Since the early 1970's more money and time has been spent by these groups to lobby for the protection of marine mammals than any other category of animals. That effort and the corresponding expense were made even when these strident NGOs knew most of the species they claimed were "threatened" or "endangered" were then, as they are now, doing fine on their own. Their rationale was and is quite understandable. Whales, dolphins, polar bears, Sea otters, and seals combined have raised as much or more money for these groups than campaigns based on all the other species combined, including elephants, rhinos and dogs and cats.

Indeed, the pictures of white harp seals being clubbed raised over 10 million US dollars over a five-year period for the International Fund for Welfare (IFAW), the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) and Greenpeace. Nearly another million went to the Fund for Animals, the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

Paul Irwin, current President and long time treasurer for the Humane Society of the United States, is reported to have said that without seals, whales and dolphins, the animal rights movement would still be about dog pounds and pit bull fighting.

Indeed, if one compares the rise of these protectionism organizations in terms of money and members, it is impossible to fail to see the absolutely key role marine mammal protection campaigns have played in these groups' growth.

A key mantra of the NGO community is the belief that the shortest distance to a person's wallet is through their heart. Yet, even admitting the appeal of a young seal, the question remains, what is it about the marine creatures that elicits so much support? Perhaps more important, is the answer to the question: just how did these environmentalists and animal rights advocates identify the fund raising power of this particular group of animals?

A little known piece of social history is that it was Cleveland Amory (not Greenpeace or Paul Watson, or Brian Davies) who first picked up the phone and contacted Brigit Bardot and asked her if she would lend her name and image to the campaign. Amory, a Pulitzer Prize winning author, had once written a very favorable piece on Bardot for PARADE magazine and knew the somewhat eccentric actress had an obsession with animals.

What even fewer people know is that Amory was a proponent of the biologist's Konrad Lorenz' relationship or kinship theories. Lorenz was a noted evolutionary biologist and had hypothesized that individuals in all animal species are naturally, indeed innately, protective of and drawn to individuals of other species that have features that resemble the features of infants or juveniles in the first species.