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Here's an educational article I found on the web. Japan is a nice country, its people are truly kind and friendly -- but there's one major problem: Japanese have become "Honorary Whites" and thus have abandoned (and look down on) their "lesser" Asian brethrens.
It aptly portrays the dangers of being an Honorary White (i.e. being used, exploited, and backstabbed!). I truly hope India realizes the folly of wanting to be an Honorary White as well. She will only get exploited, burned and hurt!
"The Japanese don't know this tsunami of bad publicity is coming their way."
From the Los Angeles Times
MOVIES
'The Cove' was covert, dangerous filmmaking
To shine a light on the mass slaughter of dolphins in Japan, filmmakers risked arrest -- and potentially worse.
By Rachel Abramowitz >>>
August 1, 2009
How does one expose the secret systematic slaughter of 23,000 dolphins?
It helps to have a billionaire, plus a dedicated activist, a neophyte filmmaker, two of the world's best free-divers, a former avionics specialist from the Canadian Air Force, a logistics whiz trained in transporting pop-music stars around the world, a maritime technician, a military infrared camera for night cinematography, unmanned aerial drones, a blimp and fake rocks specially designed by George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic to hold secret cameras.
Also required? A willingness to risk arrest, police harassment and potentially much worse.
That was the "Ocean's Eleven"-style team assembled to make this year's Sundance sensation "The Cove," the unconventional true-life environmental thriller that brings to light the mass killings of dolphins, specifically those exterminated in the Japanese port village of Taiji, just south of Osaka. The footage in the film, which opened in L.A. theaters Friday, is shocking -- a tranquilly beautiful Japanese bay turned red with the blood of dolphins, as well as graphic images of fishermen spearing the gentle, highly intelligent sea mammals.
Unlike their larger cetacean brethren whales, dolphins are not protected by the worldwide ban on commercial whaling that has been in effect since the 1980s. Taiji, a bucolic town filled with boats bearing the images of happy dolphins, is, as shown in the film, essentially a dolphin bazaar for marine theme parks hunting for their next attraction, and they are willing to pay $150,000 per dolphin. Unselected dolphins are herded into a heavily protected secret cove where they're slaughtered for food, never mind the fact that, as the film makes clear, dolphin meat is chock-full of mercury -- or as one on-screen scientist states: The creatures are essentially swimming toxic waste dumps.
The $2.5-million film, three years in the making, was born of the friendship between National Geographic photographer Louie Psihoyos and Netscape founder Jim Clark, old dive buddies who spent the last 10 years traveling the world searching for the best reefs, which they soon realized were dramatically deteriorating each time they returned.
Psihoyos recalls being in the Galapagos Islands and watching "long-line fisherman fishing in a marine sanctuary" and seeing "bombed out reefs in Indonesia." In response to the devastation, Clark launched the nonprofit environmental group the Oceanic Preservation Society, and Psihoyos began working on what initially was going to be four TV documentaries about the endangered oceans and their species.
Psihoyos started attending mammal conferences and stumbled upon the hero of his documentary, Ric O'Barry, in 2005. The 68-year old O'Barry, an endearing and obsessed activist, was the original trainer of the five dolphins who played "Flipper" on TV and blames himself for the worldwide popularity of commercial sea parks with their live dolphin acts, a practice he now decries. "A lot of the dolphins in the third world are in people's swimming pools. It's a copycat syndrome," says O'Barry, now a marine mammal specialist for the Earth Island Institute, and leader of the Save Japan Dolphins coalition. "People go to Sea World, and say, 'Wow I can do that.' There're dolphins all over the Caribbean, and Mexico -- the whole area is like a dolphin theme park with deplorable conditions. When I see them there, I feel directly responsible. I know the TV series helped to contribute to this mess. There are $2 billion in profits that come from the captive dolphins."
Filmmaking 101
At the time, O'Barry was on his way to Taiji, where he's been going several times a year in an effort to stop the slaughter, often with journalists in tow, and he invited Psihoyos to join him. Seeing the filmic potential in the trip, Psihoyos signed on, although the acclaimed photographer first decided to take a three-day filmmaking course.
"We're all professionals, just not at this," says Psihoyos, with a laugh. "I don't know if this movie could have been made by a professional crew. A professional crew would have turned around and ran. A producer would say 'This is nuts. How long is it going to take? How much is it going to cost?' There were just too many unknowns. The risk of getting hurt or jailed was daily. It didn't take filmmakers to make this film. It took pirates."
Indeed, the film depicts two commando missions into the cove, which is surrounded by razor-wire fences and policed by vigilant fisherman, desperate to keep their business out of the spotlight. There were actually 14 cloak-and-dagger operations into the protected cove to accumulate enough footage, and a dedicated runner who every day personally and craftily spirited the film out of town. "The reality was a lot scarier than the film shows," Psihoyos says. "We got ran out of town by the police twice." These days, when O'Barry makes his still frequent pilgrimages to Taiji, he always goes in full-blown disguise.
Clark brought in another diver buddy, actor-filmmaker Fisher Stevens ("Short Circuit"), to produce and comb through the nearly 600 hours of film. Stevens in turn brought in other professionals, including editor Geoffrey Richman ("Murderball" and "Sicko") and writer Mark Monroe.
Stevens insisted that Psihoyos actually become the on-screen narrator of the story, providing a charismatic and handsome figure through which to tell the story. "He didn't want to do it at first," recalls Stevens, who eventually convinced him. "The idea was this is not a just a documentary -- it's more like a thriller."
Psihoyos says that many of his stories for National Geographic had "an activist bent," but he also had maintained the belief that "a journalist is supposed to be a fly on the wall, he's not supposed to be part of the story. Still I realized if nobody gets active, then nothing would get resolved. I felt it was time to stand up."
