Lately, the Italian media has “ganged up” (again) on Canada because of the yearly seal hunt. They inevitably show brutal images of hunters beating poor defenceless seals to death. And brutal as it may sounds, there’s another version to that which the Italians don’t bother mentioning. Ever.
It comes from the April 7th edition of The Economist and the article, “Canada’s seal hunt. On thin ice. Global warning endangers a grisly ritual”. Apparently, “…in Newfoundland, the province most involved, it (the hunt) benefits only 6,000 people…”. Also, the killing of fluffy white pelts, as The Economist calls them, has been banned for 20 years. But the Italians don’t mention that when they scold Canada on the seal hunt. Nor do they tell us that Canada’s “slaughter” of the seals makes it sound as though they’re endangered, when in fact the seal population has, according the British magazine, tripled since the 1970s! And this year, due to the high mortality among pups in the south, Canada’s Department of Fisheries has reduced their quotas for the hunt to 270,000 seals, from 335,000 last year. Hunting has also dropped due to a lack of ice, and for that we don’t have to thank Canadian hunters but I guess ALL of us, including Italians: it’s due to climate change and global warming.
And when the Italians scold Canadians and their seals, rarely will they say that each bloody summer Italians abandon up to 100,000 pets before going on holiday (in three months’ time too). Who then should throw the first stone?
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