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Paul Watson on Sea Shepherds being called TERRORISTS
| Message Board > Controversy and Quarantine > Paul Watson on Sea Shepherds being called TERRORISTS |
| NOISE NOT BOMBS User Info... |  Founder and President of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society In a world where his Holiness the Dalai Lama is described as a terrorist leader by a world power like China, it is hardly an insult to be called a terrorist by some backwoods robber baron of a premier in Newfoundland. Last week Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams called me a “terrorist” because Sea Shepherd was documenting the slaughter of seals in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. My response to him on Canadian national television was to either arrest me or to shut up. I have never been convicted of a felony, I have never injured a single person, in fact I am so non-violent that I don’t eat meat. I am not wanted for any crime anywhere in the world. I am not on any “no-fly” lists. I am not barred from entry into any country. I don’t have the FBI sitting on my doorstep monitoring my every move so just what kind of terrorist am I? Williams said I would not be allowed to enter Newfoundland while he is Premier. I would like to see how he would stop me. The last time I looked, Newfoundland was still a part of Canada unfortunately and I am a Canadian citizen. I suppose he will charge me with slumming or being in Newfoundland without a club. Dan Leger, a columnist for the Halifax Chronicle Herald has the answer. According to this right wing bullet-headed scribe, both Elizabeth May the leader of the Canadian Green Party and I are “tofu-eating terrorists.” I don’t really know where “tofu eating terrorists” are placed on the spectrum of terrorism but there seems to be a vast chasm between the action of video-taping the slaughter of a seal and flying a passenger jet into a civilian building. It has been amazing to witness the polarization of the Canadian media in response to the campaign to oppose the vicious slaughter of harp seals. On one side there is “the defend the slaughter at all costs” and on the other there is the movement to abolish an industry that really has no place in the modern civilized world. It’s time for Newclublanders, Magandertal Islanders and a few Cape Brutish Islanders to toss away the hak-a-pik and get an education. The days when the uneducated “the world owes us a living crowd”, can continue to plunder the oceans is almost over. Their awesome greed has already diminished the oceans of fish, marine mammals, sea-birds and even invertebrates and still the slaughter continues as they move on to lesser valued species after trashing the more valuable. One of the things my critics don’t appreciate is that I relish their animosity. In the last week I have received a flurry of hate letters from the Magdalen Islands. Apparently some linguistic wit came up with the wording for a T-shirt and a hate letter campaign using the French word for seal to say “Phoque You Paul Watson!” I have to say I was flattered. Each of those letters cost $.96 to send so they spent a few hundred dollars sending me four words, so after reading the first one there was no reason to read the rest. My only disappointment was they did not send me one of those neat T-shirts. I would proudly wear one. Apparently some people think that their opinion of me actually means something. Premier Williams called me the most disgusting and vile excuse for a human being that he ever met which is strange since I’ve never met the man. Loyola Hearn called me a “money sucking manipulator.” Ouch! I suppose. I don’t really know what he was trying to say since the Canadian seal slaughter sucks millions of Canadian tax dollars down the drain every year to support the diminishment of life in the seas, and we raise funds from willing volunteers who support our efforts to save life in the oceans. Columnist Jim Leger actually suggested that the only reason the seal slaughter continues is because the government refuses to give into me and that I am the reason the seals are dying. Now there’s an off the wall, over the top perspective! Jimmy boy admits that there is no other reason to support the hunt other than to oppose me. In other words, the Canadian government is spending 24 million dollars a year supporting a 6 million dollar industry just so they can say I did not whoop their ass. I have been physically beaten by those knuckle dragging baby killing goons on the Magdalen Islands and over the years I have been beaten and interrogated by the Fishery thugs and the Mounties so getting called a few names this year is actually quite nice, relatively speaking. It was amazing to watch axe swinging fishermen attack our crew as the police watched with their hands in their pockets in St. Pierre. It was astounding to hear the Canadian government say they boarded our ship to protect the sealers from our “deadly” cameras, a few weeks after the gross incompetence of the Canadian Coast Guard left four sealers dead in a frozen sea. Canada did everything we expected them to this year thanks to the very easily manipulated Loyola Hearn, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans who hails from, you guessed it folks, the province of