|
|
|
|
by Jody Paterson, City
Editor
|
|
|
 |
|
| |
Message to whale-hunt foes: Indians can't live on
nobility Everything was so much easier before the Indians slipped out of
the box we'd put them in as noble and selfless keepers of the land. It
turned out they wanted to feed their families and keep their home towns
alive, and that meant making money from trees and fish just like everybody
else in B.C. has been doing for a century or so.
Now, they want whales. There are 30,000 gray whales in this part of the
Pacific Ocean, and the whaling tribes of the Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations
want a few of them. Washington state's Makah will hunt for a whale this
fall, and local hereditary whaling chief Tom Mexsis Happynook is priming
himself and his son for their first whale hunt sometime in the
future.
Happynook is the head of the World Council of Whalers, a 20-country group
put together two years ago to ready people for hunts all over the world.
The countries all once hunted whales and at least nine of them still do,
but nobody has been doing too much of it since industrial whalers wiped out
whole populations 70 or so years ago in the pursuit of oil, baleen for
corsets, and ambergris for perfume.
Now that whale populations are thriving again, the whalers want some,
mostly to eat but maybe to sell into the whale-hungry Japanese market. The
World Council of Whalers was formed to begin the public debate. "What
we want people to know is that the whalers are still alive and they want to
bring food to their table," says Happynook's spouse and fellow council
member Kathy.
The environmental movement is nervous, reluctant to look anti-Indian but
not about to endorse a return to whale hunting. The most vocal opponent is
Paul Watson, the eco-pirate who has long made saving whales his personal
issue. He has chosen Makah woman Alberta Thompson to front his anti-hunt
campaign, presumably in the hopes that using an Indian to criticize Indians
reduces the risk of looking culturally insensitive.
The fervor building around whale hunts feels a lot like B.C.'s abortion
debates of the 1980s, when people felt so strongly convinced on either side
of the issue that there was no middle ground. The group that gathered last
weekend at the James Bay Community Centre to hear Watson-ultimately a
no-show and replaced by eco-pirate understudy Michael Kundu -believe it's
simply wrong to kill something as smart, cute and "sentient" as a
whale. The whalers believe it's equally wrong to let people go
hungry.
"We're up against millions and millions of people in urban
environments who don't even know milk comes from a cow," says Tom
Happynook. "Put yourself in these coastal communities ... Our people
are eating fried bologna, hamburger soup, Kraft Dinner. There's a reason
why our houses are so dilapidated-we don't have any money."
Kundu doesn't buy it. The Makah nation has "all the amenities" in
their community three hours away from Seattle, and don't need this to
survive," he told people at the Victoria meeting. He says Japan is
gleeful over the prospect of a whale hunt for "cultural reasons"
that would set precedent and clear the way around the world for more
whaling.
Watson's supporters are arming themselves for war. It's an emotional fight
that at its core comes down to it just being plain wrong to kill an animal
as nice as a whale. For those who would doubt it, Kundu has a terrible
video of a whale being hunted, the killing dragging on for so long that
Kundu has the opportunity every time to ask the audience, "Have you
had enough? Can I shut this off now?" Happynook says that's why he's
taking his time getting ready for the hunt: The world will be watching, and
he doesn't want them to see a novice making a mess of hunting for a
whale.
Watson and Kundu have found an ally in some members of the local
whale-watching industry, who are spreading the word to tourists that whales
are going to be hunted. They'd rather the Indians started up whale-watching
businesses of their own, and feel betrayed by the enthusiasm for a hunt.
"I always think of the native people as the caretakers. I'm deeply
shocked that they want to do this," said an audience member listening
to Kundu.
But on Maslow's hierarchy of needs, survival beats out self-actualization
every time. Whether this year, next year, or five years from now, local
First Nations will soon hunt for gray whales in our waters. (Killer whales
are sacred and won't be touched.) It's not only a statement of aboriginal
right, but a means of making money and feeding families.
Whether a hunt is justified will be an issue that will polarize even the
moderates. Humans have a well-earned reputation for destroying everything
they touch. And whales are noble, kind of like Indians used to be before
they started wanting things.
Unfortunately, nobility doesn't pay the bills. Happynook says organizations
such as Greenpeace and the SPCA are at least "starting to realize they
can't just throw their moral and emotional values onto the coastal
communities that need the resource." The challenge now is to convince
a wary populace that there is such a thing as a sustainable whale
hunt.
"We want the public to feel comfortable that we're not blood-thirsty,
that whaling can be done from the premise of respect for the
resource," says Happynook. "They can still go whale-watching, do
research, whatever-but somewhere in that equation, the whalers are going to
fit in."  |
|
|
|
|
