Environmental issues are often overlooked by the vast majority of people in our society. If you’ve been raised in a normal family without any financial problems, in a neighborhood in a nice area of your town, you’re not really that likely to have been affected by environmental problems. Whether it is oil spilling in to the sea or fumes slowly tearing the ozone layer apart, it’s not something that is going to drastically change your life today, and I think that is one of the main reasons as to why some people can’t be bothered about it. Life in today’s world is hectic. For a lot of people, a day at work is more than enough, and when they get home they just want to relax and not do anything else. Sure, they’ve heard that global warming is something that is bad, but they choose to ignore it rather than to do something about it. It’s not until you start reading about it and actually understand what’s going on that you realize how alarming some of the problems our world are.
When you’re scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef outside the coast of Queensland in Australia, it’s hard to understand that somewhere else in the world, hundreds of whales are being slaughtered in the most inhumane ways. The beauty of the moment is all too overwhelming. At that moment in time it’s almost like you feel that everything in the world is perfect.
It wasn’t until 2003 that I saw a video that exposed the illegal dolphin fishing taking place in Taiji in Japan. I still remember how the water in the bays turned dark red from dolphin blood in the video, and it affected me in many ways. The video was released by an organization called Sea Shepherd, and I have a lot to thank them for. Ultimately, they were the ones who opened my eyes to what the world really looks like.
After I saw the Taiji dolphin fishing videos, I was so horrified that I immediately started gathering more knowledge of what was going on out at sea. I now regularly donate money to a number of organizations to help fight the illegal, and often completely unnecessary, fishing that is taking place all around the world. That is one of the reasons I’ve started this website. I figured I own it both to myself, but also to Sea Shepherd. Please visit their website. If not to donate or help, at least to educate yourself!