Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

A note I feel important to make: this ban concerns only Bluefin tuna, right? well, there's more than one type of tuna, and most types are not endangered (albeit some [like the albecore] are data deficient). why aren't yellowfin and albacore good enough to catch? surely targeting them rather than Bluefin would allow those stocks to recover. (AHHH WIKIPEDIA IT'S TOTALLY INACCURATE --> wikipedia isn't so bad for scientific stuff, so sayeth my crazy awesome solar system prof guy) --> ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albacore http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowfin_tuna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_bluefin_tuna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_bluefin_tuna

sebster wrote:The bio-mass of creatures at the bottom of the food chain needs to outweigh the top by several magnitudes for the whole thing to work. You need a hell of a lot more cows and chickens than people to keep us all fed, for instance.

Yes, of course you do. That's biology 101. I was not trying to support or disprove anything of the sort, only correcting a very wrong statement, that humans are the most populous species on the planet.

Kilkrazy wrote:
I asked my wife what she thinks of the failure of the ban and she is pleased because eating tuna is part of Japan's tradition.

What will she think when there are no tuna to eat? What becomes of this tradition then? Why do they not get that this fish will become extinct?

I cannot wrap my brain around the Japanese outlook when it comes to ecological issues or issues of animal welfare. It's like there is a total disconnect between what I see as the ineffable truth and what they say is a traditional right.

I love many things about the Japanese, in terms of their culture and then it comes to whaling, deforestation, dolphin eating and the insistence on finding the rarest things on earth so as to extract some small parts of them to eat for incredible sums of money.

Just don't get it and it leaves me seething.

CaptainCommunsism wrote:A note I feel important to make: this ban concerns only Bluefin tuna, right? well, there's more than one type of tuna, and most types are not endangered (albeit some [like the albecore] are data deficient). why aren't yellowfin and albacore good enough to catch? surely targeting them rather than Bluefin would allow those stocks to recover. (AHHH WIKIPEDIA IT'S TOTALLY INACCURATE --> wikipedia isn't so bad for scientific stuff, so sayeth my crazy awesome solar system prof guy) --> ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albacore http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowfin_tuna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_bluefin_tuna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_bluefin_tuna

I made the same point earlier, and I think you want...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skipjack_tuna which make up the bulk of what we call tuna, and aren't endangered/overfished.

The main problem with this is that its the small communities, who have fished/hunted without a major impact, that will be affected, while it is the giant corporations that messed everything up with over fishing.

talking about a goverments gross income or a country's status as a first or third world status, as both japan and canada have very very poor communities, just like the US has areas that are 3rd world, goverments don't like to support the poor by taxing the rich seeing as pissing off the rich (including the middle class) leads to less re-electability.

I do believe that systems have to put in place to protect the species from exstinction, while still allowing their harvesting. removing a top predator (in this case polar bears or blue fin tuna) would adversly effect the ecosystems they inhabit

If only we had called them Sea Kittens! None of this would be happening.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:
I asked my wife what she thinks of the failure of the ban and she is pleased because eating tuna is part of Japan's tradition.

What will she think when there are no tuna to eat? What becomes of this tradition then? Why do they not get that this fish will become extinct?

I cannot wrap my brain around the Japanese outlook when it comes to ecological issues or issues of animal welfare. It's like there is a total disconnect between what I see as the ineffable truth and what they say is a traditional right.

I love many things about the Japanese, in terms of their culture and then it comes to whaling, deforestation, dolphin eating and the insistence on finding the rarest things on earth so as to extract some small parts of them to eat for incredible sums of money.

Just don't get it and it leaves me seething.

MGS old chap, you're married to a foreigner.

At some time you are going to find a point of difference with her about something that really matters to her and you find silly, and you are going to have to keep your peace to stop the cutlery from taking off.

Instead of banning the fishing of the special tuna, why don't they charge the people fishing the tuna a fee for having reduced the number of tuna for everyone else. Then they can reduce the number caught and raise some money to buy the poor people new whatevers. The rich people will have to pay more for their tuna too, which should make them happy, since rich people love paying too much for food.

Instead of banning the fishing of the special tuna, why don't they charge the people fishing the tuna a fee for having reduced the number of tuna for everyone else

Because it doesn't work. If you raise the price people simply start fishing illegally, the Portugese have been fishing illegally in Canadian waters for decades, they fish fish which are protected by Canadian and in some cases international law, yet because they can still find a market for the fish they will keep coming back.

As for the Polar Bear hunt, a single polar bear can bring 20000 dollars, thats incredibly significant to a community where they average earning without that polar bear quota is either equal to or slightly over that sum.

