Greenpeace Japan gets support from Japanese

[Sarapva]

The Greenpeace Japan web site (in English - http://www.greenpeace.or.jp/index_en_html ) is having a lot more visitors lately and comments by Japanese people who are against whaling. Here are some comments in English by people in Japan:

http://www.greenpeace.org/internatio...riticism200108

[Chi65]

Thanks a lot, Sarapva, if anything should happen, then its the waking up of the Japanese themselves, and that we have nothing against them in general, particularly not Germans!
I can very well sort out, who is what and where there, like everywhere, no matter which country or colour etc..

Very interesting posts indeed, I need more time to read it all. Wonderfull, to have some clear voices from inside.

as an addition:

Stockpiles of whalemeat are increasing in Japan

http://weblog.greenpeace.org/makingw...at_are_in.html

[Sarapva]

Yes, that's what I thought. These are people living in Japan who are against whaling. I'd like to hear from more of the population, though.

[Chi65]

We will, once they know where to put their voices to be heard against the PR machinery over there.

[caster51]

Greenpeace Japan gets support from Japanese

they got too fat like bush once supported Bin radin ?

[Kyoto Returnee]

Originally Posted by caster51

Greenpeace Japan gets support from Japanese

they got too fat like bush once supported Bin radin ?

I agree with Sara as it's pretty obvious, or at least the Japanese I have spoken to that they do not agree with killing whales..

Maybe that's because the pople I know tend to be family with children, not sure.

As for Greenpeace, they get support from many country and cultures around the globe and last time I saw, they had a Japanese member on board whilst they were pursuing the whalers.

As I have constantly said, this has nothing to do with racism, the issue here is whales.

I note some users thought that people were treating Japanese unfairly due to the whaling issues, but that just is not the issue nor the reality, obviously.

[Chi65]

Some addition from an article, thats generally interesting:

http://www.smh.com.au/news/whale-wat...764171935.html

Spy v spy as Airbus joins the fight against whaling

January 22, 2008

AUSTRALIA has flown its first whaling surveillance mission as forces opposing the Japanese fleet in the Antarctic are stepped up.

The flight by an extended range Airbus, along with the sighting of a Japanese fishing boat said to be shadowing Sea Shepherd, raise spying over the "scientific" whaling program to a new level.

There are also signs that international attention on the program is creating unrest in Tokyo.

The Airbus A319, fitted with surveillance and imaging equipment, is being used by the Rudd Government, with the Customs patrol ship Oceanic Viking, to gather evidence for potential international legal action against the whaling.

The aircraft performed well on a six-hour low-level search out of Hobart on Sunday, locating two foreign fishing vessels in Antarctic seas, a spokeswoman for the Home Affairs Minister, Bob Debus, said yesterday.

Bad weather prevented it from flying into its original search area but, depending on the weather and the activities of the whaling fleet, the A319 would fly another mission again soon, the spokeswoman said.

Greenpeace International's whales campaign co-ordinator, Sara Holden, said the vessel Esperanza was still following the Nisshin Maru and in turn was being tailed by the Yushin Maru No. 2, the catcher ship at the centre of last week's detention crisis involving Sea Shepherd activists.

Sea Shepherd's leader, Paul Watson, said his vessel, the Steve Irwin, had been followed for three days by a Japanese trawler.

"The Fukuyoshi Maru No. 68 is a large drag trawler," Captain Watson said. "It's a fast ship and can easily stay out of reach of the Steve Irwin. The Sea Shepherd helicopter has flown over and it is not equipped with any fishing gear. There is evidence of electronic surveillance gear."

A Japanese Government spokesman could not be reached for comment.

Ms Holden said: "So long as they are not whaling, that's the point. The fact we are in day 10 without any whales being taken is fantastic. We suspect that the orders from Tokyo are for nobody to see them whaling. This is a delicate time for them politically."

She said Japanese people were raising doubts about whaling.

Greenpeace's Japanese language website had leapt in popularity. The number of page views jumped last week from 10,000 a day to 10,000 in one hour.

"Visitors to the website are also signing up to a online petition asking Japanese ministers to stop squandering taxpayers' money on whaling," said Dave Walsh, a Greenpeace spokesman.

