"A dolphin's smile is the greatest deception.
It creates the illusion that they're always happy." – Ric O’Barry
Japan. Slaughter. Dolphins. They don’t seem related, but they are. Use them all in one sentence and you get the whole idea.
I never thought anyone who’s Japanese cannot do anything that will put his nation to shame but the fishermen of Taiji, Wakayama are doing just that.
The dolphin slaughter in Taiji was brought to light by a 2009 documentary film that later won the 82nd Academy Awards despite controversies and the mixed reactions. The film attracted a wide media attention. It was described to be a Gaiatsu, or foreign pressure, for the Japanese whaling authority.
We know, the movie is so 2009, but we’re thinking it’s still worth writing about, after all, people are still talking about it. As a matter of fact, while I was writing this article, I saw events on Facebook, both happening in the US, of screening of the film in universities organized by vegan groups and Asian associations.
Bicol Organization of Neo-Journalists (BONJOUR) in partnership with the Earth Island Institute – Philippines and in cooperation with YOUTHink, United Nations Youth Association of the Philippines (UNYAP) and Rotaract Club of Legazpi Central organized a special documentary screening of the internationally-acclaimed documentary at the Pacific Mall Cinemas 1 and 2, Mar. 10 and 11.
“[Dolphins], too, have rights and we must uphold them. After all, we consider ourselves as the superior species,” Jovic Maurice Yee, project head and BONJOUR external vice president said.
BONJOUR President Jessa Mae Jarilla expounded, “We are not the only ones who deserve to live in the world.”
So, what’s so peculiar about it?
If you thought Ric O’Barry is the least likely to be in opposition of dolphin captivity, least of all become a marine activist, you haven’t seen the movie.
O’Barry, the author of (breath in deep, this title is long) Behind the Dolphin Smile: A True Story that Will Touch the Hearts of Animal Lovers Everywhere, is the dolphin trainer of the five dolphins which played the part of the possibly most famous dolphin in the 1964 National Broadcasting Company television series Flipper, a show that lasted three years with 88 episodes. He worked for Miami Seaquarium. He was even the highest paid dolphin trainer in the 60s. So what made him quit his job and do things that would make all dealers guilty of wanting to get him arrested or killing him?
After one of the dolphins, Kathy, committed suicide in his own hands, O’Barry said in the film, he finally saw the infliction of pain and suffering to the dolphins brought by the captivity. He said that dolphins can commit suicide by ‘not taking the next breath.’
Dolphins, like all other cetaceans, are voluntary breathers. This means they can decide whether to take or not take the next breath. Because of this, they are sometimes called conscious breathers, constantly being conscious in order for them to continuously keep breathing, even when asleep. So unlike us, they can just commit suicide whenever they feel like everything around them is going wrong, something I wish we can do, too. Kidding.
This made Ric O’Barry decide to be a defender of the ocean mammal. And for a number of times after that, he was unremittingly going back and forth prisons. The first time was when he let Charlie Brown, a dolphin that he himself captured, break loose in Bimini, Bahamas just the day after Kathy died. Getting in prison didn’t stop him in his advocacy. He promised not to quit until every dolphin in captivity is free and enjoying the wild where they really should be, their real environment.
In the film, O’Barry and Louie Psihoyos (the film’s director, a former National Geographic still photographer) formed a crew of free divers, marine biologists, adrenaline junkie, marine activists (that include Isabel Lucas who previously took part in an attempt to stop the hunt in 2006 with 29 other Surfers for Cetaceans members), and an underwater cinematographer. O’Barry and the others had to go James Bond during nights in a series of missions to and fro the national park and their hotel.
In the location where the slaughters happen every year, cameras are banned and tourists’ view is blocked. This is in spite of the fact that the place is a national park. The film’s crew had to use cameras that looked like rock in order to film the dolphin slaughter with the help of a motion picture visual company (the one that provided the visual effects for those fan favorites Pirates of the Caribbean , all of the first four movies, and where Adam Savage, Grant Imahara and Tory Belleci of Mythbusters all worked for).