When it comes to native communities fishing, in Canada they can already exploit resources that would be illegal for non natives to exploit because it falls under traditional way of living. There are fishing bans in some areas of BC that the Natives are allowed to ignore and do so. They fish with the exact same equipment that regular fishermen use, they sustenance fishing anymore than a regular fisherman with a 500 000 dollar boat is.

Ratbarf wrote:

Instead of banning the fishing of the special tuna, why don't they charge the people fishing the tuna a fee for having reduced the number of tuna for everyone else

Because it doesn't work. If you raise the price people simply start fishing illegally, the Portugese have been fishing illegally in Canadian waters for decades, they fish fish which are protected by Canadian and in some cases international law, yet because they can still find a market for the fish they will keep coming back.

But this is as much a problem with a prohibition on fishing them, isn't it?

How is this all going to effect the Tuna Helper, and other fish related boxed dinners, industry, or Tuna Box Industrial Complex?

MeanGreenStompa wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:
I asked my wife what she thinks of the failure of the ban and she is pleased because eating tuna is part of Japan's tradition.

What will she think when there are no tuna to eat? What becomes of this tradition then? Why do they not get that this fish will become extinct?

I cannot wrap my brain around the Japanese outlook when it comes to ecological issues or issues of animal welfare. It's like there is a total disconnect between what I see as the ineffable truth and what they say is a traditional right.

I love many things about the Japanese, in terms of their culture and then it comes to whaling, deforestation, dolphin eating and the insistence on finding the rarest things on earth so as to extract some small parts of them to eat for incredible sums of money.

Just don't get it and it leaves me seething.

QFT.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:

Bunker wrote:

MeanGreenStompa wrote:

I'm glad you find the extinction of a keystone species a serious matter.

I find it considerably less serious than the forced poverty of entire communities just because someone who isn't affected by it at all decided his "morals" were more important than people being able to sustain a living.

Are you a member of PETA by any chance?

I find the ramifications for all the communities that rely on the tuna and the current ecology of the pacific to be pretty serious. I find the maintaining of a species to have a higher priority than some folks getting to pay for expensive sushi who eat it for the pure reason that it is becoming rarer and rarer.

Who the hell is in forced poverty in Canada? What the hell is the GNP of that country? Forced Poverty? Are you trying to be insulting to the people living in real 3rd world nations or is the administration of your country so utterly bereft of capability that it would allow part of it's population to endure poverty due to not being able to hunt bears.

Here's a kicker, just what the hell are they going to do when there aren't any more left, you'll still be in the same mire, are you seriously telling me it's better to just 'delay it a bit whilst we make some species extinct after which we'll be right back at the same problem'...

Pure gold. So your answer is:


We demand to be able to hunt these creatures so we aren't forced into poverty, we will hunt them until they are extinct, at which point, we will be forced into poverty.

There will be no sustained living if this is not halted now, no 'cultural future'.

MGS: unfortunately you hae fallen for one o them Media one sided stories. argue all you like, with what ever facts you like, but your just blowing hot air out your Arse on this, No, really you are no matter how you slice or dice it......
*YOU ARE ONLY PARTIALY INFORMED*
You dont know squat about fur harvesting in canada, and what it means to the people that have to do it, nor are you apperently aware of the fishing situation and its regulation in canada, nor who is really to blame for a huge number of speices ending up on the endangerd lists.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Ratbarf wrote:

Instead of banning the fishing of the special tuna, why don't they charge the people fishing the tuna a fee for having reduced the number of tuna for everyone else

Because it doesn't work. If you raise the price people simply start fishing illegally, the Portugese have been fishing illegally in Canadian waters for decades, they fish fish which are protected by Canadian and in some cases international law, yet because they can still find a market for the fish they will keep coming back.

As for the Polar Bear hunt, a single polar bear can bring 20000 dollars, thats incredibly significant to a community where they average earning without that polar bear quota is either equal to or slightly over that sum.

When it comes to native communities fishing, in Canada they can already exploit resources that would be illegal for non natives to exploit because it falls under traditional way of living. There are fishing bans in some areas of BC that the Natives are allowed to ignore and do so. They fish with the exact same equipment that regular fishermen use, they sustenance fishing anymore than a regular fisherman with a 500 000 dollar boat is.

Agreed. though it is worth of note that the First nations people dont abuse the privlage. i have never heard of abuse even one millionth as bad as that of illigal trawlers from alot of european and asian countries. most canadians remember fish like Flounder, cod, turbit, bluefish, that were almost whiped out in part mainly due to illigal foreign fishing.

