The world of Paul Watson, seal-hunter hunter
Friday, April 4th, 2008Anti-sealer activist Paul Watson, the founder of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, spoke to me today from the Halifax airport as soon as he landed. He’s the man who drives the sealing industry mad — raving mad. Beat-you-over-the-head mad.
Watson, who frequently sails his protesters into the belly of the seal-culling beast, announced that the recent loss of four sealers who were drowned when their boat capsized following a deadly Key-stone Cops Canadian Coast Guard tow, paled in comparison to the loss of seals, which he said, “is a greater tragedy.” He went on to name-call the sealers saying that they were nothing more than vicious baby-killers and “cigarette smoking apes with clubs.”
Kind of nasty considering the recent deaths.
Watson demurred. Then went on. “I had 30 sealers beat me almost to death. I don’t exactly feel great about these people.”
One deer hunter called in to say that he can’t buy his deer meat at Sobey’s and while his hunting is recreational he still eats what he shoots. Watson had less of a problem with this guy. His concern, he told listeners, was our raping of the environment: depleted fish stocks, species elimination, etc. Paul Watson particularly singled out the Fisheries Ministry for its incompetence. How true. The proof is in the pudding with the Cod on that one.
But, surely, recreational hunting is more heinous than people who are culling animals for profit. Burt Watson went on to characterize the sealing industry as a sham, as a form of welfare. And that we should just pay the folks not to hunt.
More callers said they support Watson than didn’t. His star turn in the documentary “Sharkwater: from the son of my old friends Brain and Sandy Stewart of Tribute Magazine Fame, Rob Stewart, hasn’t hurt his profile. He loves the battle.
The fixation on seals though has me a bit concerned.
Seals are seen as sympathetic for two reasons: the big watery eyes, and the nature of the killing process which involves clubbing. Watson has the seals and whales and other species all in the same category of man’s inhumanity to nature. However, the seal populations are actually doing ok. Whales, not so much.
Seal activists are an endangered species too if you speak to the cigarette smoking apes with clubs.
Paul Watson part 2 Monday morning April 7th/08. 9am AT. Stay tuned. Also on Monday morning, investigative journalist Daphane Bramham who goes inside the cult Mormon world of child-bride polygamy. “The Secret Lives Of Saints: Child Brides and Lost Boys in a polygamous Mormon Sect.”