After screenings all over the world, the documentary brought many activists to Taiji, most of them were no-Japanese, thus the term Gaiatsu.
Watch the film. You will forever be thankful O’Barry and Psihoyos decided to make a documentary about the dolphin hunt. After that, you’ll surely change your impressions on dolphinariums and sea parks.
Blood Dolphin$
The television series, Blood Dolphin$, does not only focus on the Taiji dolphins.
O’Barry is in a mission once again, but this time with his son, Lincoln O’Barry (the series director), Kate Tomlinson (still photographer), and Pete Zuccarini (underwater cinematographer) with the help of Lawrence Makili, a Solomon Islander who is also a dolphin activist.
The title refers to the blood trade of dolphins happening in other parts of the world.
After the first episode about Taiji, O’Barry and Lincoln travels to Solomon Islands where dolphins are killed for their teeth (used as currency and dowry), and hunted for dolphin dealers, an industry in Solomon Islands that Chris Porter introduced to the locals.
The mission was launched by an invitation from Chris Porter (not the basketball player, nor the footballer, nor the standup comedian. God!, there are too many Chris Porters in the world), who said he came up with the project called Free the Pod, a move to release 17 dolphins that were held captive in Porter’s pen. In other words, Chris Porter, a dolphin exporter, is turning his coat over to side with the dolphin activists.
Someone would think it’s far fetched to stop dolphin hunting in the Solomons because it’s part of their tradition and all, right? But later in the series, the O’Barrys learned that the tradition of killing dolphins has long stopped and was again re-introduced to the locals by Porter. Otherwise stated, Porter is responsible to all the slaughters that were once again happening throughout the country.
Porter is O’Barry’s long time resistor. They have clashed before regarding the dolphins in the former’s enclave in Gavutu Island.
In the second episode, Lincoln goes undercover in the nation’s capital, Honiara, where he discovers captive dolphins swimming in pools filled with their own feces. Those dolphins remained unrescued but were transferred to a larger offshore pen.
The talk with Porter, just like their previous meeting in 2006, released no dolphins.
They were successful, on the other hand, in dealing with the people of the village of Fanalei to stop dolphin hunting, something which led to the agreement of other villages to the deal. At the end of the episode, a video of Porter releasing the 17 dolphins was shown. The Solomons mission lasted for two episodes, ending the series. Yup, there are only three episodes. Maybe they should have made an episode at Subic.
Don’t but a ticket
So what makes us all different to the 5% population of Taiji that knows the slaughter activity if we still buy tickets and get excited over dolphins jumping on air, playing with big balls, throwing people on air, ? Nothing. By watching and buying a ticket to dolphin shows we are constantly demanding dealers to still buy and import dolphins and arousing them into continuing what they are doing. *Enter dolphin suicide*. *Enter more work for O’Barry*. *Enter more activism*.
O’Barry must have given an understatement saying that the dolphin industry of putting them in captivity and making on them while they’re on large aquariums is like prostitution. The least we can do now, as ordinary people engaging in activism towards the issue, is to not buy a ticket in dolphin shows.
Dolphins in captivity exhibit abnormal behaviors, unlike when they are in the wild. The dolphins you see in dolphinariums and aquatic parks are nothing similar to those ones in the wild.
The whale watching industry in Donsol made the town 1st-class from being a 6th-class municipality.
You might wanna try whale watching, or observing the cetaceans in their natural habitat. Year round, here in the Philippines, dolphins are observed at Central Visayas, Batanes, Palawan and Davao Gulf.
Painting 23, 000 dolphins all over the nation
If you think that’s not possible, sorry to disappoint you, but someone was able to do just that.
For eight months last year, Amado Guerrero ‘AG’ Saño painted dolphins in memory of the 23, 000 dolphins killed in Taiji each year. This he did in campaign against the hunt in Japan and the dolphin shows here in the Philippines. During that time, Saño had hundreds of volunteers helping him.