Newfoundland – seal torturing capital of the world, where men are serial baby killers and politicians salivate like dogs anytime they can see an issue to distract from their own incompetence. Oh I forgot, Hearn called me “gutless” for not being on the ship when it was boarded thereby depriving him of the pleasure of having his thugs beat the crap out of me again as they have so many times before. At the same time, he accused me of not respecting the law. The reason that I was not on the ship is that there is a court order barring me from the Gulf of St. Lawrence for my past “crimes” of witnessing a seal kicked in the face and tortured. So for abiding by my court order, this paragon of political virtue calls me gutless. If I had been on the ship he would have accused me of being in contempt of a court order and I would have gone to prison. I may originally be from Atlantic Canada Mr. Hearn but I’m not completely stupid. I said a week before our ship was boarded that the best thing that could happen to publicize the seal slaughter this year is if the government attempted to arrest the ship in international waters. I also said that I did not think Loyola Hearn was that stupid. I guess I was wrong. He handed us a bonanza of international publicity and he grabbed the tar baby that we had dangled in front of him. If it goes to court our GPS unit that recorded our movements will prove beyond any doubt that we never entered Canadian waters. If they destroy or tamper with that unit, they will surely lose the case. They simply cannot prove the Farley Mowat ever ventured into Canadian territorial waters because it was our strategic decision to never enter Canadian waters. We will fight him in the courts as we have humiliated him in the media. Our objective is the total and complete abolishment of the slaughter of seals, a crusade that I have been fighting since 1975 and for which I will never surrender or retreat until we secure a complete and lasting victory for the seals and the oceans. Oscar Wilde once said that “the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.” Because of this campaign, they are talking about us and the seals in the Canadian House of Commons, they are talking about us in the bars and cafes of Atlantic Canada, they are talking about us in the European Parliament, and they are talking about us around the world and it really does not matter if the talk is positive or negative to our cause – what is important is that we are raising awareness and provoking discussion and that is the nature of a free and democratic society. The best way to describe ourselves is as an acupuncture needle. We probe and stimulate a response, we get people thinking and we make things happen, we set in motion a series of actions and actions designed to provoke and then we let the campaign run its natural course once we set it firmly on the rail to the destination we wish to reach. For when all is said and done, it was a simple campaign. All the Sea Shepherd crew did was take pictures and shoot video of seals being killed. We did not injure or attempt to injure anyone. We did not damage or attempt to damage any property. We did not disrupt nor attempt to disrupt the killing of the seals. We took pictures! And in response to this the government of Canada sends a para-military police unit with heavy arms to storm a Dutch ship in international waters. They have seized the ship without charges or explanation. They arrested the Captain and crew, charged them with approaching a seal being killed and then deported them making it impossible to attend their own trial. They roughed up 15 other crew-members and restrained them without arrest against their will. So after storming our ship with weapons and stealing it and the possessions of the crew, the Canadian government calls us “pirates.” In response to our documenting atrocities on the ice, the Canadian government charges us with unlawfully documenting said atrocities and calls us “terrorists” and a threat to democracy. But this of course is in the bizarre world where the Dalai Lama is a terrorist and the Chinese are “good communists” compared to those “bad communists” in Cuba. Former Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney can rob the country blind and is now called a “statesman.” Oil companies can loot the planet for fantastic profits without criticism from the government yet organizations that don’t spend a dime of the taxpayers’ money to protect wildlife and the environment are called “money suckers.” As they say in Canada, “Go figure, eh!” - Wed, 23 Apr 2008 5:37pm | ||
| sumyungai User Info... | Life goes on, dude. - Wed, 23 Apr 2008 7:31pm | ||
| Endeløs User Info... | I'm not reading some crusty asshole's copy n' paste article. I will take this opportunity to say this- The clubbing of unwashed, unemployed anarchist scum should totally be legalized in Canada. - Wed, 23 Apr 2008 7:43pm | ||
| trevor corey User Info... | Paul Watson is a hero of mine. - Wed, 23 Apr 2008 11:57pm | ||
| Andrew User Info... | i never realized there were so many rednecks on this board...wait...nevermind. - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 2:33am | ||
| BBJones User Info... |  | ||
| Dr.DoomXXX User Info... | "The clubbing of unwashed, unemployed anarchist scum should totally be legalized in Canada." -True - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:27am | ||
