Poetry – One Gaff and a Slow Slice – a poem about the murder of the highly intelligent porpoises and dolphins.

Posted on by Opher

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This was a number of my Anthropocene Apocalypse poems.

The dolphins and porpoises have bigger brains than us. They are certainly intelligent. But they are gentle creatures with no need to build shelters or machines, let alone weapons.

I stood on the hills above Wineglass Bay in Tasmania with  my wife Liz and my friends Dylan and Julia. It is one of the most beautiful sights with its emerald green water and golden sands. I thought it was called Wineglass Bay solely because of its shape as a wine glass. It wasn’t. In the older days they would herd thousands of dolphins into the shallow water. The hunters would stand in the water gaffing them with huge serrated hooks and sawing through their necks to sever the spinal cord with great serrated knives. They would continue in an orgy of murder until all the trapped terrorised animals were slaughtered and the water they stood in was turned from emerald green to crimson. From the hills the water of the bay was turned red as if it was a half-full glass of Beaujolai.

Can you imagine that much blood?

Can you imagine the pain? To be speared with a huge gaff while some brute slowly cuts through your body with a great knife?

You’d think that was bad enough. But those were uncivilised days. People were brutalised. Except it is still going on. In the Faroe Islands they are still doing this.

They are as bad as the sadists of ISIS!

One Gaff and a Slow Slice

One gaff

And a slow serrated slice,

Sawing and hacking to the cord.

Then relief.

Agony prolonged,

Intense,

and grief.

 

Gentle and trusting

Easily herded

Into the shallows

Where the blood

Is curded.

 

Gleefully stabbed.

The shock resounds.

Excited hunter

With joy rebounds.

 

No concept of the pain.

Sad meat upon the shore

Crimson seeps between

Each grain

But the fever

Still screams

For more.

 

Butchered in the sunset

Ruddy water

Reflects

The crime.

Hunter stands

In depths

Of gory grime

As one

Of the great tragedies

Of our time.

Opher 4.7.2015

Anthropocene Apocalypse – the Rights of Chimpanzees, Gorillas and Whales?

Posted on by Opher

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The Civil Rights battle is won. Human Beings are all one species and equal before the law in most countries. All that remains is to enforce the law, remove the vestiges of racism and establish true equality. There are still battles to be fought but the war is won.

What hasn’t yet been won is Rights for Primates and other sentient animals.

The primates (Gorillas, Chimpanzees, Orangutangs, Gibbons and Bonobos) are our closest relatives. They are obviously intelligent, have advanced family structures and behaviour patterns and yet are still being treated like vermin. Their habitat is being destroyed by logging and they are being butchered for food, trinkets, medicine and to procure pets.

We need a world-wide Civil Rights movement for Primates. They are need to be afforded rights, protected and given land to live in undisturbed.

Another group of intelligent organisms are the whales, dolphins and porpoises. They have bigger and more complex brains than humans, a social structure, language and high intelligence yet they are still being barbarically gaffed and callously hacked and sawed to death in barbaric acts. They too need to be afforded rights as sentient beings and protected!

Now is the time to campaign for Animal Rights!!!

Anthropocene Apocalypse – The sadistic slaughter of dolphins and porpoises. Shame on Denmark, Faroes and Japan!!!

Posted on by Opher

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Dolphins, porpoises and whales have brains analogous to human beings. They have language. They care for their children and have a family life. They are highly intelligent. They are also very sensitive and suffer pain.

Why is it considered alright in countries like Denmark, Japan and the Faroe Islands to indulge in gratuitous cruelty that is so barbaric it is beyond belief. It’s the sort of thing ISIS are doing – not civilised people. It is a frenzy of unbelievable sadistic, primitive viciousness.

Dolphins are herded into a shallow bay. People wade out among them, or use small boats. They are gaffed with a sharp hook while someone saws at their neck with a knife until they reach the deep spinal chord and bring their agony to an end.

For me this is no different to doing the same thing with humans. Imagine if I went down the high-street herding all the shoppers into a blind alley and then waded in with a sharp barbed hook, gaffed them and started sawing they heads off as they screamed.

There’s no difference!

Dolphins and porpoises are sentient beings. They feel pain. They have imagination. They should have human status and rights. This is murder.

In Tasmania I was taken by my friends Dylan and Julia to see the most idyllic Wineglass Bay with it’s cobalt blue waters. I thought it was called Wineglass Bay because of its shape but that was only part of the story. It was one of the places around the world where people carried out this horrendous act of slaughtering dolphins. It was called Wineglass bay because when this poor animals were being butchered alive the water of the bay would turn blood red. From the hills around it resembled a half full glass of Beaujolais. Imagine how much blood it takes to stain a vast bay like that blood red?

This has to stop!