Imagine a thousand puppies hooked through the jaw being dragged behind a boat. It’s probably not the nicest though you’ve had today. But scientists say that biologically, fish have the same system for sensing pain as dogs. See, I wasn’t torturing you for no reason – I’m helping you give up fish.
From the awesome Vegan and Vegetarian Solutions for a Sustainable Environment Podcast
[audio:http://media.libsyn.com/media/water/2009-10-15_VSSE_AryanTavakkoli_EatingFish.mp3]
Take a listen, but in case you don’t have the bandwidth for a measly 8mb (if you’re like my grandfather on his 200mb monthly ADSL…)
Many people are turning away from red meat because of its negative health and climate effects. Many of these people are simply becoming vegetarian or vegan, but others are turning to fish for a source of nutrition. This is nowhere near as good for ourselves and our world as going veg and here are the reasons why (if you know of others, please comment below).
As a part of my support for www.blogactionday.org, I want to remind everyone that fish is a no no as far as the climate is concerned. Climate change affects the ocean and the ocean affects climate change. We’re changing the ocean’s ecosystem, something which can change the climate. Read point 1:
- As good as it was, the Podcast missed the biggest point, which I’ll copy and paste from The Institute of Science in Society:
Increase in carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere and global warming are threatening the oceans’ phytoplankton that supports all marine life from zooplankton to whales. Phytoplankton is also the fastest assimilator of carbon, clearing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to prevent it building up as a greenhouse gas that warms the earth.
When phytoplankton is in jeopardy, all life is in jeopardy, on land and at sea. Marine life will literally starve to death, and the decay and decomposition that follow would release enormous amounts of carbon dioxide from the estimated 800 Gt of the ocean’s standing biomass, resulting in further global warming on a massive scale. (emphasis added)
- Deep sea trawling (or “bottom trawling”) is extremely damaging to the ocean ecosystem. 300,000 whales, porpoises and dolphins are killed by these heavy steel nets that haul everything in their path to the surface. The bycatch is sometimes many times more than the intended catch. This is senseless, unnecessary and illogical. World fish populations are close to collapse now and many species are becoming extinct.
Links:- Deep Sea Trawling Neither Green nor Profitable – New Scientist
- Deep Sea Conservation
- Fish are Toxic, with dangerously high levels of Mercury, Arsenic, Lead. This is why pregnant women are advised to limit and avoid certain fish. PCB and Dioxin levels are high in all fish and several times higher in farmed fish.
- Fish farming can be even worse than commercial fishing. The farms are rife with pollution and disease (just like their land-dwelling counterparts). Fish excrement and chemical laden food falls in huge concentrates below the farms and contaminates and rots the surrounding ocean.Parasites such as sea lice are common fish-farming problems. Sea lice eat the living fish creating sores, sometimes down to the facial bones (“the death crown”). The crowding in the farms spreads such parasites and disease to wild fish. Farmed fish are fed from already exhausted fisheries. 5 kg of wild fish feed only one kilo of farmed salmon. Again, this is illogical, unsustainable and unnecessary.
More info: Fishinghurts.com
- Fish feel pain like mammals. Would you hook a puppy through the mouth and drag it behind you? Would you tie it up and throw it in a bucket to drown? It hurts to write these words as much as it hurts to read them. Neurobiologists who study fish are very clear that there is no difference between the pain felt by fish and dogs. Scientific adviser to the British government Dr. Donald Brown says the scientific literature is clear. Professor of marine science Tom Hopkins says that the pain a fish feels when hooked is like dentistry without Novocaine, drilling into exposed tooth and bone.Imagine thousands of fish dragged behind a boat by a sharp hook through their mouths? If it didn’t happen everyday it would be inconceivable. Imagine they are puppies. Again, visit Fishinghurts.com.