France8:

Hi Concerned Canadian, When you sign "Everything I eat is 100% organic. I just happen to kill it myself...", it's good that you it 100% organic but it would be even better if you did it without killing any sentient being. "All sentient beings, humans or nonhuman, have one right: the basic right not to be treated as the property of others."(Gary Francione ) Humans have to stop overexploitation of non human beings. Exploitation of non human beings is at the root of the Earth devastation. I'm also a concerned "Canadian".

Exactly what are you suggesting? That we minimize our footprint to the extent that we never impact other species? I'm no biologist but I think you have to accept that our very existence impacts other species. I live very closely with nature. I live in a remote place surrounded by ocean, barrens, bogs, and the occasional forest. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that I am more in tune with nature than anyone of you commenting on here. I often sleep outside, not on some cozy sunbathed campground but on these barrens and bogs and, yes, sometimes on the ocean ice too. Just about everything that I eat is killed by me. I get to look it in the eye. I make sure it doesn't suffer. I don't have my slaughtering done by some faceless, nameless proxy so that I can pick up my meat from the store shelf. You suggest I shouldn't do this. Why? At what point was it decided that in the hierarchy of moralities your's took precedence over mine? Who makes that call? It is surely not you nor any other human on the planet. I will not refrain from using a bountiful resource to provide for my family and go from eating cheap, nutritious, and humanely slaughtered wild meat to paying $4 for a green pepper just so you can appease your guilt ridden conscience. I'm sorry but I love people. I love my family and I love myself. I don't have the same loathing for myself or my species that so many others on here seem to share. If my existence has to be supported and maintained by sometimes killing other animals then I will do it without batting an eye. I'll make it as quick and humane as I can but I will do it with a clear conscience. Unlike most of you I accept that I am a part of nature, not a spectator of it. I don't get my information from the Discovery Channel, Sesame Street, or Lunatic TV, or whatever other program you might watch that helps you feel so detached from the harsh yet beautiful realities of life. Your expressions of righteous indignation make for great reading but little substance. Whether I kill a seal or a polar bear kills it makes no difference. It will still die. I'll just be much kinder. Unlike most of the other sealers out there that people on here are so willing to attack, I have a voice. I also probably don't meet the stereotype most of you have in your mind and I am not inclined to be bullied, belittled, or typecast just so you can spew this idealist crap about animal utopias. There is no such thing. You want to talk about environmental impact? The very earth you walk on was once the home of some animal that you have misplaced so that you could have that space. Spare me the criticism. You want to eliminate human impact? In order to that you have to eliminate humans. It's easy make such broad misanthropic statements when the people being affected and far away. Not so much when it's you and yours. As I'm typing this tirade I'm watching my dying father stare out the window at an ocean he is no longer well enough to navigate. His life was filled with backbreaking labour and a family that loved him and shared that labour with him. When I read some of the fanatical crap that is posted on here I think about him and the life he has led. It is wrong for anyone to suggest that men like him are sadistic barbarians. When I see them I just see simple men of modest means working so hard to provide for their families. Delude yourselves all you want. This is what they are and all the Paul Watsons/McCartneys of the world can tell all they lies they want. It won't change the truth. Of course, the road to hell is paved with good intentions so it shouldn't surprise me that most of you appear Machiavellian enough to be willing to accept the injustice done to us in an effort to achieve a goal that will only result in disaster for the seals and my family. At least you'll sleep well at night knowing you tried your best to do what was right. That's the important thing, right?

Hi France 8, I don't know that changing the method in which the seals are killed will do anything to mollify animal rights activists, although we sealers have offered to consider this in the past. The whole "clubbing" controversy is really a smoke screen. You might be interested to know that only a very small number of them, typically 5% or less, are killed in this manner. The majority of them are shot with a rifle the same as wild animals in Europe. In 30 years of going to the ice I have never seen a seal clubbed. Every animal I ever saw killed was killed with a rifle. Unfortunately for the seals a number of veterinary studies have concluded that the hakapik, a Norwegian tool adopted by Canadian sealers, is the most efficient and humane method of dispatching the animals. The problem is that it looks brutal and though the graphics of it may be disturbing they are also misleading. It is easy to convince people with pictures and make them believe this is cruel and heartless. The reality is, it is crueler to shoot them than club them but many of us refuse to adopt that method simply to avoid creating more controversy. In fact, just last year we offered to ban the hakapik completely and use only rifles. The response from animal rights groups was overwhelming and instantaneous. They were againast banning the hakapik because they acknowledged that it was the more humane method. At the same time, they use the images of seals being killed with this tool to convince the world of it's brutality. Odd isn't it? No doubt they have scored a victory in terms of shutting down markets. The sad thing is, alll this has achieved is to ensure that the animal will be killed solely for population control and that none of the carcass will be used, other than what can be sold in local markets. The bulk of it will simply remain on the ice or in the water for the scavengers. It is a tragic waste of an individual animal's life and a horrible waste of a viable, renewable resource. In a world filled with stories of animal populations being wiped out, stocks being overfished, and rural communities dying, we were a success. Tiny remote communities like mine managed this animal population for the last 400 years and both the animals and the humans thrived. The population has been stronger these past years than they have been in decades. Instead of receiving praise and commendation for our success we receive hate mail, death threats, and ridicule. No doubt some will have a knee jerk reaction and be dismissive of my comments but if they wre truly interested they'd look beyond the propaganda spread by extreme animal rights groups and do some real research. I hold little hope for that as most people seem to accept as fact everything put forward by groups like the IFAW or the Sea Shepherd society. I guess it's easier to accept than to challenge....

