“POOR ME !”

The latest incident is further proof that the trolls value their cause more than the community guidelines and terms of service at Youtube.

They insist that every time an anti-sealing activist is suspended by Youtube for violations relating to the rules that it is not the violations that got them suspended but their opinions.

Youtube makes the decisions, not the person filing the complaints, yet they claim their opinions are being oppressed by unwarranted complaints.

Is it not possible for them to voice their opinions without violating the rules they agreed to comply to when they first signed onto Youtube ?

Bell Sympatico – Yahoo/Facebook Woes

A few days back Facebook died on me just after I had written a long message because of a problem at my IP. This was right after I had gone a weekend without internet service because their modem died.

Guess what happened yesterday ? The modem screwed up as they were doing maintenance.

And today ? Yet another lengthy post was sucked into their hole of errors. Their previous Yahoo/Facebook “network timeout error” problem came back.

What the hell is going on ? In June the quality of service i’ve had with Bell Sympatico dropped significantly. And worse, the power cord on my replacement modem is screwy !

History Repeating With Anti-Sealing

The anti-sealing activists are scoffing at sealers, claiming their traditions are violent, worthless and antiquated. They claim sealers are lazy, stupid, psychotic and demand that they be re-educated.

A few hundred years back someone had decided that the aboriginals of Canada and Australia were antiquated savages, with violent anti-social traditions that should be removed from their lives to make them fit in with more civilized people, who happen to be white.

The residential system was meant to re-educate the youth but instead it emptied out communities and tore people from their traditions, needlessly. It imposed numerous stereotypes, systemically, including this belief that aboriginals were lazy and prone to criminal behavior.

Are we not learning from history ? We should not be emptying out the fishing communities of Newfoundland because of the whims of arrogant foreigners, that do not know the realities of life in that province.

“Sealers are Lazy” ?!

This may be one of the oddest statements from the anti-sealing activists I encounter on Youtube.

Commercial fishing is far from an easy task. It’s labour intensive and quite dangerous at times. And sealing on the ice flows can be as traitorous, the weather being significantly colder during this off-season activity.

Sealers get to scamper in the deep cold, in the middle of nowhere, and haul seal after seal into their ship. Yet the activists believe it takes so little effort that lazy people would be interested in this activity.

These claims prove that they are removed from reality.

“The Seal Hunt Is Over” ?

I find it rather interesting that the anti-sealing activists on Youtube claim to believe the seal hunt is over because of the May 5th, 2009 vote at the European Union yet still post videos on the subject.

If they are so certain that the seal hunt is over, then why are they doing that ? Or harassing people on Youtube and Facebook for simply voicing their opinions ? Or re-posting videos from before the vote ? Or had attempted to Joe Job this blog ?

Even more interesting is the fact that PETA was so confident about the ban that they started their Canadian Maple Syrup Boycott twenty or so days after it was voted on !

IFAW’s Doubious Press Release

On December 17th, 2007 IFAW had a press release issued in reference to the European Union commissioned EFSA report that had been released that month on the seal hunt.

What is interesting about this press release is that it is entitled “EFSA Report to European Commission Finds Canada’s Commercial Seal Hunt Inhumane” and starts off with this statement :

“The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) today released its report on the Animal Welfare Aspects of Seal Hunting, finding there is absolutely no scientific evidence to support the Canadian government’s claims that its commercial seal hunt is ‘humane’.”

The IFAW press release also stated that the EFSA scientists found that “sealers often do not comply with the Canadian regulations in relation to manually checking the skull or administering a blinking reflex test”.

I find these claims interesting because of the following conclusions found in the EFSA document :

“Many seals can be, and are, killed rapidly and effectively without causing avoidable pain, distress, fear and other forms of suffering, using a variety of methods that aim to destroy sensory brain functions.” (General Conclusion, Part 3, quoted in full)

“There is strong evidence that, in practice, effective killing does not always occur but the degree to which it does not happen has been difficult to assess, partly because of a lack of objective data and partly because of the genuine differences in interpretation of the
available data.” (General Conclusion, Part 4, quoted in full)

Even the summary of the opinion issued by the EFSA clearly states that the evidence against the seal hunt was insufficient, inconclusive and biased.

It is then logical to believe they did not conclude that the incidents of non-compliance to Canadian regulations by the sealers were so numerous as to use to word “often”. And in reality the report had stated that several independent groups had observed non-compliance “on many occasions” (Section 7.3, page 77), which was apparently not convenient for IFAW to use.

Then there’s the alleged condemnation of the Canadian hunt.

