Whale hunting (and dolphin hunting) tends to come up any time the Faroes are mentioned, and I don't understand why it's such a cause celebre. I don't see how this is worse than any other form of hunting or fishing, and frankly I prefer it to most forms of animal agriculture.
Industrialized whaling has done massive damage to global whale populations, but the Faroes are tiny and (to my knowledge) their hunting practices do not have a significant ecological impact.
It's probably because a lot of people see whales and other large sea mammals (and some large land mammals) as much closer to humans than say, tuna. I'm not going to argue about whether or not that's a correct take.
And yes, there are plenty of very arguable inconsistencies (eg: eating pigs and cows is okay, eating horses is not) in how people look at animal consumption, but I don't particularly think that invalidates ethical concerns over whaling.
(edited for missing words)
What do you mean eating horses is not OK, in Switzerland we have plenty of horse butchers, you can find horse meat products like salami in all bigger supermarkets.
Its not consumed in same amounts as beef for sure, but its not shunned by most. And yes there is no logical reason to eat beef (especially calves if we consider the cuteness factor) but not horses, horse meat is even healtier.
I'm not sure how "it's okay in <country x>!" is really relevant, TBH.
There are plenty of places where it's not considered okay by a significant portion of the population, so it's a pretty valid to use it as an example of an inconsistency.
You said eating pigs is ok, massive numbers of countries don’t have pork on the menu. You said eating beef is ok, yet go to India and try that
Your culture thinks eating horse is bad, other cultures it’s fine, but beef or pork is bad.
Even dog and cat are quite common in many countries.
It's an example of an inconsistency that people have when it comes to what they're willing to eat.
It does not have to be a universal truth.
Cultural bias is definitely relevant in a discussion about why people do or do not choose to hunt and/or eat specific meats.
The point of horses was an example of an inconsistency. Saying "I have a counter example" doesn't create a relevant discussion.
It doesn't make the horses example any less of an example of an inconsistency.
Edit: not only that but the whole point of me bringing up inconsistencies was to say that just because they exist doesn't mean people can't have ethical concerns about whaling (or other kinds of animal hunting / farming).
Horses also eaten in Iceland
And Belgium.
Curious contrast about eating horses. My grandmother used to live in a very humble area of my hometown and I was there often. One day, when I was a kid, there was this agglomeration in the main avenue in that neighborhood: people lynched the butcher because for years he sold everyone horse meat for cow meat, and eating horse is taboo in my region of Brazil. Years later, when I moved to Switzerland I was very surprised when I first saw packaged horse meat for sale in the supermarket right next to cow meat, pork, etc.
>eating pigs and cows is okay, eating horses is not
This is the situation in the UK. Some people trace it back to chivalry, where horses were very expensive and mostly owned by the nobility. But I don't know if that is the real reason.
Although it turned out that British people have been eating plenty of horse. They just didn't know it:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21375594
I think it is because of the popularity of riding, people are used to seeing horses in that role. Not quite pets, but in a relationship to people closer to that of dogs and cats than that of farm animals.
People ride horses in France, so I'm not sure that is it.
Just makes it look like people jump on the virtue signalling bandwagon when they espouse opinions that aren't broadly consistent with their actions. Like eating beef several times a week, but feeling compelled to bring up the killing of pilot whales in amounts that are not at all concerning from a species conservation point of view.
I don't think many people live entirely ethically consistent lives. I sure don't.
That doesn't necessarily make every ethical boundary they try to have "virtue signaling".
I think a lot of it has to do with how they do it. I believe a lot of other whaling operations catch and process whales at sea. In the Faroes, whales are driven into shallow water and killed near land in sight of people who aren't accustomed to such things.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-45209587
Traveling to other cultures involves being exposed to seeing things you aren’t accustomed to. In many ways, that is the whole point.
I’m not defending the Faroese here (nor casting aspersions on them, either), more just saying that it’s your responsibility to research the customs of the places to which you travel, and to not go if you think you might not like what you see.
It's also fine to say it's cruel as fuck.
> "The squealing from the whales was horrible. They were putting hooks on ropes in their blowholes to pull them in and then hacking at them with knives."