[Sarapva]

This is getting to be like a spy movie! The spies are being spied on .....

This is an interesting article by Junichi Sato from Greenpeace Japan:

http://www.greenpeace.org/australia/...ruths-hit-home

Until very recently, the whaling issue had been almost non-existent in the Japanese news media, due to the self-censorship within its ranks.

This was created because of the nature of the whaling debate.

Taking the anti-whaling position was considered to be taking a position that was anti-Japanese culture.

The anonymous anti-Australian video on YouTube implies exactly that. It is incorrect, a misreading of the anti-whaling campaign.

It is an attempt to divert the whaling debate towards something else.

To counteract any such perceptions in Japan, Greenpeace's key message is "We love Japan, but whaling breaks our hearts".

Linking whaling with nationalism in Japan has made it very difficult for the media to criticise the country's whaling policy.

Mr. Sato also says that there is what's called a "whaler's sanctuary" in Japan that protects politicians and whalers who have money in whaling. They have been able to control media access to what they're doing. He also says that the Democratic Party of Japan is gaining popularity and might be able to take more action against whaling if they can win the next election.

[Chi65]

Yep, thanks, and the controllers underrate the powers of the internet immensely ...
and those Japanese, who are already able to read a lot more than just japanese languages. . .

I am not surprised about the media control at all, nor about leading to false paths. We had enough of those here already to know their games. Only, who lies, has shorter legs, as we say in Germany. Sooner or later it will come out anyhow.

And the fanatic racist-section is too close to already known structures of the past.

Once this is known, certain parts will loose a lot of credibility. The usual Japanese is not silly at all, in fact, I always adored their quick understandings, once it was on the table, which is a case of information, and that can be found worldwide nowadays. And they will find it for sure.

[Kyoto Returnee]

Excllent article form the man, Sato san himself.

And the Greenpeace anti whaling lobby's motto:

We love Japan, but whaling breaks our hearts

Pretty much puts the misconceptions straight for the forum members who are claiming this is about racism, not whaling, although I note, their statements appear totally ignorant.

As far as I'm concerned, YouTube doesn't play into my hands, as let's face it, any Tom, Dick or Harry can make and post a video claiming what they like, willy nilly, simply expressing their own democratic opinion, just as they do on this forum.

I enjoyed the article.

Thanks Sara for posting

[kame]

Most of you are over-optimistic about some Japanese being against whaling. Japan is a democratic country so there are always people for and against every issue. As for whaling, even the Green Peace sponsored poll indicates that Japanese who oppose commercial whaling is a minority.

If you really know the Japanese sentiment about whaling, you would realize that those who are reluctant to commercial whaling are so because they don't think it's worth the effort to fight the outside pressure. Japan has traditionally been very weak against foreign pressure, especially from the US. A lot of people still think that if they get so angry about whaling, let's just give up and avoid the trouble. The anti-whaling sentiment coming from the resentment of the whaling act itself is rather rare in Japan.

This mentality still exist in Japanese for many other issues, like the BSE testing issue on imported beef, but Japan and its government have been unusually resilient against the foreign pressure on whaling. I believe there are lots of reasons for that which I am not going into here, but for Japan to take such a stand in a issue like whaling shows how important whaling still is to the Japanese culture.

[kame]

Largely thanks to the dangerous protests against whaling fleets televised in Japan, Green Peace has garnered more negative impression than positive from Japanese people. They must be totally ignorant of the docile nature of the Japanese public to understand that physical protests are frowned upon in Japan, or they do it anyway for PR overseas.

If you ask average Japanese, most of them will tell you that GP is too radical and they actually have negative impression on them. If the goal is to change the mind of Japanese public, I would not count on GP which is already labeled environmental nut-heads in Japan.

