The Cove

I watched this movie and felt a little disturbed by it. In fact it's a mixture of sadness, anger and outraged. This is a more like a documentary made by Richard O'Barry or Ric O'Barry. If you do not know who is this guy (neither do I at first), maybe the word 'Flipper' will ring a bell? Yes, he's the trainer who trained the dolphins in the TV series Flipper. Here's a little bit more information about him...

Richard (Ric) O'Barry (born c. 1941) was first recognized in the 1960s for capturing and training the five dolphins that were used in the well-known TV series Flipper. Soon after one of the Flipper dolphins died in O'Barry’s arms he made a radical transition from training dolphins in captivity to assertively combating the captivity industry. O'Barry is currently featured in The Cove, a film that uses covert techniques to expose the yearly dolphin drive hunting that goes on in Taiji, Japan.



Coming back to the movie, The Cove...

...begins in Taiji, Japan, a town that appears to be devoted to the wonders and mysteries of the sleek, playful dolphins and whales that swim off their coast.

But in actual fact, tens of thousands of dolphins are being killed here every year and the worst part is they (the fishermen) did it heartlessly?

If we kill for survival, I can understand but killing these dolphins is clearly not for this reason! They captured the dolphins and chose few to be sold to marine parks for show purposes. The price of these show dolphins can fetch up to US150,000 each! Okay, I understand this part. They did it for money but what about the rest of the captured dolphins? Why do they have to kill them? Why can't they just set them free?

The dolphin meat cannot be consumed by human because the level of mercury in their meat is very high! Then came the outraged part, they fed these highly contaminated meat to their young children! What in the world is wrong with their brains!

Please watch this movie and tell me if I was wrong. If you are not a bit saddened or angered by it please let me know? For the time being just these photos to give you a little kick?

The colour of the sea water turned red from the blood of the dolphins!

I wish the killings will stop! Not only the dolphins but for sharks too!

For those of you who love sharks' fins soup or dishes please refrain from ticking them on your dinner menu. I know sharks are not so lovable or even likable but cutting off their fins and throwing them back into the sea to die slowly...? That's cruel!

And for your information, sharks' fins has no taste on its own and have no nutritional value of any kind! There are many other nice delicious food out there right? Tradition? If a tradition is not right, we should just change it? And this has happened before, many times. Like the tradition of leg binding for little girls in our Chinese culture? Well? Let's do it?

And I have to shout this out, Stanley and his family just did it. They omitted sharks' fins soup from their dinner menu (wedding dinner) and the announcement was made as such...

...for your information, the organising families have asked to inform you that as a small part of their contribution on shark conservation, no sharks' fins will be served this evening. The families asked for your understanding.

This could be a very small step to a big change to our society's mindset! To Stanley and his family, I SALUTE U!