| trevor corey User Info... | Did BB just say "terrortits" ? - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 2:36pm | ||
| {UTA} Mike User Info... | What I want to hear from some of the activists are solutions and answers to the how the fishermen will make a living if they ban seal hunts. I dont see one single solution in Paul Watsons diatribe above as to how to feed the fishermen if the govt. takes away their livelihood. The killing method could be changed, but to what? Ammo costs money. Poison costs money and could have negative effects on the environment. But nobody is coming to the table and saying, "Ok, here's a solution to how we keep the hunt to a minimum or not at all, but in the meantime this is how we will employ the fishermen" If they DONT cull the seals, then the seals eat all the cod, and there goes their other source of employment. Not to mention cod stocks are already low in that area, and the seals eat the most cod. Even after the seals are culled, there are still 10000's of seals. maybe Mcartneys ex-wife can take all her settlement money and pay out all the fishermen who will be on welfare if the seals killings are banned. A little hard to be homeless in seal land, unless you want to be a polar bear popsicle. Ban the hunt, and all the homeless seal fishermen can come live on the streets of Victoria and cull the local street people. :) (I kid.. I kid.. or do I? ) Paul Watson should stick to ramming and scuttling whaling ships, an industry that really isnt neccesary in todays day and age. - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 4:34pm Edited: Thu, 24 Apr 2008 4:35pm | ||
| What Did You Say? I'm Sorry, My Eyes Are On Fire... User Info... | Tofu eating terrorists? Anarchist scum? I'm glad you are all exposing yourselves for who you really are. I'm never posting on these boards again, ever. - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 4:35pm | ||
| Tyler User Info... | conrad is a good person. - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 8:46pm | ||
| Endeløs User Info... | "I'm never posting on these boards again, ever." GOOD. I'm glad my comment offended you enough to chase you away from the Live Vic board. One less granolafag, may your pacifist cohorts soon follow suit. - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 8:58pm | ||
| Doc User Info... | Good person or not, he is still a naive, stary-eyed, hippy idealist that needs to pull his head out of his ass. It is a fact of nature that big, mean animals kill smaller, weaker animals and that my friend is all that we are, big, mean animals. I suggest you get used to it or go live on some smelly hippy commune somewhere. ~No, I will NOT remove my hand from your breast, thank-you very much! Doc - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 9:03pm | ||
| Bryan User Info... | The volley of middle aged right wing bile spouted at every post on here even vaguely definable as expressing "hippie" or "PC" ideals is getting to be as funny, if not even funnier than said ideals themselves. I love this board. - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 9:12pm | ||
| The Coug User Info... | "GOOD. I'm glad my comment offended you enough to chase you away from the Live Vic board. One less granolafag, may your pacifist cohorts soon follow suit." Awww someones parents didn't give them the attention they needed growing up. It's okay to hide behind tough guy facades man, it's cool. - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 10:39pm | ||
| jeff User Info... | conrad has a full time job.....god and hes really nice and i like him a lot - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 10:58pm | ||
| trevor corey User Info... |  Don't be such a pussy. Two people do not represent this whole board. Also, I believe BB wrote "terrortits", not "terrorists". - Thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:39pm Edited: Fri, 25 Apr 2008 2:17am | ||
| BBJones User Info... | Those are frightening, TC. Much worse than i had imagined! Here's one question for you. If Newfoundland is the sencond larget oil producing provice in Canada, and Oil makes provinces rich, why is Newfoundland so poor? - Fri, 25 Apr 2008 7:47am | ||
| _Griphin_ User Info... | In the immortal words of Dade Murphy from Hackers, "Yak! Yak! Yak! GET A JOB!!!" (this is going out to Paul Watson's rant) - Fri, 25 Apr 2008 11:19am Edited: Fri, 25 Apr 2008 11:25am | ||
| trevor corey User Info... | Yeah. I feels bad fer the Newfies that have to do this to make money. I doubt they enjoy it. It's always the poor that work in slaughter houses. Some Newfies actually are guides for tourists who want to see the white pups, only to come back two weeks later, when the white coats are gone, to club them to death. - Fri, 25 Apr 2008 4:07pm Edited: Fri, 25 Apr 2008 4:08pm | ||