[Chi65]

Sorry, but I don't believe this, and the latest raise in visitors on the greenpeace pages show other signs.
The whaling-PR machinery in Japan runs, we know about the control and manipulations, but there are also people driving around peacefully to film and ask the public about their opinion and tradition, and the answers are more in the direction, that they had a time, when whaling was necessary and the meat cheap and available (while it is expensive now and thus not really a question to wish to keep it up forever), and they were very concerned about keeping the traditional balance. If so, like just hunting a few whales (under 10!) a year or so and only the near by ones.
And the hunting tradition is not that old at all (16th century), it is in contrary believed, that once before that they only used the stranded ones! So you can see in several museums even.
One must not talk them into something, thats not the theme nor tradition, they know very well, how it really is, and say it openly at enough places. They are not silly, as expected.
For those I have a lot of respect and understanding and thanks for telling the visitors in a friendly way, which also reaches the public.

The radical whalers are blinded by commerce, and its very interesting, that this is very well understood.

[kame]

Chi, believe what you want, but you obviously lack the ability to assess the true Japanese sentiment on the whaling issue, only listening to what you want to hear. If you observe Japanese media or are familiar with the current atmosphere in Japan, it's pretty clear that there's little momentum in anti-whaling sentiment within Japan. I suspect the increase in access to the GP website is purely due to the increased attention to the issue itself, especially after the recent outrageous Sea Shepard's act of terrorism.

The physical protest tactics employed by GP and Sea Shepard are never received well by the Japanese culture. In fact, it triggers negative impression on the issues they protest. If they haven't realized that, their PR is pathetically in need of overhaul.

A better explanation, however, is that their media stunts are intended for the audience outside Japan to get people like you excited so that they can attract more money and resources. They've been successful in that regard, but if you really want to change the sentiment of the Japanese people, GP/Sea Shepards are doing exactly opposite. After all, those organizations don't really want anti-whaling campaign to come to an end.

[Chi65]

I have not been talking about sea shepherds.
And if there are considerably many more coming also for signing a wish/petition etc., its not just curiosity. I think, the blindness is on anther side, also transferring the PR methods from the whalers, which is not new here.

Their "stunts" are not for getting people excited, but for the whales and making people aware of the false game, that is played, which was clear for me even before I knew about them, nor knew, that greenpeace came to the same conclusions... if you would have read backthreads, you would know this now.

You can of course make up your own stories, but they are not mine.

[Goldiegirl]

The Japanese censor tv programs that are against whaling. When I was at the hotel watching CNN-J the topic of whaling came up and the screen went black. Hmm, then when the show was repeated later that night it went black just for the anti-whaling piece again. I don't think most Japanese get to see what whaling really looks like.

[Chi65]

Which is what I mean with false game. . .

[kame]

I searched for Japanese blog entries on whaling by Google. I clicked on the first couple of dozen blogs that showed up and tallied according to the writers' opinions regarding whaling. 20 of them were clearly in support of whaling, many of them disgusted with the recent Sea Shepard and Green Peace protests (as I imagined). 4 of them were anti-whaling in nature of which two of the writers were living outside Japan (one in Australia, complaining how Australians accuse the author about whaling).

You may not see it through the filtered foreign media and your desire to not see what you don't want, the current anti-whaling protests are not changing how Japanese feel about whaling.

[kame]

Originally Posted by Chi65

Their "stunts" are not for getting people excited, but for the whales and making people aware of the false game, that is played, which was clear for me even before I knew about them, nor knew, that greenpeace came to the same conclusions...

Yes, GP does understand their stunts would get to you, anti-whaling generous donors outside Japan. I am saying that their stunts do little to change the opinion of the Japanese public, but rather serve to fuel the pro-whaling sentiment based on nationalistic arguments. If GP didn't see that by now, their PR people are blind. But again, they want this to continue.

[kame]

Originally Posted by Goldiegirl

The Japanese censor tv programs that are against whaling. When I was at the hotel watching CNN-J the topic of whaling came up and the screen went black. Hmm, then when the show was repeated later that night it went black just for the anti-whaling piece again. I don't think most Japanese get to see what whaling really looks like.

I've been living in the US for a while but I've never seen cows, pigs, or kangaroos getting slaughtered on national TV. For Japanese, whales are essentially the same as these animals we kill for food, so there's really no motivation to watch how whales are killed on 7 o'clock news. Everybody (not only Japanese) knows it's ugly to kill animals we eat, but we choose to close our eyes, at least keep it away from TV screens.

You can accuse the Japanese TV for not showing enough whale hunting scenes on prime time TV after the American networks start airing what's going on in the slaughterhouses in California.