Hawkins wrote:
MGS: unfortunately you hae fallen for one o them Media one sided stories. argue all you like, with what ever facts you like, but your just blowing hot air out your Arse on this, No, really you are no matter how you slice or dice it......
*YOU ARE ONLY PARTIALY INFORMED*
You dont know squat about fur harvesting in canada, and what it means to the people that have to do it, nor are you apperently aware of the fishing situation and its regulation in canada, nor who is really to blame for a huge number of speices ending up on the endangerd lists.

So your point is... 'You don't know, you're only citing reuters and the discovery channel news, so your talkin out your arse'...

And your contrary information is? Nowhere.

I am well aware two species are facing imminent extinction and your telling me I only know half the story. WHERE IS THE OTHER HALF OF THE STORY THAT TELLS ME THESE SPECIES ARE NOT GOING EXTINCT? (see that, I used caps too!)

As to who's to blame, yep, that's important to understand and deal with, however my concern is the same as the rest of the world's should be, the prevention of the extinction of species.

Hawkins wrote:"You dont know squat about fur harvesting in canada, and what it means to the people that have to do it, nor are you apperently aware of the fishing situation"

I know those communities will be royally fethed when there aren't any left... So what's your point?

Don't scream at me I don't know and then fail to provide me with this hidden truth you know about and I don't. Enlighten me so I no longer talk out of my arse about things I've read about in internationally recognised media and that actually took place.

'Hey they have the right to hunt these things!' - Great, until there aren't any left, then what? What fething use is their 'right' to hunt then? What is their 'right', who ordained it, cos in my book, no culture should be allowed the right to arbitrarily exterminate a species.

But you dont understand. its that simple. id suggest you take a long walk off the short goggle pier MGS. if your wanting sustansiation evidence . it wont be hard to find.

You for lack of better words, dont know [MOD Edit - Please do NOT try and get around the swear filter.] about the canadian harvests and the regs concering them.
Complain and whine all you like on this topic, but dont exspect me to treat it as anything but contemptual. inform yourselfand then come back swinging, till then your words or arguements are useless.
the canadian govt has been facing problems like this for more than 80 years, and for the most part i dont think you really understand the complicaions behind decisions to oppose the ban.

I understand clearly that both the Canadian and Japanese administrations have opted for the short term placation of their electorate over the long term implementation of measures that will safeguard those same communities livelihoods.

Why do I need to obtain the 'evidence' of what you're saying? You made the claim now back it up!
I've already cited my evidence of the failures of your government to do anything but just take the path of least resistance.

@Hawkins: That's the saddest excuse for a counter argument I've ever seen.

If you object to MGS' position, you should posit a situation in which extinction due to overfishing is a desirable thing.

I would suggest you check the CBC for the polar bear parts only, you may think it would be partisan but they hate the current leading party and they hate them right back so its pretty balanced.

Tyyr wrote:Yes, of course you do. That's biology 101. I was not trying to support or disprove anything of the sort, only correcting a very wrong statement, that humans are the most populous species on the planet.

Cool, I wasn't trying to correct, just expand on your point. It's good that we agree.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Gwar! wrote:If only we had called them Sea Kittens! None of this would be happening.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Ratbarf wrote:

Instead of banning the fishing of the special tuna, why don't they charge the people fishing the tuna a fee for having reduced the number of tuna for everyone else

Because it doesn't work. If you raise the price people simply start fishing illegally, the Portugese have been fishing illegally in Canadian waters for decades, they fish fish which are protected by Canadian and in some cases international law, yet because they can still find a market for the fish they will keep coming back.

People still murder despite it being illegal. The answer to the issue isn't to let everyone murder, but to put more resources into preventing and punishing murder, and increasing the penalty for breach.

sebster wrote:People still murder despite it being illegal. The answer to the issue isn't to let everyone murder, but to put more resources into preventing and punishing murder, and increasing the penalty for breach.

And this will work because we have unlimited resources.

@Hawkins. It's not so much a question of what the medias been feeding us here. It's not even a question of morals. The established fact here is:-

-This kind of tuna is being overfished. In a short period of time there will be none left.

From that one fact, we can extrapolate another one using logic:-

-If there are none of that kind of tuna left, the fishermen will be left in exactly the same position as if they were stopped from fishing that kind of tuna tomorrow.

Ergo:-

-The fishermen are screwed, whether they stop fishing the tuna now, or when the tuna eventually do go extinct.