| Comrade Black User Info... | Actually they don't use the meat at all, they kill for furs, and on top of which they primarily kill baby seals cause the pelts are better for the fur market. In fact if they were hunting seals traditionally and using every part of the animal, and not selling furs in japan, with our government subsidizing (with our tax dollars) efforts to open new markets in Asia for seal pelts, then I might just not care as much... but when the quotas are about 270 000 per year, and the laws prevent any one from even documenting or observing the hunts, then no I can not support them. "If they DONT cull the seals, then the seals eat all the cod, and there goes their other source of employment. Not to mention cod stocks are already low in that area, and the seals eat the most cod. Even after the seals are culled, there are still 10000's of seals." As well seal populations are only a tenth of what they were a couple hundred years ago, and back then there was also many more fish. Depletion of fish populations is not being caused by seals at all, it is being caused by fish farms and industrial fishing. The reality is seals only come to canadian shores to birth, and they DON'T EAT WELL HERE, they fast the entire time, it is part of their life cycle. Don't believe seal industry propaganda. Even more, the reality is the seal hunts create only about 200 jobs for a bout a month and a half each year... So when you wanna talk about unemployment, this is barely even relevant, cause it is such a small portion of the population of New Found Land. "Give them back their country so they can make a living. Then you can harp on them about killing food. Until that happens you are all tofu-eating terrorits." Who, the indigenous people that lived on those shores for thousands of years before colonization? I agree then if thats what you mean... - Fri, 25 Apr 2008 5:38pm Edited: Fri, 25 Apr 2008 5:54pm | ||
| Endeløs User Info... | "Awww someones parents didn't give them the attention they needed growing up" A quote from Full Metal Jacket? Bravo! Try and come with your own material next time round, coug. - Fri, 25 Apr 2008 7:58pm | ||
| Doc User Info... | There actually are no more people that are "indigenous" to Newfoundland, there were eradicated years before that hole joined Confederation. Quite sad really. As for the hunting and protesting thing, hows about me and a thousand odd of my friends start showing up and blockading entrance to your little hippy, anarchist, tofu parties? We can drive around in our cars, and we can even take runs at people and ram the police when they try to intervene. When we get busted, we'll cry political persecution, and say that we are acting in the best interestes of society. Doesn't sound quite as good when it works against your beliefs does it? ~Sir, I'm gonna have to ask you to blow into this 21 guage breathalizer please. Doc - Sat, 26 Apr 2008 9:17am | ||
| trevor corey User Info... | Newfoundland is the only successful genocide in recorded human history. The last Beothuk died in 1829. - Sat, 26 Apr 2008 1:43pm Edited: Sat, 26 Apr 2008 1:43pm | ||
| trevor corey User Info... | I thought this appropriate for this thread http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tglVg9_G5nk&feature=related - Sun, 27 Apr 2008 2:41am | ||
| Andrew User Info... | In regards to the person never posting again due to the majority of people on here being macho assholes...It's like the jerry springer show, it's fucked up, but something deep down inside likes to watch. message boards are just like real life, if you challenge some1's little social position, they'll try to get rid of u by making ur life hell and not worth being there. Just ask Trevcore - Sun, 27 Apr 2008 6:37pm | ||
| Mr. Hell User Info... | No one can ever leave here forever of their own free will. - Sun, 27 Apr 2008 7:02pm | ||
| trevor corey User Info... |  If we ever meet I'll buy you a Pepsi. Sorry kiddo. - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 12:05am | ||
| Andrew User Info... | im devastated actually ! - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 6:14am | ||
| trevor corey User Info... |  | ||
| The Coug User Info... | A quote from Full Metal Jacket? Bravo! Try and come with your own material next time round, coug. Yeah only illiterate morons like you would assume that as a "quote" from some movie. I guess thats what you get when your opinions aren't actually researched whatsoever. - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 4:34pm | ||
| Aidan Logins User Info... | "hows about me and a thousand odd of my friends start showing up and blockading entrance to your little hippy, anarchist, tofu parties?" Why? Tofu Parties don't kill things. It's like you have no ideals except that you want your own selifish comfort, big trucks to pick up chicks with fake tits and all that. You'r pretty retarded I guess. Also want to say that I'm not an anarchist or anything like that, so don't start calling me an anarchist or pacifist or hippy or PC whatever like you do to anyone who isn't a selfish prick. I just had to make this comment cause I was shocked by how lame and weak your argument is. There is really NO reason for seal culling... at all. And the jobs... people can do something else with their time. There's billions of people who get by without clubbing baby seals to death. The ONLY reason people do it is to make a quick buck. I don't know whether that is wrong or right. but I know that is the only reason it's done. - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 6:12pm | ||