Wunjo, Sorry, I think you may have misinterpreted some of what I wrote. As you suggest, I am not out to cause any unnecessary suffering to anything. What I was trying to convey, with limited success, is that once the nature of this hunt changes from a government monitored and regulated harvest to a mere exercise in culling then there will be ramifications that people like yourself are unable to predict. First, we have to radio ashore every day the number of animals we've taken so that the quota is closely monitored to ensure we do not exceed it. When we reach shore our catch is tallied to ensure we have not misrepresented ourselves. We face prosecution and the loss of our licenses if we have. As a side note, bear in mind that the quota, though it seems large to you, is currently too small. Even with us taking 4%-5% of the population it hsa been increasing at an average rate of 12% per year. It sshould be higher but the primary reason it isn't is international pressure. We have kept it low to maintain good relationships with countries like those in the EU so that we don't damage the market for our products. If that market is gone we no longer have that pressure and can therefore start culling the correct number of animals, likely starting with a mass cull to thin the herd dramtically in one year. This means more animals than are currently killed. Second, we pay a portion of the proceeds from our catch to fund the the monitoring that currently occurs. That's right, we pay for it, not the animal rights groups. However, if we aren't making money off it and aren't bringing them to market there will be no monitoring. There will also be no closely guarded tally of pelts to ensure that the numbers we say we've killed are in fact correct. Instead, the carcasses will remain at sea and we will simply have to provide anecdotal evidence of the numbers we've killed. Not the most reliable monitoring system. Third, the methods of dispatching these animals have long been a bone of great contention. While the EU may have previously been able to wield some influence on this issue they can do so no longer. The "humane" way of killing them will be whatever the Canadian governement decides it is. What the EU should have doen was require that all animals be killed in a certain manner and under a certain quota system before it would allow products from the industry into its markets. Instead it has merely said , "We don't care how you kill them or how many you kill, we are not, under any circumstances, allowing your produts into our countries." Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't that mean that they have removed themselves from the issue completely? What possible influence could theyhave over the issue now? All they can do is rant and rave, which won't upset us greatly because it is all bark and no bite at this point. They are like the bee with one sting. The threat of the sting is what gives it power. Once the sting is used the power is gone. I promise you, I care more about seals than any of you. The fate of my family, industry, and community have been intimately linked with the welfare of these animals for the past 350 years. All the EU has done is harm me, my family, and my community while doing absolutely nothing for the seals. Well, not exactly nothing, I guess they've removed the limitations on how many of them can be killed and the manner in which they can be killed. I hope that's how they measure the success of their latest move because if it isn't then they achieved nothing more than a concurrent surge in public opinion and a monumental failure in animal welfare. Not exactly the hallmarks of great legislation...

I'm sorry to say that this ban will not have the effect many of you desire so badly. I doubt any of you can foresee what will happen so I will share with you how it will affect how people in my community hunt seals. Will it mean we cannot ship seal products through or to EU countries? Yes. Will it mean that fishermen like me and my family will stop killing them? No. They are a population that is out of control. Up to this point it has been profitable for us to sell pelts and other seal products in an effort to use as much of the animal as possible. The income has been very important to us. The primary reason for the modern seal hunt, however, is population control and we still need to do this. What does this mean for the future of the hunt? Well, it will cease to be an economic endeavor in which we attempt to curry favour with the international community in order to protect the markets for our seal exports. The result? Since we do not have to carry seals to market we are not limited by how many animals our boats can hold. We will not be carrying any. This will mean we can actually kill more since we do not have to worry about our vessel's capacity. The slaughter will be in the name of culling the herd so we will simply kill them at our leisure and leave them where they lie. Since we no longer have a market to protect we do not have to worry about international pressure to kill only certain numbers or in certain ways. The EU has completely removed itself from the equation. The only power it had over the hunt was its ability to pressure the markets within its constituent countries. That power is now gone. If I might make a slightly crude analogy, it's like your wife refusing to make love to you. If she makes it a permanent situation by leaving you you don't really have to romance her with flowers and chocolates do you? Your concern for her favourable opinion of you has evaporated with the relationship.... The final result of the ban will be this: We will kill as many or more seals. We will not have to bring them to market. Since it will only be a cull we will cease to have government observers and inspectors. They don't need to witness a cull of seals any more than they need to witness you killing a rat or a mouse in your basement. Because there will be no market for seal products we will use nothing of the animals we kill. We will do this all in the name of managing the population of animals that we can't sell to protect the stock levels of those we can sell, just the same as the fish farmers in the UK do. I understand the motivation behind the anti-seal hunt movement but I've often thought it a little short sighted in its inability to see the larger picture and the benefits the hunt had for the seal population and for those of us that make our living off of it. I regret the victory of emotion over reason for it means that what was once a reliable, renewable, and susainable industry has become nothing more than an exercise in killing beautiful animals that have bred themselves to such levels that they have become pests. The seal hunt will now become a maritime varmint shoot and their carcasses will rot on the ocean floor rather than fueling an industry to employ rural people. I'm pretty sure this is not the result you were all looking for but it is the reality. Sorry to disappoint.