So what now?
I cannot deny the truth to anyone, before The Cove, I thought the dolphin smile tells that they’re fine in captivity while in fact they’re all straining to survive from all the stress of all things happening inside sea parks (if you don’t know what I’m talking about, that’s it, you need to watch the film!).
When they all need to be out there, catching fish, living in their real habitat, here are the dolphin dealers being their horror and all.
I’ve frequently asked this question: What can we do now?
Well, the first thing to do was already mentioned. Two, What you can do is, tell your friends about the movie and the television series. I’ve done my part writing this, but this surely is not the last of it. I am most willing to hand you a copy of the movie. Find your way into our office.
Three, if you have a blog, you know what to do. It won’t hurt to blog about it. Four, follow @TheCoveNews on Twitter. Five, visit TakePart.com/TheCove. Six, roll a dice, if you get three consecutive sixes, you saved a dolphin. (Sorry, I can’t help making that up). Six, this may seem remotely connected but it helps: help preserve out aquatic resources. Dispose of your waste properly and fix any leaks at your home. Seven, write. Write to politicians when you come up with any idea that has something to do with helping preserve the environment.
Don't forget to leave a comment. Thank you!
This is an article I submitted in our Feature Writing subject about the hiring of police officers here in the Philippines.
Don't forget to leave a comment. Thank you!
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| Photo from http://blog.lib.umn.edu |
If the statistics haven’t reached you yet, you know nothing about how many in earth’s population hunger kills at this very same hour.
If the statistics haven’t reached you yet, you don’t know the scarcity in food that applies to all living creatures, you and me, humans and pets, unemployed or employed.
If the statistics haven’t reached you yet, you didn’t hear that in 2006, almost five-hundred million people died of hunger. And every year, the number is adding up.
Hunger is a killer; the statistics will tell you that.
Now that you know, only one thing’s left to be branded – cause. You might wanna stop scratching your head ‘cause we both know the number one reason. Yes, the foe of the first of eight Millenium Development Goals (MDG), poverty. Unicef said that “more than 30 per cent of children in developing countries – about 600 million – live on less than US $1 a day” and that every 3.6 seconds, one person dies of starvation. Usually, the fund organization said, it is a child under the age of 5.
And the word poverty branches out towards other words. What am I saying? We all know that families need – in addition to food – shelter, clothing, education and medicine. So the families’ budget is divided among these. Then it all goes down to this: the budget for food becomes not as much if the others are gone, therefore, less food is bought. Less food is served over family tables. Enter hunger. Enter sickness. Add unemployment in the formula and you’ll get the real picture, or something near. Enter death.
Another thing, though it may seem too far a topic, climate change may also affect everyone’s tummy. Other than the fact that some farm food are produced in little amounts due to lack of farming skills, changing climate greatly affects production of food. Climate change affects the cycle of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. CO2 is decreasing, and as one of the requirements in the process of food production in plants, this decrease affects us all. Enough with science. The bottom line is that hunger will never be eradicated for as long as climate change is felt.
If the statistics haven’t reached you yet, maybe your stomach can tell. Or mine.
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| Twitter logo. |
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| Blogger logo. |
You know the sites, but do you really know the first social networking site or SNS? Facebook? No. Friendster? No. LiveJournal? Definitely no.
Ever heard of the Bulletin Board System or the BBS? It’s the first SNS and it’s just like Facebook. Only in BBS, you may download files and games. Oh, you can do that in Facebook now.
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| Facebook logo. |
Launched in the second month of 2004, Facebook has since dominated the cyber world and lorded over sites like Friendster (which is now only ranking 146 in the most popular sites in the world). A movie was even produced based on the true events that occurred before and after the founding of the site – The Social Network. The movie follows the story of Mark Zuckerberg and the law suits that followed after he made the site. Facebook made him the youngest billionaire in the world.
