Analysis of The Reasons Why Protection of Whales Needs to Be Enforced

Whales are among the largest, most intelligent, and most interesting creatures on Earth. These creatures should be preserved and not killed for human means. Humans are killing whales for things like meat, cultural tradition, and of course, profit. In the early days of humans, whales would be hunted for essential reasons but toda y whale products are much less needed. The killing of these amazing creatures is wrong for many reasons. This paper argues three major cons of whaling: the inhumane methods to kill the whales, the fact that many are endangered and on the brink of extinction, and losing creatures of extremely high intelligence and value that are fascinating to study and learn from.

The practice of whaling uses an array of weapons to kill a whale, some are more humane than others but these methods can never guarantee a single lethal shot every time. The weapons used include penthrite grenade harpoon cannons and high caliber rifles. If the whale is not killed by the first shot what happens? The whale suffers and may escape injured making it a 'Struck and Lost' whale. These injured whales may either die slowly and painfully or live on with incredible and debilitating injuries. There are many cases of whales like these. In Greenland's narwhal hunts “struck and lost animals adds an average of 42% to the harvest statistics for 1954-1998” (Rommel, 4). In a recent hunt for Bowhead whales there were “13 whales that were struck and lost in 2011, two had a fair chance of survival, eight had a poor chance of survival, and three died” (Suydam, 3). These whales were not killed with the first shot or even a second shot, they escaped with injury. Most of these whales were severely hurt or killed from their injuries and were not humanly killed. There are some whales that are indeed killed with the first shot but it can actually be tricky to determine if a whale is badly suffering or is dead. Whales can store large amounts of oxygen and shut down organs to appear dead to the human eye and instruments when really they are still alive and experiencing intense and inhumane pain (Rommel, 5). The International Whaling Committee has a few factors to help determines if a whale is dead and insensible to pain, they include “Relaxation of the lower jaw; Or, no flipper movement; Or, sinking without active movement” (Rommel, 5). As one can imagine, a whale could go undetected by humans and still be alive and in an incredible amount of pain. The harpoons that are used actually explode when contact is made with the whale's body, this is supposed to instantaneously kill the whale but a hit whale may suffer for minutes or agonizing hours (“The Fallacy of Humane Killing”, 3). If a whale does not appear to be dead from the explosion a whaler might shot the whale with a rifle. This can cause the whale more pain if the shot is not fatal and increases the inhumanity of the action. These killing methods used to be worse. These now banned methods include cold harpoons and electric lances. A cold harpoon is one shot at a whale and does not explode, these will usually only kill a whale if a vital organ is hit and very rarely does this type of method give rise to an instantaneous death, the whale is almost certain to suffer for long periods of time (“The Fallacy of Humane Killing”, 4). The electric method was used by the Japanese to preserve the whale's meat. An exploding harpoon may cause damage or loss of meat whereas electrocuting the whale does not. This electrocution is very inhumane since the pain is so intense.

Many whales are either protected, endangered, critically endangered or extinct. Whaling increased endangerment status even when quotas are regulated; “At the June 2005 International Whaling Commission meeting, the Japanese government controversially announced plans to add endangered Antarctic fin and threatened humpback whales to its annual shopping list, and doubled its quota for minke whales” ("Whaling on Trial: Vindication!", 8). These whales are supposed to be protected because they have a low abundance. Why are they being killed? This only further endangers them. A study of whaling in Antarctica concluded that “blue and fin whales had been depleted by between 95-99% from whaling” (“Campaign Whale”, 6). Many countries are to blame but that does not matter now, what matters is that we deal with preserving all species of whale from whaling. Whale expectant mothers, mothers, and young are killed even though it is prohibited (Suydam, 4). How can a whaler be certain that the targeted whale is a male? In many species the male and females are indistinguishable. If a mother is killed, the calf will likely die of starvation because the mother is not present to provide milk and care. Whales repopulate slowly, females become sexually mature between 4 and 12 years and calf every 3 to 4 years (Clapham, 46). The decrease and elimination of whale populations will have an unwanted resulting effect on the ecosystem. Whales are a top predator and eat krill, zooplankton, and small fish. A single blue whale can consume 40 million tonnes of krill a day (Lian, 2). Without these whales the krill and small fish populations would grow out of control and cause a major shift in the flow of energy and food chain. Other organisms in the ecosystem are likely to be affected also. There may be an increase or decrease in the numbers of organisms that directly or indirectly depend on the whales. This kind of a shift in an ecosystem is usually quite destructive. A depletion of whale feces can also impact not just the ecosystem but the world. Whale feces provides nutrients for phytoplankton that use carbon dioxide from the air. It is estimated that 400,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide is pulled from the air due to whale feces (Lian, 2). This creates cleaner air in the atmosphere used by other organisms to maintain life. The dead carcass of a whale is also vital in ecosystems. When the body sinks to the ocean floor, many deep sea bottom feeders live of the carcass for long periods of time (Lian, 2). These organisms include sharks, crabs, worms, clams, corals, anemones, squid, isopods, bacteria, snails, and other scavengers (Switek, 3). If there are less whales to naturally die and sink, these dependent organisms lose a food source which can wipe out a species.