| {UTA} Mike User Info... | "And the jobs... people can do something else with their time" like what.. shovel snow? Catch cod for a few weeks every year and then what. I dont think there's alot of industry in some of these areas. There is fishing and there is sealing. They'd have to move some of these families to other areas in order to give them jobs.. otherwise they sit on welfare.. which leads to alcohol abuse and other social degradation all of which the government gets to catch grief from. On one hand they have the protesters calling for banning of the trade, but on the other hand if they ban it, then they have the tax payers crying foul as to the amount of bail out money that needs to be spent on supporting the families (or re-locating them, re-training them and paying them for their properties) Comrade Black said only about 200 jobs are created by sealing, I read last year they handed out almost 12000 licences. If it was JUST about the fur trade being unethical and a quick buck, Id hope it would have been banned already, but there are other social economical issues at hand. - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 6:39pm Edited: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 6:56pm | ||
| trevor corey User Info... | 200 does sound kind of low considering the total allowable kill is 350,000.If I lived in a shithole were the only way to make money was clubbing defensless animals, I'd move, or sell weed. You are supposed to crack the crab in half, then gut it before you boil it. Boiling crab alive is a very common mistake. - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 6:56pm | ||
| Endeløs User Info... | "Yeah only illiterate morons like you would assume that as a "quote" from some movie. I guess thats what you get when your opinions aren't actually researched whatsoever" OMG!! LOLZZ!! Another classic zinger, Coug! Hope you don't dare step over the boundary lines and call me dumb, stupid, or *GASPS*, retarded. - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 9:17pm Edited: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 9:18pm | ||
| Aidan Logins User Info... | Yeah 200 sounds ridiculously low, like maybe it was a typographical error. Or Black is lying. "they sit on welfare.. which leads to alcohol abuse and other social degradation" and clubbing baby seals for their pelts. I'm pretty sure there are other things people can do. Not matter how cold it is. Industry and Job are two different things; there are many ways to make a living without being a bottom level employee of a major corporation or clubbing seals for their pelts. Anyhow, I's rather help put people in a situation where they don't have to resort to cashing in on animal skin than have this kind of horror continue. Or maybe make it so that you're allowed to hunt the seals if you use the rest of the animal too. I don't mind killing animals too much (except in huge numbers for no good reason), but I really don't like huge amounts of waste. My bottom line is that I don't think creating jobs justifies mass killing. I mean, jobs are important... but come on now, gotta draw the line somewhere. - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 9:21pm | ||
| The Coug User Info... | OMG!! LOLZZ!! Another classic zinger, Coug! Hope you don't dare step over the boundary lines and call me dumb, stupid, or *GASPS*, retarded. I wouldn't call you "retarded" because people of that nature usually have some sort of legitimate drive in life, unlike social cannon fodder big-mouths on the internet. - Mon, 28 Apr 2008 9:55pm Edited: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 9:56pm | ||
| Doc User Info... | Aidan, First, you don't know me, so don't DARE to call me selfish. Second, ask California how banning seal culling works. They tried it about 10-12 years ago, while you were still a wee lad, and had to start contracting out seal hunts because the population of seals was out of control. Third, maybe once you've actually exercised your right to vote, then you can propose alternatives, no matter how naive or idealistic. To put it in perspective for you, banning the seal hunt would be analogous to outlawing logging or fishing in the Queen Charlotte Islands. There AREN'T other jobs for these people short of what Mike said, which is relocating and retraining the whole bloody lot of them. ~Sucking cock rules! As long as it's my cock and your sucking Doc - Tue, 29 Apr 2008 9:37am Edited: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 9:38am | ||
| trevor corey User Info... | The Haida hunted the sea otter to extinction. - Wed, 30 Apr 2008 3:34am | ||
| {UTA} Mike User Info... | Listening to some animal rights guy on the radio yesterday saying that boycotts of the canadian seafood industry have reached $500 million annualy and that over 6000 restaurants in the USA alone have stopped buying canadian fish products with the number growing each day by the dozens, ALL due to the sealing industry.. This is why I take a neutral stance to this issue, it seems to me that statistics and stories are blown out of proportion by both sides. How the hell do they track the fact that 'Enter number here' of restaurants have stopped ordering canadian seafood directly as a result, and that 'Enter another number here' are leaving each day. Is there an extreme right wing restaurant division that specifically tracks these statistics? - Wed, 30 Apr 2008 5:50pm | ||
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