End the killing of seals
By Danielle Katz
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals
This year marks Canada’s 150th birthday. But as it prepares to celebrate, a dark cloud hangs over the festivities: the bloodbath that takes place off the East Coast every year. I’m talking about Canada’s commercial seal slaughter, which began earlier this month. As you read this, baby seals are likely being shot to death or bludgeoned with hakapiks, deadly hooked clubs with a sharp metal tip.
Canada’s commercial seal slaughter is the largest mass killing of marine mammals on Earth and it has become a stain on the country’s international reputation. If we want this year’s to be the last one, every kind person must rally.
Thanks to sustained activism by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and others, we are close to ending it, but that’s little consolation to the tens of thousands of baby seals who will still be killed this year. Sealers object to calling these animals “babies,” of course, but that’s exactly what they are. Many are slaughtered before they’ve even eaten their first solid meal or learned how to swim. While sealers are not allowed to kill “whitecoats,” infants with iconic fluffy white fur, they are permitted to kill the animals as soon as the fur is shed, when the pups are only about 3 weeks of age. Most are killed when they’re between 3 weeks and 3 months old.
These babies are defenseless and have no escape from the violence that rains down on them. Eyewitnesses have seen weeks-old pups shot in the face and wounded pups left to choke on their own blood as sealers rushed to attack the next fleeing victim. This horrific spectacle is repeated again and again on Canada’s ice floes every spring, and for what? For fur, a frivolous product that no one needs or even wants.
Declining demand
All major markets for seal fur have closed, including in the U.S., the EU and Russia. This month, Switzerland became the 35th country to ban imports of seal-derived products. And despite a marketing blitz that has cost Canadian taxpayers millions, China has shown little interest in buying seal skins or meat. In desperation, the industry is now trying to revive the trade in seal penises, dubiously marketing them as aphrodisiacs.
One by one, Canada’s excuses for continuing to defend the slaughter are disappearing. The commercial East Coast slaughter is not a subsistence activity but rather an off-season venture that enables a few small fishing villages to earn some pocket change. When you factor in costs such as deploying the Coast Guard for several weeks each year to break up ice and rescue stranded sealers, flying delegations around the world to try to fight bans on seal fur, activist surveillance, and funding the seal-hunt bureaucracy, the seal slaughter hits Canadian taxpayers hard.
And while commercial fishers have long scapegoated harp seals for diminishing cod populations, a scientist with Fisheries and Oceans Canada says that the evidence for this claim is lacking. To the contrary, cod and seal populations have both grown over the last 10 years, according to John Brattey, who believes the seals actually prefer eating other types of fish.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has tackled many social issues since taking office. Now, he has another opportunity to offer help to others who desperately need it: baby seals. Please take a moment to urge Prime Minister Trudeau to lift the cloud darkening Canada’s anniversary celebrations by ending federal subsidies of the commercial seal slaughter.
Danielle Katz is an associate director with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.