A few months after the release of The Cove, The New York Times published an article by Tokyo correspondent, Hiroko Tabuchi, explaining the outrage that the film has sparked in Japan.
As the film touches on, most of Japan’s population has no ide
a Japan is a hub for dolphin-hunting, which kills thousands of dolphins each winter.
Tabuchi explains how “whale and dolphin hunting is considered an important part of Japan’s traditional livelihood and culinary culture,” a practice they defend against foreign interference, such as O’Barry and his crusaders (NYT). As explained in the previous post, people like “Private Space” go to great lengths to keep people from going near the cove, even though only a minority of Japanese eat whale meat, and even fewer eat dolphin.
There is a strong taboo in the Japanese news media against any criticism of the country’s farmers and fishermen. Instead, they are often depicted as heroic defenders of a way of life that is fast disappearing.
In light of the screening of the film at the Tokyo Film Festival (after initially being rejected), with a disclaimer stating that Japan had nothing to do with the production of the film, “the fishing cooperative at Taiji demanded that the festival drop The Cove from its program, accusing producers of trespassing on private property to film footage and of making false assertions”(NYT). The town even hired a lawyer and was preparing to take legal action.
No legal action has been taken by the Taiji fisherman’s union, and if they have not done so by now, I assume that they won’t in the future.
While the film has made both Japanese and international audiences aware of the issue, the Taiji community holds that the dolphin fishery is still an indispensable industry for the local residents to make their living (CNN). Even though many people in Japan were horrified by the massacre that occurs each year, the country has yet to take definitive action.
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