Well, if the report had concluded the Canadian hunt was inhumane, it would have been stipulated, specifically in the conclusions, and a ban would have been specifically recommended.

Not only are there no conclusions in regards to the inhumanity of the Canadian hunt, there are no recommendations for a ban. The report also does not include a conclusion that seal hunt are “inherently inhumane”.

Furthermore, Dorian Prince, the EU Ambassador to Canada, categorically denied that the proposed ban targeted Canada in a July 17th, 2008 televised interview on CTV and stated that he believed Canada and the EU could find a resolution if the legislation is passed.

So much for IFAW’s claims in regards to the EFSA Report.

Ignorance is Bliss in Blind Activism

Can someone argue against the “interpretations” of a document they haven’t read ?

I keep on encountering anti-sealing activists that make uninformed assumptions in regards to many of the documents I mention to them. From the March 2001 document from anti-sealing group IFAW to the December 2007 EFSA report that the European Union commissioned specifically for their 2009 vote.

The situations involving the later is the most perplexing.

Why wouldn’t they have read the report ? It was linked prominently from the European Union’s site, the site dedicated to the proposal and the official press releases.

It’s not as if it was one of many documents either. They only had one document to read. And even if they didn’t want to read that 121 page report the 2 page summary of the EFSA opinion was also linked.

It is quite obvious that their research abilities are limited and that they’re blindly parroting what they find at the anti-sealing web sites.

The EFSA-Q-2007-118 Report

http://www.efsa.europa.eu/EFSA/efsa_locale-1178620753812_1178671319178.htm

A 2 page summary and 121 page opinion can be found in PDF form at the above URL.

They’re self explanatory and that’s why the anti-sealing troll(s) are flooding the Google searches with their propaganda using EFSA-Q-2007-118 as a tag.

FYI, this is the only report commissioned by the European Union in regards to their proposed ban. It was published in December 2007.

Respect & Flame Baiting

Apparently the trolls haven’t understood that everyone knows the game they’re playing.

Years back when I was a member of the Usenet I encountered people who claimed to support a cause but made it so that there was no way you could respect them as people or their opinions.

They went out of their way to be obnoxious and from the sidelines I watched, completely confused by it all. I didn’t see how this abrasive nonsense was in any way promoting their views or cause. And quite frankly their tactic worked on me. I didn’t want to discuss the issue with these jerks and posting my opinions on that Usenet group would mean that I would. So I did not post my opinion.

That’s the the point of the harassment and hate on Youtube ; Undue control.

They want new users to be confused and to post nothing, so their opinions are left undisputed. They want people to subscribe to a stereotype, even against their fellow activists, just to keep people from voicing their opinions is a reasonable manner. And they randomly insult people and make ridiculous claims to provoke users into off topic conversations to bury the posts that dispute their opinions.

That’s right ! I don’t think all anti-sealing activists are like these trolls. And that’s why they’re on my case. I am much too reasonable for their liking and it spoils their game.

Everyone is entitled to their opinions on Youtube, within the community guidelines established by the site. That means I am entitled to my opinion as much as the activists. And the trolls are merely a sideshow vying for much more of the attention and control than they deserve.

If they think they’re going to alter the purpose of Youtube, they’re sadly mistaken.

Permanent Banning = Game Over !

It appears that some of the more obnoxious anti-fur and anti-sealing activists believe that they are exempt from the rules at Youtube.

When a user violates so many Youtube community guidelines and terms of service that Youtube decides they are permanently banned, this means this user does not get to come back on Youtube. Period !

The Youtube Community Guidelines clearly state, in bold : “If your account is terminated you are prohibited from creating any new accounts.”

The community guidelines also state that :

• “YouTube is not a shock site. Don’t post gross-out videos of accidents, dead bodies and similar things.”
• “We encourage free speech and defend everyone’s right to express unpopular points of view. But we don’t permit hate speech (speech which attacks or demeans a group based on race or ethnic origin, religion, disability, gender, age, veteran status, and sexual orientation/gender identity).”
• “There is zero tolerance for predatory behavior, stalking, threats, harassment, invading privacy, or the revealing of other members’ personal information. Anyone caught doing these things may be permanently banned from YouTube.”
• Everyone hates spam. Do not create misleading descriptions, tags, titles or thumbnails in order to increase views. It’s not okay to post large amounts of untargeted, unwanted or repetitive content, including comments and private messages.

When a user chooses to violate these rules, they only have themselves to blame when they are reprimanded. And when they create accounts after they’ve been terminated with the sole purpose to harass people, they are violating their own internet provider’s terms of service and/or user agreements.