (Iran just recently and Iraq over 20 years ago in Desert Storm), what, is it "It's hard so waa?"

And what do those two have in common? Oh yes, they are not rich 1st world economies. No one here is contesting that big rich nations can bully their lesser neighbors for their own profit. Hell that's what the whole UN sanctions thing is designed for to begin with. To bully small nations into compliance with the desires of big superpowers. What I am saying is that they will not treat each other the same way. At least not if they belong to the same power block.

Now of course, opposing power blocks (like the EU vs Putin thing) do sanction and argue with one another. But that's been a thing since like before Napoleon.

[Thanas]

This isn't about cultures changing.

It is, you pseudo-edgy pseudo-rebel.

The only reason why the Japanese are hunting whales is because of their "culture". There is no need for it, heck they don't even like to eat whale meat.

[Purple]

It is, you pseudo-edgy pseudo-rebel.

The only reason why the Japanese are hunting whales is because of their "culture". There is no need for it, heck they don't even like to eat whale meat.

And what does that have to do with the question of foreigners intervening to change things by force of sanctions and threat? Because that is the argument here. He says we should force the Japanese to stop doing it and I am saying that it is unrealistic to expect that to happen.

No one is talking about the option of the Japanese deciding on their own that it's enough without being threatened into it. In fact, that is the only realistic option for this to stop.

[Thanas]

Not really. The EU could simply ban products of Japan if they were serious about it.

And the seal ban shows that if you piss off the EU long enough they will do so.

[Grumman]

Not really. The EU could simply ban products of Japan if they were serious about it.

And the seal ban shows that if you piss off the EU long enough they will do so.

The seal ban only targets seal-based products. There's a huge difference between the EU Ban on Seal Products and banning everything Canada and Norway produce, and people here are advocating the latter approach.

[Batman]

So what is it Japan produces the western world can't do without or get elsewhere, to the extent that Japan gets to keep it's economically totally unnecessary whaling shenanigans?

[Alyrium Denryle]

Just out of morbid curiosity, if you or someone you cared about were starving, would you kill a gorilla to feed them?

I kinda want to answer this too.

No. I would not. Because killing a Gorilla is flat out, no-holds-barred murder. I might eat one if it was already dead from causes other than being killed for food, but I would do the same with a human under starvation conditions.

No no. I would eat the innumerable insects in easy reach wherever gorillas are likely to be present.

Would you kill a gorilla for money to buy shoes and clothing for your children, if the alternative were for them to go barefoot and dressed in rags?

I wont commit murder for the sake of clothing. Where gorillas are present, there are other materials that can be used for basic clothing.

I mean, I strongly support efforts to maintain wildlife preserves in Africa, but there is a cold reality here that I'm not sure you're facing: a lot of Africans are really fucking poor. A lot of them- tens if not hundreds of millions- can't even live in the kind of basically sustainable subsistence-farming Iron Age lifestyle that their ancestors used to survive for thousands of years. Because the population's boomed so much that they're up to their eyeballs in teenagers who have minimal education and nobody can think of anything economically productive for them to do for the lack of infrastructure and resources.

Does not excuse murder. And wasteful self-destructive murder at that.

It is instead incumbent upon us (white people) who through colonial domination put them in that position, to raise them up out of desperate poverty.

The same goes for the rest.