whale-meat eating has been a japanese culture for centuries, and as long as they catch the number of whales NOT exceeding the limit they were given, i have no trouble with this.

they can catch it as research or as food, i don't care, as long as they follow the rules.

anyways, whale meat nowadays is quite expensive, and they don't really taste all that amazing, i guess it's an acquired taste.

* i ate a whale burger once in akita, and i don't remember what type of whale it was. it tastes like cheap chicken... and i don't really like the taste.

anyways, i don't think labeling it as 'research' is a retarded politics, because it was actually a brilliant use of a loophole.

The purpose of the International Whaling Commision moratorium on commercial whaling is to allow whale populations to recover such that sustainable commercial whaling can continue in the future. Japan's stance is that because a simple population count is not considered enough by the anti-whaling members of the IWC to determine the sustainablity of a comercial hunt they will use lethal methods to track the population dynamics. The measured taking of animals is a common method to determine that a population of animals is strong enough to support controlled hunting.

I see no issue with Japan's whaling operations. They're quota is between 0.13% and 0.26% of the Antactic Minke whale population, 338,000-665,000 depending on which population figure you use, and the whale is not considered endangered by most definitions.

I disagree with Whaling but Tenchu's assessment is very.... "colourful" to say the least.

Japan are exploiting a loophole in the Whaling-moratorium which allows for whaling in the name of research, and the by-product of such "research" to be sold off commercially.

It is not illegal though and such behaviour is not unusual on the International political stage.

I really don't have a clear idea about Japan's domestic politics and why the Japanese government supports whaling but from what I hear it's seldom eaten by Japanese people and there is no commercial benefit it.

It sounds to me that these whaling lobbyists in Japan need to be minimised somehow and that if that happens the problem will be taken care of... though since I have no idea as to why they're influential at all I will leave it at that.

I had raw whale at an izakaya two nights ago. I don't think I've ever had red meat that was so soft and full of flavor like that. Mmm...

Ugh...

I would never eat in a place that served whale meat.

Many restaurants in Japan do. It`s not really a niche thing, and is in fact quite common in izakaya. I`d say more of them do serve it than don`t - although raw is less common than whale "steak" and "bacon".

In some places, it`s even a staple of the lunch menu in school.

Meh... I won't eat at Japanese restaurants then. I like Indian food as much as I like Japanese anyway so if I eat out in Japan I'll just eat Indian.

Sad thing is, no one will get your bit of protest.
As long as you don`t order or eat whale, I don`t see the issue. If it were indeed something niche, with only a small number of places serving it - I could see the effort. Otherwise... well... Even small grocery stores have it so it will be quite hard to find food if you avoid all establishments that serve or sell whale.

Just don`t buy it.

I've also had whale sashimi, unfortunately it had been frozen and was ruined because of this. I also had two other cuts that were cooked, one was intestine and I believe the other was "cheek". The intestine cut was really good and also salty. The cheek was very tender and the taste was different from anything else I had eaten.

As far as whale consumption by the general population my wife says it is highly regional, being more popular in Yamaguchi prefecture and especialy Shimonoseki. Growing up in Kure, she said it was a regular part of school menus. However it is far less available now.

Most of the people that I talked to about the topic insist on being able to hunt whales because whale meat has a been a historic part of the Japanese diet. They also object to being told what to do by other people, much the way any countries citizens obejct to being told to do something by another country. I would also say that support for hunting of baleen whales is linked to the hunting of dolphins and porpoises. Only if you can get the communities that are involved in both to stop will either of them stop.

Of Iceland, Norway, the Faroe Islands, and Japan; Japan is probably the most likely to cease whaling. But I think they are also more resistant to outside influence because of their strong history of isolationism.

Maybe... I'll still try and only eat out of restuarants that don't serve it though but yeah... if it is that much of an inconvenience to avoid in grocery stores then I guess I'll have to make some concessions.

It's easy for restaurants. I like Japanese food but I can eat it anywhere from America to China. Furthermore I like other kinds of food just as much... like Italian, South American, Indian, Chinese.... so whatever.

I'm not really doing out of protest... well not to draw attention or anything.

Just a personal thing I will have set myself.