I know that light bulb above you. Better start that social network now, and fast. Facebook is adding thousands of members by the minute.
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| Past Friendster logo. |
After being labeled as the Texting Capital of the World (maybe because of the unlimited text offers of all networks), some sites are now calling the Philippines the Social Networking Capital of the World. Now, should the Pinoys look at this negatively or positively?
In one hand, this means Pinoys are sociable, computer literate (haha, eat that!), and, well, current-events updated. I don’t need to explain further on this. On the other hand, this means we waste a lot of time in front of the computer instead of doing work, and, and, forget it, I can’t see any other negative issue about it. Haha.
Here’s the good thing about SNS: they are used in legal and crime investigations. Just like how cellphones were used in crimes scenes before the SNS got popular, these sites prove to be catalysts in the process of investigations. Someone’s posts, comments and other web activities in the net may be used in favor or against them.
We may also communicate with friends overseas without going through the trouble of writing on paper and waiting weeks before it gets to their addresses. On the tail end, it takes away the post man’s job. And your stamp collection never adds up. And it’s never too personalized as your own handwriting (but if your penmanship is hieroglyphic, be happy and go crazy about it).
For first time applicants, just be careful about what you post on your Wall. The manager of the company you’re applying to may look into your accounts. Whatever they read there may affect your application. It’s your resume in the social networking media.
Another thing: Looking at it generally, we can never deny the fact that there are other big issues in the social networking media that may destroy identities and lives. There’s cyber bullying, which has few laws against it. (States like California, Florida, Texas, and Missouri in the United States of America, have addressed the problem of cyber bullying). The pictures you have been hiding all these years may quickly spread throughout the sites when it lands into some crazy guy’s hands, or your brother who always wants to see you humiliated around your friends. It’s the scandal in the social networking media. There are also few limitations as to the posting of offensive remarks in these sites. There goes the trauma. (Enter, trauma). (Laugh out loud, trauma). (Cry, girl). (Cry, boy).
Children below the age limit are also – not surprisingly – members of the sites mentioned above. Why, you ask? Because one, Children See, Children Do. Remember I mentioned about Pinoys being computer literate? That doesn’t exempt the ones under the teenage bracket. And two, the age verifications are ineffective most of the time. So when kids get frustrated on the games they’re playing at Y8 (or when they think Facebook games are cooler than playing race or dress-ups in NewGrounds) they log into those account, and poof!, see vain picture with slightly nude boys and girls. It’s the cocaine of the social networking media, those pictures. Not for me though. *wink*
It’s also sometimes making a big wall between someone’s social life and interpersonal communication. Not to mention how some teenagers seem to “not want” their parents to gain access in their accounts. It’s the diary or journal of the social networking media. The one that you just want your friends to read, only your friends. Only in SNS, some of them are not familiar to you. Just your stalkers, or your friend’s friend, or the fake accounts of your brother or mother or father or your evil sister.
Is SNS all that bad? Or good? You be the judge. I vote for good. Who doesn’t love faster access to the cool television series’ fan pages? The rock bands you’ve been stalking and praying for to visit the Philippines? Your crush/es? Your ex who’s been running in your brain? Or enjoying a chat with your professor when all you need to say is, “Please make me top in your class,” or “I liked your status, give me high grades in my class card.”? It’s the bribing in the social networking media, made faster within just a click of the mouse, or the tap in the keyboard.
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The Rei
- the rei
- junior journalism student at the bicol university college of arts and letters. had his environmental essays exhibited at the Nishinomiya Municipal Gallery of Nishinomiya City, Japan for the 16th and 17th Eco-Panel Exhibition along with the other works of artists all over the world for Learning and Ecological Activities Foundation for Children or LEAF's Earth Watching Club that promotes community-based environmental learning activities . The Rey Anthony de los Reyes Ostria is: a full-time stalker, part-time believer, other times a skeptic, a dreamer, a sophie and a freak.