Psihoyos and O'Barry hope the film will generate awareness and help bring change to the situation in Taiji. As a country, Japan has also opposed extending the international whaling ban to dolphins. Speaking before the film's commercial release, O'Barry noted, "[The Japanese] don't know this tsunami of bad publicity is coming their way. In Japan, they call it 'giatsu,' which translates into external pressure. . . .[This] movie is giatsu on a massive scale."
rachel.abramowitz
@latimes.com
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
A couple of years ago I was listening to a radio talk show host talking about how China slaughters untold number of dolphins. The guy was a racist because he knew it was the Japanese not the Chinese who do this. He was a gay that cried about dicrimination against gays yet was a outright racist at the same time. He especially had a problem with the Chinese because as he publicly let people know that he was outraged how China could have a maglev train, even though it was German made, while the US didn't. So he basically admitted that anyone he saw as inferior could not have anything that a white person didn't have first. So which is why he would frame China for what Japan does.
As for Japan... ain't it just too bad. Unlike the simple-minded Japanese, I have always known Westerners don't make any distinction from Chinese and Japanese or any other Asian regardless. So what happened to the "civilized" club of democratic countries that don't do inhuman acts? I hope this movie reaches down into the hypocritical bone of every Westerner. Because unlike China who can come out fighting if cornered, the West knows they can molest Japan anytime they want and they will be like a deer in the headlights conflicted with their false sense of kinship with the West and especially the Hollywood gods they worship who seems to behind this upcoming assault on Japan. The Japanese psyche is going to explode seeing this assault upon them when they thought they were a part of the elite club where members are suppose to keep a code of silence on each others cultural ugliness. You ain't so white like you think, Japan, afterall.
And I love how the Japanese are being portrayed like North Korea or any other Third World dictatorship where if a Westerner gets caught by them there's no respect for human rights and their lives will be endangered.
Japan, the hypocrite, thinking they could act as if they were humanitarians openly criticizing China as if they thought they were part of the elite club of nations. They love George Lucas in Japan. Now he and the Hollywood they worship are helping in maligning Japan. How ironic. This just goes to show there's no good deed that goes unpunished. The Japanese worship the West and this is how they get treated by them? There's a lesson to be learned about the West. The difference between being accepted by the West or not is the difference between you accepting racism or not. There's no such thing as equality in the mind of a Westerner.
Too bad Japan. I hope the West really pours it on.
Related link: 'The Cove' was covert, dangerous filmmaking - Los Angeles Times
It aptly portrays the dangers of being an Honorary White (i.e. being used, exploited, and backstabbed!). I truly hope India realizes the folly of wanting to be an Honorary White as well. She will only get exploited, burned and hurt!
"The Japanese don't know this tsunami of bad publicity is coming their way."
From the Los Angeles Times
MOVIES
'The Cove' was covert, dangerous filmmaking
To shine a light on the mass slaughter of dolphins in Japan, filmmakers risked arrest -- and potentially worse.
By Rachel Abramowitz >>>
August 1, 2009
How does one expose the secret systematic slaughter of 23,000 dolphins?
It helps to have a billionaire, plus a dedicated activist, a neophyte filmmaker, two of the world's best free-divers, a former avionics specialist from the Canadian Air Force, a logistics whiz trained in transporting pop-music stars around the world, a maritime technician, a military infrared camera for night cinematography, unmanned aerial drones, a blimp and fake rocks specially designed by George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic to hold secret cameras.
Also required? A willingness to risk arrest, police harassment and potentially much worse.
That was the "Ocean's Eleven"-style team assembled to make this year's Sundance sensation "The Cove," the unconventional true-life environmental thriller that brings to light the mass killings of dolphins, specifically those exterminated in the Japanese port village of Taiji, just south of Osaka. The footage in the film, which opened in L.A. theaters Friday, is shocking -- a tranquilly beautiful Japanese bay turned red with the blood of dolphins, as well as graphic images of fishermen spearing the gentle, highly intelligent sea mammals.
Unlike their larger cetacean brethren whales, dolphins are not protected by the worldwide ban on commercial whaling that has been in effect since the 1980s. Taiji, a bucolic town filled with boats bearing the images of happy dolphins, is, as shown in the film, essentially a dolphin bazaar for marine theme parks hunting for their next attraction, and they are willing to pay $150,000 per dolphin. Unselected dolphins are herded into a heavily protected secret cove where they're slaughtered for food, never mind the fact that, as the film makes clear, dolphin meat is chock-full of mercury -- or as one on-screen scientist states: The creatures are essentially swimming toxic waste dumps.
The $2.5-million film, three years in the making, was born of the friendship between National Geographic photographer Louie Psihoyos and Netscape founder Jim Clark, old dive buddies who spent the last 10 years traveling the world searching for the best reefs, which they soon realized were dramatically deteriorating each time they returned.
Psihoyos recalls being in the Galapagos Islands and watching "long-line fisherman fishing in a marine sanctuary" and seeing "bombed out reefs in Indonesia." In response to the devastation, Clark launched the nonprofit environmental group the Oceanic Preservation Society, and Psihoyos began working on what initially was going to be four TV documentaries about the endangered oceans and their species.
Psihoyos started attending mammal conferences and stumbled upon the hero of his documentary, Ric O'Barry, in 2005. The 68-year old O'Barry, an endearing and obsessed activist, was the original trainer of the five dolphins who played "Flipper" on TV and blames himself for the worldwide popularity of commercial sea parks with their live dolphin acts, a practice he now decries. "A lot of the dolphins in the third world are in people's swimming pools. It's a copycat syndrome," says O'Barry, now a marine mammal specialist for the Earth Island Institute, and leader of the Save Japan Dolphins coalition. "People go to Sea World, and say, 'