The New Foundlander Hunt

The New Foundlander Hunt

a essay

By Fleur De'La Fay

For my english class

If you got an e-mail saying “let’s put 4000 Newfoundlanders out of their jobs” would you forward it? What if it said, “let’s stop an entire economy dead in its tracks!” Or how about “lets take money out of the places it is needed (like heath care or education)” Now what if it said “lets stop the slaughter of innocent baby seals” then would you forward it on? Well it’s basically the same thing. According to CBC in depth 4000 Newfoundlanders hunt seals. And according to statistics Canada Newfoundland has the sixth highest unemployment rate in of all the Canadian provinces with 37.5 thousand people unemployed. Now if we stopped the seal hunt the unemployment rate would rise to 41.5 thousand raising it to the fifth highest in Canadian provinces. This in truth will cost the government money that could be used towards education or health care. Even if the government doesn’t take the money from those arias it has to come from somewhere so the only other option is increasing taxes, and nobody wants to pay more for a situation that could have been easily avoided. The Seal hunt, which according to the DFO is self-sustained, costs the government less. The seal hunt is all that these people know and according to CBC it only accounts for 1/3 of their salary. So if we take this away from them how would they feed their children? They can’t hunt seal. Now you could argue that they could go to a fast food restaurant and work there oh but wait PETA and IFAW have already made it public places like KFC and McDonalds who pay minimum wage have animal cruelty going on there. Seems to me in a province where 37.5 thousand people are unemployed jobs that PETA approve of are well hard to find. If we ban the seal hunt we could have whole community starving. Calling ourselves “dignified Canadians” doesn’t seem right if we just stand by and let fellow Canadians starve?
And speaking of Canadians stopping the seal hunt while I was researching I found something that was well odd. Most of those “lets stop the slaughter of baby seal” sites are hosted by American citizens. IFAW is an American invention, PETA is American based, Pamela Anderson is American okay so she was born in Toronto but MOST of her bits are American. They who don’t depend on the hunt for their next meal are telling the people that it really affects, what do to. If Canada bends over backwards to accommodate their bossy neighbors when will it stop? How much Americanization can Canada take before we are American? Already they are creeping in with their fast food chains and clothing brands. The seal hunt is just another thing that the U S would be stealing from us. Its is our culture! Ancient traditions that we have kept are being threatened by the pop culture of America. So if we change this wont that just be and invitation to the Americans to change everything? What else can they take from us? The Junos?
After reading all those American sites a thought struck me, I don’t remember ever hearing about a campaign to protect the Deep Sea Anglerfish. You know the big ugly fish with the light on its head from finding Nemo? Well that’s because the angler fish is exactly that… big and ugly. If seals weren’t so cute I don’t believe that people would protest the hunting of them. In all actuality the mascot seal of PETA’s stop the seal hunt rally is incorrect instead of using the older grey seals that hunters are Legally allowed to hunt for their mascot PETA chose a newborn seal that according to CBC Canada banned all hunting of in 1987. People that’s 20 years that this law has been in order yet PETA hasn’t updated their campaigned?
But aside from having information that is out dated PETA and IFAW are misinforming the public. If you have ever been to the PETA or IFAW site or received a chain letter with a link to a video about seal hunting you will have seen 2 minuets of a little baby seal pup with huge brown eyes and a soft white coat withered in pain as the big mean human drove a spike into its head. Now as I stated earlier the seal with white fur is not legally allowed to be hunted. Now after watching the video I really don’t blame you if you wanted to stop the seal hunt because well that video was gross and it looked really violent but PETA forgot to tell you that the seal in the video was already dead yes even though it moved and blinked it was dead. According to the DFO seals have a swimming and blinking reflex that takes place after they die. They blink and thrash although since they are dead they are in no pain. According to PETA’s “independent” veterinary studies show that “most” of the seals are killed inhumanly, but According to the veterinary journal of Canada 98% of all seal killing is humane. Now doesn’t it seem strange that PETA couldn’t site the vets? And “most” seems like a pretty rough estimate to me.
So all in all if we want to be the 51st state that has a whole community starving, high taxes because the unemployment rate is so high and a population where misinformed super stars tell us what traditions are important then be my guest send that chain letter on.