A breathing piece of cat food = a human life

Anti-whalers launch kamikaze operation
By Tamara McLean in Auckland

RADICAL anti-whaling operation Sea Shepherd is promising dramatic attacks against Japanese whalers in coming months, with volunteers warning they're prepared to die for the cause.

The group has announced "Operation Divine Wind" against the Japanese whalers, who plan to begin their annual hunt in the Southern Ocean in December.

The name translates to the Japanese word kamikaze, the name given to World War II pilots sent on suicide missions.

In launching the mission at the weekend, Sea Shepherd leader Paul Watson promised on the group's Facebook page a "very dramatic and adventurous three months beginning in December".

"I am confident that we will be able to stop them once again," he wrote in a statement "liked" by more than 2000 Sea Shepherd Facebook fans.

The Sea Shepherd has become increasingly successful in recent years at disrupting the Japanese fleet, last year taking it further when New Zealand activist Peter Bethune illegally boarded a whaling ship and was briefly jailed.

Angered by the campaign, which reduced the catch, the Japanese government has injected $US27 million ($27.71 million) into the program to improve the safety for its crew.

Undeterred, Sea Shepherd announced it will send 100 volunteers to the Southern Ocean and is prepared to lose lives if necessary.

"They will have to kill us to prevent us from intervening once again," Capt Watson said.

"Are the Japanese people ready to take human lives in defence of this horrifically cruel and illegal slaughter of endangered and protected species of whales?

"If so, my answer to the Japanese Government is hoka hey - it's a good day to die."

He also accused Japan of continuing its whale program solely to save face against activist opposition.

"It now seems they are simply obsessed with killing whales not for need, and not for profit, but because they believe they have the right to do what they wish and kill whatever they wish in an established international whale sanctuary, just for the sake of defending their misplaced honour."

He claimed the program was a "smack in the face" to foreign nations that donated funds in the wake of Japan's killer tsunami.

Japan's Institute of Cetacean Research has yet to comment on the claims.

(End of story, my comments follow.)

This isn't treated as a bunch of nuts making completely idiotic statements, its treated as hard news. In this day and age, it unfortunately is.

Not too long ago, idiots like this would have been laughed off the face of the planet. "You want to commit suicide for cat food? Have at it sweetpea!" would have been a popular sentiment. Not these days.

So the life of a whale is seen to be equal to that of a human, even those who disagree will do so with a muted voice. This is where the ideas of moral relativism and "judge not lest ye be judged" has brought us. These nutjobs will confront the Japanese whalers and you can bet they'll be sympathetically portrayed by the MSM.

I've read several places where Caesar decreed his horse be worshipped as a god and when Christians refused they were persecuted. So it's a safe bet a good portion of the populace of Rome went along with worshipping "Flicka". A lot of them probably did it with a smirk.

But how many actually bought into the insanity with a straight face?

How far from that level are we?