Book Review: The Whale Warriors

I spotted this on the bargain shelf at Tattered Cover a couple days before my trip, and at $6 I could not resist. I had seen a few commercials for the new Animal Planet series Whale Wars and was both compelled and upset, because I would be on another continent when it debuted. So seeing the same kind of story in book form was perfect.

As it turns out, this book covers the same group that is featured in the TV series. They are called the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, and they are hardcore. Greenpeace is more well known for their whaling protests on open seas, but Sea Shepherd goes miles beyond protesting. Among other sea-life protection activities, they hunt down illegal whaling fleets with the intent to physically stop them. The captain Paul Watson has a record of sinking several whaling ships over his career without killing or harming anybody. His ship, the Farley Mowat has a pointed metal battering ram on the front they call a can opener. Whale Warriors is Peter Heller's account of covering Sea Shepherd's 2006 campaign to disrupt Japan's illegal whaling activities near Antarctica.

I found the book very interesting and I'm glad I picked it up. It is a huge eye opener. I did not know anything about whaling, and Heller gave a lot of great info. He exposes the amazingly cruel methods used, the bogus "scientific" justifications from the Japanese, and some of the realities of the world's dying seas.

The action in the book isn't as great as I had hoped, but the information was enlightening. I'm so glad the TV series is on now because the realities of whaling need to be further exposed. The Japanese are really just butchering these whales for no good reason. Screw cultural relativism; what they are doing is wrong. There is no logical justification and I suggest you look into the issue if you haven't seen the show.

Japan is still at it, by the way.