Extra Credit #2

The Cove

The Cove is a documentary movie about the captivity, slaughter and industry of dolphins. Ric O’Barry was a guy who helped to take a movie of dolphin call Flipper but latter he realized the problems of dolphin being captive after his loved dolphin Cathy suicide. He spent ten years building dolphin industry up but now he spent last thirty five years to try to tear it down. O’Barry found out that there are dolphin slaughters going on in Japan, Taiji and he begins to gather people to reveal the secret. Taiji is the largest supplier of dolphins to marine parks and swim with dolphin programs around the world. Dolphins not being selected are being slaughtered and sold for their meat and an estimated 23,000 dolphins and porpoises are killed in Japan each year.

I was surprised about this truth of dolphin meat and slaughter happening in Japan. I never know this news before and I didn’t know that dolphin meats are sold as whale meats without labeling it. I felt rage in government and the media who are trying to cover the news. Tiji also give away free dolphin meats to school lunch which is ridiculously dangerous because dolphin meats contaminated with high levels of mercury. Mercury is toxic and cause Minamata disease in 1985. The children were starting to be born deformed, loss of memory, hearing, and eyesight; they die slow. The government knew this and they still allow Taiji to sell dolphin meat and keep the secret. Most of Japanese didn’t even know this. I was shocked.

There is organization that protects all cetaceans in the wild call IWC (International Whaling Commission) but small cetaceans, dolphins and porpoises aren’t protected because it is benefit for people who are slaughtering and eating the dolphins. In the movie, Japanese member of the organization claims that they are doing “pest control” because whales and dolphins are eating too much of fishes but human is the culprit for the problem of fisheries decline in the world. I was impressed about all the reasons those people can make up in order to kill dolphins. It was sad to watch this ugly truth in my country. Also it was tearful especially when I watched the scene when the fishermen are stubbing the dolphins and the water goes bloody red. The sound of dolphins cry could not get out of my ears.

There are so many problems in our world, in the air, on the land, and under the water. I felt the importance of media, we need to know what is going on and be active of these problems. We should stop those ironies.