The only difference is that if they are allowed to keep fishing tuna, the fishermen have a short period of time before they are screwed. However, the trade off for this is the extinction of a species.

So what do you think is more important? The temporary economic stability of a few Canadian fishermen before they're screwed, or the extinction of an entire species?

To quote those old Fighting Fantasy books:-

You Decide!

ketara; lets leave off the fishing question and look at the bear issue first, i'll put together the fish thing later.

firstly though id like to say its not my job to educate people that are too lazy to inform themselves. in the future ya can burn, i wont be playing the 'i have an artical, so i have an 'informed opinion'' game again.

Moving on

here is the organization:

http://www.cites.org/eng/disc/how.shtml
Please read the parts concerning artical 1 protection and artical 2 protection.
Do note that its the american proposal that is pushing for the Raise of artical 2 to artical 1 on polarbears. its suspecious that hunting that claims less than 300 bears anually, is under fire when the REAL problem is global climate change, the US knows this and its widely belived that the CITES proposal is an attempt to shift focus away from this fact. (Really? you ask, are you joking? no im not the US has a proud history of clouding the facts, mudding the waters, and passing the buck. And then using liberal media to back up the shananagans) ECO crisis, and not hunting is the number one cause for the polarbears plight. a fact the US proposal failed to mention.
If climate change continues, by 2050 2/3rds of the polorbear habitat will be gone. no matter if they are hunted or not, soon after the bears will only exist in zoos.


Next:

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/north/story/2009/10/26/nu-cites-pbear.html#socialcomments



http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2010/03/18/tech-cites-polar-bear-ban.html?ref=rss

Both of these articals name actual harvest numbers, and informed individuals that understand the polarbear problem. though they are CBC reports and partial to the canadian standpoint, still looking offers a more factual view of the subject.



http://pbsg.npolar.no/en/status/status-table.html

this is the Athority on polarbears, no other organization has as much knowlage or on site information as these people.




lastly....
http://www.panda.org/what_we_do/how_we_work/policy/conventions/cites/cites_cops/15th_meeting/

Wait WTF?!?, WWF opposes the proposal for the bears?.
this should be suficent data for most of you, but a few points to add are:
1. the Artical 1 status does not not mean that the bears are not hunted. regardless those bears will be harvested.
2. regardless of this propals pass or fail the first nations people by right have the legal atthority to hunt these animals. and if Canada were to recind that right.... well those of you living in canada might remember the OKA crisis, and the deaths that resulted in it. the canadian govt. is right not to open that can of worms again.
3. Lets say it again. Harvesting bears isnt an issue as to weather this species will survive or not. harvest numbers against B&DR, are sustainable. the proposal has done just what it was ment to do, deflect critic away from the real problem. which is 'CLIMATE CHANGE' (oh look me and my caps again)
4. the Cites proposal is regarded by many of the people invloved withthe bears to be misinforming and lacking in factualy information.
5. canada has a very long history of protecting ALL its wildlife species, and has had mesures in place to protect ALL of our species. do you really think we wouldnt stop the hunting if it actualy was harmful? come on, wake up. Canada has been monitoring and protecting the bears for well over 50 years. those measures are not static, they change, cope, evolve to fit.

Claim backed.

Edited for stupidity.

I hear polar bears are having trouble with starvation. In that case, I wouldn't think hunting would be making things any worse for them, as long as you're not hurting their food supply.

Melchiour wrote:One species driving another to extinction is the process our world works with. It has happened before humans, it will happen after. Humanity is one species imp0acting another, it happens. Globally the world will survive, things will be impacted and things will change sure, but the world will still spin.

Humans are still animals. No one calls an animal that eats another to extinction immoral. That is all we are doing really. The idea that we should save another species seems misguided.

This. This is what I believe in. He is right. Animal extinction is a natural part of life. They are dying for a simple reason. They cannot adapt. And I know what a lot of people are saying. Extinction has to happen by natural means, where their habitat is destroyed or killed by a predator. But what they aren't realizing is that we are the reason they are dying. We are the top predator. To progress and multiply, we have to kill others. Kill or be killed. Trying to save a creature who has a high chance of extinction already is a waste of resources, time and effort. We shouldn't try to save all these animals just because we like the pretty little birds and fishies. These animals have lost the evolutionary arms race. It is unfortunate, but this is the way things are.

We shouldn't try to save all these animals just because we like the pretty little birds and fishies.

Why not? It's of less real benefit to us to wip them out than to sustain their existence. If we sustain them, we can eat this kind of fish for many centuries to come.

