NATIVE WHALING, THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM.

Hi,

Yesterday, I lost a friend. No, he didn’t die, he made a decision which made friendship difficult, if not impossible. We were unable to agree on that touchy issue of native hunting, the elephant in the room when it comes to Gray whales.

“ You haven’t made a strong enough case,” he said. “ I don’t agree with you.”

I can’t remember how many doors have slammed in my face over this issue. As though I personally should bear the collective responsibility of flawed humanity by daring to question the rights of any human to kill whales. Shall I be the emissary responsible for the whales, the human who stands up and argues for the rights of another species to exist ? Who says that the equation – humans need whales so whales must die – is an illegitimate, immoral and un-enlightened attitude. That its not okay to kill whales to “ make up “ for all the bad things that have happened to indigenous people. That it’s not okay to put whales on the sacrificial altar of redemption.

This a decision that collective humanity must make. And that decision is not a simple yes or no.

So many people miss the essential point. The extent of exploitation of our natural world is horrendous. Species after species is going to extinction. Extinction is forever. If you keep killing a species like the Gray whale,already on the downward path to extinction, there will soon be nothing left to kill. There’s enough food on Planet Earth without continuing to kill whales. Many species are now so toxic they should not be eaten and Arctic whales, particularly the Grays, are seriously contaminated.

Yes, indigenous people feel a strong sense of injustice because they were not responsible for the massive killing sprees.

Twice now in the long history of these ancient whales, they have been killed to near extinction. The US has a dismal, shocking history of Gray whale slaughter. In the old days, Ojo de Liebre in Baja was known as Scammon’s Lagoon. The history of Scammon’s slaughter of Gray whales is almost impossible to read as he and his men turned the waters of that Lagoon into a blood bath.

It was in 1857 that an American whaling captain, Charles Melville Scammon, discovered the entrance to a lagoon which the Spaniards called "Ojo de Liebre" (eye of the jackrabbit). Its warm, calm waters, shallow bays and broad tidal flats served as a breeding ground for thousands of California gray whales that migrated from the cold waters of the Bering and Chukchi seas.

His grotesque exploitation of these mammals for their precious oil, whalebone and meat almost led to their extinction. By the turn of the century, only 2,000 California gray whales were in existence.

Mass whaling transformed the lagoon into a frantic marine slaughterhouse. To Scammon, “the scene of slaughter was exceedingly picturesque and unusually exciting.” Bomb-lance guns crackled “like musketry” and the foamy thrashing of bombed whales resembled an “aquatic battle scene.” Bustling boat crews knitted shut the giant lips of dead whales and towed the bloated corpses to their ships and the try-pots, whose stinking smoke spiralled into the desert sky.

The influx of whalers resulted in further refinements of lagoon-whaling techniques. Whale calves, until then dangerous nuisances, became deadly lures. At low tide, a boat would chase a stray calf into shallow water; soon the anxious mother would appear to retrieve her calf, only to become stranded. Once the mother had become exhausted by frantic efforts to extricate herself, the whaling boat returned for the kill. Sometimes the harpooner would step out of the boat, wade over to his giant quarry, and plunge the harpoon home.”

No matter how you dress up the slaughter of whales, it is a bloody nightmare. If whales could scream, we would hear their cries into eternity as so many have been killed. There is no swift way to kill a whale. Gunshot wounds, harpoons, grenade harpoons, lances, they all bring misery to whales who cannot become unconscious but must stay conscious until their great hearts stop beating. Nothing has changed. Whalers still go after calves so the mother and male escort can be slaughtered. The cruelty inflicted is shocking.

A few years ago, when the Makah tribe of Washington State killed their first Gray whale in 70 years, a young juvenile, the tribe danced on the corpse. The whale, a friendly, was migrating back to its feeding grounds and came to the Makah boat to say hello.

In the old days, the Makah whalers had to spend one year without sex in preparation for killing a whale. After a year of cleansing, a freshly killed slave was strapped to the whaler’s back as he prepared spiritually for the slaughter. No such constraints apply today.

Who knows how it must be for the Gray whales who survive the long long journey to the waters of the Bering and Chukchi Seas only to be met with guns, harpoons and death as the Chukotkans take their share of the kill quota.

It’s a brutal, ugly death. The miracle is that the Gray whales continue to come to human beings in Baja. Imagine their journey, at one end people caress and stroke these whales, at the other end they’re hunted to death.

Let’s be very clear about whaling. The California Gray Whale Coalition opposes ALL WHALING. Whaling must end, like slavery. Like the slaughter of buffaloes. Climate change presents the greatest threat to the survival of all cetaceans as their habitats change drastically and food becomes increasingly scarce.

Native whaling, like commercial whaling must end. A dead whale is a dead whale. As collective humanity, we must move on to another place. We need to recognize the rights of the whale nations to exist.

The Coalition believes elders of indigenous tribes are on the same page, they know how bad things are with the whale nations.

As for the friends and acquaintances who vehemently support the rights of indigenous to continue with the slaughter of these highly intelligent creatures, they must answer to their Gods. We all must do what we must do.

End whaling.