"Why not encourage the Japanese to take whales which are abundant, like Orcas"

Because Orca's aren't whales, they're a breed of dolphin.

The Japanese need to study whales for the survival of their economy and society - not dolphins.

One can only wonder how our country has survived all these years without researching whale after whale after whale...

Soon the Japanese will know so much about whales, there'll be none left!

Their research will then be about as usful as my job testing matches at the match factory.

"Why not encourage the Japanese to take whales which are abundant, like Orcas"

Minkes are plenty abundant. There are hundreds of thousands of Minkes in the Southern Oceans, and Japan's take is much less than a thousand per year.

All it comes down to is cultural imperialism. Western environmental activists believe Japan should not hunt whales because Western environmental activists believe whales are cute. End of story. There is no other rational opposition to the harvest of Minke whales.

Does anybody know if whale oil will work in my bullbar equipped, diesel four wheel drive?

Dick and Yobbo I think you're right regarding Minke whales. They are not an endangered species.

Yobbo there is another rational argument to killing whales and that is cruelty. Whales are shot by harpoons tipped with exploding grenades. The whales can take a long time to die and suffer terribly during this time because they are still conscious. If the harpoon shot does not kill the whale (approx 50% of the time) the whale is dragged to the ship and shot at with guns. It can take many shots to kill a whale, and some take an hour to die. We wouldn't let cows or sheep be killed like this, so why allow such cruel killing of whales? RSPCA guidelines for slaughter are that animals should be killed instantaneously or instantaneously rendered insensible to pain until death supervenes.

I think it would be okay to hunt and eat whales on two conditions:
1. The whales were not an endangered species; and
2. The whales did not suffer while being killed.

I'd rather have a good life in the ocean and die miserably like a relatively small number of whales than be a battery chicked or pig all my life. Being a milking cow doesn't look like a whole lot of fun either. Hunting is also legal in Australia, and I presume a fair few ducks etc. don't die a particularily quick death as well. Why should whales get special treatment ?

Pedant thanks for your post. It's about the only sensible and straight-forward explanation of a reason for not killing whales (or atleast not killing them as they are currently killed) that I've seen. I agree that we should atleast look to slaughter them as humanely as possible as we try to do with cows or other animals.

Having lived in Japan for a while I know that Japanese cultural attitudes to the treatment of animals can be quite different from our own. However, if the Japanese were given a fair comprimise whereby they were allowed to farm whales in exchange for coming up with more humane ways of slaughtering them then I think that they would be quite cooperative. It really seems to be the emotion driven garbage from the west that is causing this issue to be so imflamed.