Besides I don't buy the whole evolutionary argument. Why? Because if we are to regard ourselves as better than animals, then we have to see ourselves as being capable of stepping outside of the boundaries that nature created for us. We may still be animals at the end of the day, but the point I'm making here is that we don't have to act like them! Otherwise I might as well just rape every women I like the look of, and kill anyone who I don't like the look of.

Ketara wrote:Because if we are to regard ourselves as better than animals.

Who says we are? You are free to go Raping and Pillaging as much as you want, just don't be surprised when the other monkeys come and lock you away in a monkey cage.

I never meant that we were better than animals. What I meant was that no animal(except other humans) kills humans in large numbers. But, as humans, we kill large amounts of animal spacies for food and other resources. I don't know about you, but that sounds like a top predator to me.

I usually see the evolutionary argument as a counter to the claim that we must preserve nature because it is intrinsically important ("deep ecology"). The counter being that as every species will gladly cause any amount of harm to other species or ecosystems to multiply and take over, then an imperative to preserve nature when this inconveniences us us unnatural, and if nature is intrinsically valuable we are obliged to destroy its current, ever-changing incarnation if this is in accordance with unchanging natural law.

It is a good argument, I think, against the "deep ecology" mode of thought, and one of the main reasons I don't see any merit to it. It does not, however, justify any environmental destruction which is harmful to humanity. Waste isn't advantageous.

Frazzled wrote:What do tuna eat? They aren't that picky-lobsters, crabs, shrimps, and barnacles. clams, snails, oysters and mussels, and even each other.
Read more at Suite101: Sea Creatures 101: The Life of Your Seafood: Tuna http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/aquatic_animals/106468#ixzz0ielGwx6A


Man those tuna are mean, picking on those poor hapless shrimp, oysters, and snails. Butchers!
Save our snails! Eat a tuna!*

*Brought to you by the Save our Snails Alliance, a political action committee founded by the Escargo Alliance, The EA, protecting the rights of those who eat icky things for 175 years.

Polar Bears are cool though, and man they love coca cola!

Not only Coke, but Rum as well. BUNDABERG FOR THE WIN!

CaptainCommunsism wrote:A note I feel important to make: this ban concerns only Bluefin tuna, right? well, there's more than one type of tuna, and most types are not endangered (albeit some [like the albecore] are data deficient). why aren't yellowfin and albacore good enough to catch? surely targeting them rather than Bluefin would allow those stocks to recover. (AHHH WIKIPEDIA IT'S TOTALLY INACCURATE --> wikipedia isn't so bad for scientific stuff, so sayeth my crazy awesome solar system prof guy) --> ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albacore http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowfin_tuna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_bluefin_tuna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_bluefin_tuna

I agree with this. Most of the Bluefins cought I'm thinking will end up in cans. And canned tuna tastes like arse. FACT.

Besides. Albacore and Yellowfin are considered fantastic eating fish.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:
I asked my wife what she thinks of the failure of the ban and she is pleased because eating tuna is part of Japan's tradition.

What will she think when there are no tuna to eat? What becomes of this tradition then? Why do they not get that this fish will become extinct?

I cannot wrap my brain around the Japanese outlook when it comes to ecological issues or issues of animal welfare. It's like there is a total disconnect between what I see as the ineffable truth and what they say is a traditional right.

I love many things about the Japanese, in terms of their culture and then it comes to whaling, deforestation, dolphin eating and the insistence on finding the rarest things on earth so as to extract some small parts of them to eat for incredible sums of money.

Just don't get it and it leaves me seething.

Again, MGS has proven to be awesome.

whatwhat wrote:

CaptainCommunsism wrote:A note I feel important to make: this ban concerns only Bluefin tuna, right? well, there's more than one type of tuna, and most types are not endangered (albeit some [like the albecore] are data deficient). why aren't yellowfin and albacore good enough to catch? surely targeting them rather than Bluefin would allow those stocks to recover. (AHHH WIKIPEDIA IT'S TOTALLY INACCURATE --> wikipedia isn't so bad for scientific stuff, so sayeth my crazy awesome solar system prof guy) --> ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albacore http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowfin_tuna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_bluefin_tuna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_bluefin_tuna

I made the same point earlier, and I think you want...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skipjack_tuna which make up the bulk of what we call tuna, and aren't endangered/overfished.

Striped Tuna (Skipjack in some places) is a baitfish here. Most people wouldn't be caught dead eating the smelly, horrible, oily excuse for a fish. Good bait for decent fish but...

My vote? I say restrict the fishing of a very important marine predator.

It's almost the oppostie of what I feel about Kangaroo culling.