Whales are extremely intelligent, so intelligent that in fact they are being considered for special rights called non-human persons. These rights would be given to whales, dolphins, and porpoises because they “are so highly evolved and complex in terms of their behaviour that they deserve special protection with a universal bill of rights” (Connor, 2). India has recently officially granted these rights to dolphins since May 24, 2013 (Anagirlempath, 1). Dolphins and whales posses many cognitive abilities determining their personhood like self-awareness, concern for others, culture, and language (Anagirlempath, 1). Thomas I. White obtained his doctorate of philosophy at Columbia University and recently published a book on this subject. White states that “Personhood” is a philosophical concept that helps classification remain un-biased to species (White, chapter 6). White also says that persons are beings who: are alive and aware of their environment, have the capacity for pleasure and pain, have emotions and a sense of self, control their actions, recognize other persons and treat them appropriately, and have a variety of higher order intellectual skills, scientific research on dolphins shows that they have all of these traits (White, chapter 6). Because of this, dolphins are unquestionably persons and have a “moral standing” (White, chapter 6). This makes the murder of whales unmoral because they have such a “moral standing”. These rights, like in India, make killing and captivity illegal. Whales are also fascinating because of their social intelligence. There are occurrences where “non-kin form large hunting teams with enduring bonds, specialized tasks, tool use, and gender equity. Their haunting songs and social chatter also suggest that an un-deciphered intelligence echoes through our oceans” (Sharpe, 2008). There may be different dialects of the sonar “clicking” that whales and dolphins produce. These accents are quite distinguishable and show the complex intellect required to establish such a communication phenomenon. Humpback whales are known for their mating songs. These songs are complex with different sounds, rhythms, and tones. These whales are intelligent enough to recall and reproduce the same song after years. Biologsts fount that “more than 500 humpback whale songs and found that more than 35% of the compositions contain rhyming sounds, which the scientists believe may be mnemonic devices to help the whales learn and remember the songs” ("Rhymes Discovered in Whale Songs...”,1). Their intelligence gives them the advanced abilities to connect this keenly by a social means. Whales often live and travel in groups or pods. These are likely the whales family members or community. With killer whales, these pod arrangements are permanent. Killer whales form strong life long bonds with their families. They often share meals together (H, 9). Whaling and killing these intelligent creatures is a waste of value; whales' intelligence and social behaviors are unique and special. Whales should be studied and not killed, much would be learned from them.

There are some reasonable arguments to support whaling. One is the demand for whale products. Whale meat and items are set at a high price in countries like Japan where whale meat is a delicacy and where the rich own other whale items. There are communities in the major whaling countries, mostly Japan and Norway, that are centered around whaling. As for the demand of whale meat and products it seems that Japan is losing interest: “whaling is dying in the hearts, minds, stomachs, wallets, and marketplaces of Japan” (Ramage, 1). In Japan, people are losing the desire for whale but the frozen stockpile of whale meat increases. A study was conducted and found that “88.8% of Japanese people have not bought any whale meat in the last 12 months, while just 27% of respondents expressed support for whaling and only 11% said they support it strongly” (PR Newsline, 2). The desire and demand for whale products is decrease the need for whaling. Data like this does not help support whaling but help to decrease and eliminate whaling.

Another argument would be the necessary killing of whales for research. There are certain quotas countries may meet for scientific whaling of non endangered species, but a whale does not have to be killed to learn about it. One can “tag” a whale by attaching an electronic tag on the animal easily and painlessly. This tag can pinpoint and track to location of the animal to help provide information about migration, behavior, feeding, and breeding. Whales can also be observed from a boat, this method can track individuals or pods and their behaviors. Small underwater microphones can be trailed behind a boat to record and analyze whale's vocalizations. A small biopsy can also be taken, given that the sampler is close enough to the whale. None of these methods kill the whale but they do yield incredible scientific findings.

Whaling needs to stop. If it continues, there might not be any whales for the generations to come. Whales are essential to oceans and if they are gone then many problems are sure to follow. Whales are intelligent beings with emotions, personalities, and comlpex social lives. The methods used today are barbaric and inaccurate, usaly causing the whale a great deal of pain. All whaling shoud be stopped because of these and many other reasons. The importence of this issue is recognized my some but it needs to be recognized by many more in order to solve the problem.