[kame]

I cross searched Japanese blogs using keywords "whaling" and "Green Peace" (in Japanese) using Google. Out of the first dozen hits in which the writers discussed Green Peace in this context, not a single entry praised or said anything positive about Green Peace.

This cursory observation is consistent with my previous argument that the anti-whaling tactics of GP is not working if their goal is to change the attitudes of Japanese people toward whaling. It may puzzle you, but this is nothing difficult to predict if you knew Japan and its culture. Could the giant international environmental organization be stupid enough to overlook such an obvious marketing strategy? I don't think so.

[Goldiegirl]

There's no reason to watch theory sounds very scary to me. And I live in Wisconsin where cows and other animals are slaughtered and it is shown on tv, especially when they are abusing the animals before slaughter. As for changing the attitudes of Japanese people I think it's hard. I was amazed while in Guam, that all these Japanese paid 70 dollars to go and watch whales and dolphins and were ohhing and ahhing over their beauty, but they are the same people who will tell you that Japan needs to kill them for science and they eat them. I just can't figure that one out.

[Kyoto Returnee]

Originally Posted by Goldiegirl

There's nor reason to watch theory sounds very scary to me. And I live in Wisconsin where cows and other animals are slaughtered and it is shown on tv, especially when they are abusing the animals before slaughter. As for changing the attitudes of Japanese people I think it's hard. I was amazed while in Guam, that all these Japanese paid 70 dollars to go and watch whales and dolphins and were ohhing and ahhing over their beauty, but they are the same people who will tell you that Japan needs to kill them for science and they eat them. I just can't figure that one out.

Well said and that also always had me perplexed.

Howabout a dog being tied to a 50cm lead oustisde it's kennel at the front of a hosue 24/7.

I used to see this in Japan all the time, the dog had usually gone mentally insane, and yet, people would pass everyday, the people that think dogs are "Kawaii". Who are they trying to kid!

[Chi65]

Thats the shizophrenia these days, pretty much like the nazi, who went on killing kids alike as a job to feed his own kids. . .
If you have seen the videos, that I posted (and thats only the beginning of such actions), there is this former whaler, who was in the Olympic project and then stepped out of the company to do his whale-watching job to consciously "give it back", as he clearly says. Thats the way to come to own balance and mental health. And it also pays off for him. No need to worry about other ways. They are very well possible, in case, there are questions about how else to survive.
And he is an insider, which says it all!

People like him do more for the Japan's reputation than loads of fighters for killings (1000 for science? What a bad joke, still, no need to go to Greenpeace, to understand that, people can think themselves, but then may join others).
Don't anyone tell a German, we had it all to the extreme in our own past, and the cinema was packed when the film about scientific killings of the Japanese in older times came here, many have seen this during a Berlinale film festival! It was plain horror...such an argument wakes up such memories, very vividly, surely not only in me.

It will be like digging their own holes, as we say in Germany. We did this too, if anyone remembers. . .once you start in this direction. . .

It may need more time to inform people about all this, but it will come. No matter, what.

Now the censoring issue too, fine, just go on whalers, we know, who needs such censorings, those who have to hide something. Its kind of naive.

And, Kame, as I said before, there are many Japanese, that can read english, thus all the english pages in the internet, that are related, from all over the world. Its open and free for everyone to see. And whoever can read english, can also translate and spread around, any which way.
Without controls. . .no way back to old dictatorships in the end.

[Chi65]

And as long as no one can explain in depth, why any whale has to be killed for scientific reasons, nor what these scientific reasons imply, and why they are so necessary, when the meat is highly toxic, yet sold after such a research, even as health food (another big dangerous lie, and bluff, that shows, how little they care about the people, and reminds on "soylent green" again) etc. etc., I do not buy this reason at all.
The whaling commision's reputation isn't good anyhow, nor is it a global master above all.
One should really rather do a research about them and the reasons for those many (how many within all these years?), who stepped out. . .

I am sure, enough of this is known to Greenpeace, by the way.

Who cares about people?
Obviously only those, who care about whales.

(And one should not try to fool synaesthetes, we can "see", where the "wrong colours" in an argument appear. . .)