Greenpeace protest for fish but not humans???
I'm sorry, but what the hell Greenpeace? You are protesting against Sealord for the way they treat Tuna, but not the way they treat humans???
Don't get me wrong, I love the little fishes too, and believe the manner inn which Sealord rapes the sea and over fishes is terrible, and hiding behind 'safe dolphin' brands which aren't actually very good at keeping dolphins safe is a joke, but right when Sealord are embroiled in allegations of slave labour, my deeper concerns are how Sealord are treating human beings, not bloody fish.
Rudman sets the scene...
In 1992 came the Sealord deal, giving Maori 50 per cent of Sealord Fisheries, 20 per cent of the quota for new species and additional cash and shares in other companies.
In 2004, Te Ohu Kai Moana was set up to oversee these assets. Since then Maori have built up this asset and now, according to the Ministry of Fisheries, "control or influence more than 30 per cent of our commercial fisheries".
As far as the $4 billion plus domestic fishing quota is concerned, Maori interests control around 37 per cent of it.
But instead of expanding the local fishing fleet, and creating new jobs onshore, the Maori quota owners are hiring ancient Asian and Ukrainian boats to do the fishing, and most of the processing is done overseas.
They are turning a blind eye to the often scandalous conditions of the workers on these ships.
Following the recent release of a report by an Auckland University team headed by Dr Christina Stringer, probing the labour and human rights abuses aboard foreign fishing vessels, Council of Trade Unions secretary Peter Conway called for pressure to be put on the fishing quota holders, not on the protesting Indonesian fishermen now facing deportation after fleeing their ship.
...the disgusting way in which Sealord has gone about playing an active role in turning a blind eye to this slavery should shame and shocknus every bit as much as their damage to fish stocks yet the human element in this abuse is utterly ignored by Greenpeace.
Greenpeace should have highlighted this human abuse alongside the Tuna abuse if they wanted to avoid the double standard of putting huge effort and cost about protesting for the fishes while ignoring humans.
We all love the fishes, but I have a soft spot for humans as well.
posted by Bomber @ 12:14 pm
9 comments
9 Comments:
The various iwi and Maori elite who are benefitting from the importation and exploitation of foreign labour need to lead the charge against this human abuse because if they don't, it will make mockery of their own fight for justice and rectifying the wrongdoings of British colonisation (which are justified) and leave them looking like hypocrites.
The fishing was good; it was the catching that was bad. - A.K. Best
Sustainable fish stocks is a core Greenpeace issue. Good on them (on behalf of us) for making a great splash with this issue. I hope all fish consumers get the message and vote with their dollars.
Yes the labour rights and local employment is also an important issue. However Bommer, don't knock Greenpeace doing a good job. Everyone on the left need to work together and support each others efforts. It's for other groups to get consumers and citizens worked up about the labour and value capture issue, particularly the Maori party, Maritime union, Labour party.
I endorse McDiesel's comments but would also like to hear a statement from Mana on the whole issue.
Dominic - well said.
Maori need to address this issue, or else they will be handing ACT and other right-wing Treaty-deniers ammunition on a plate.
Bomber, the idea that you can't pick your own battles to fight is nonsense.
It's the same one that would say we shouldn't be helping the poor in New Zealand when there's even poorer people in other countries. Don't fight about thing A, because thing B is worse!
We can't fight all the battles all the time, nor even just the ones the media chooses to highlight this week. We just fight the battles we're good at fighting.
In my view, Greenpeace is basically a business anyway. While as green as possible myself, I've never had much time for them. They just seem to want a capitalism that treats animals well.
Dude I think you're missing the point. Greenpeace is not talking about the treatment of tuna at all though I'm sure it's not pretty on the big industrial boats. The campaign is about the bycatch of juvenile tuna, sharks, turtles and a whole bunch of other stuff that in sum means the tuna fleets is wiping out whole ecosystems which in turn threatens the livelihood of whole pacific communities. It's about the marine environment and it's about justice for the Pacific people. Should Greenpeace work on related issues just because they're important ? No. If it took that approach it would be spread so thin it would never achieve anything.
@Bomber There's no reason why you can't start a campaign against Sealord targeting them for the human rights issues that you mentioned. So instead of talking about what Greenpeace didn't do, mobilize, take action, and stand up for what you are passionate about.
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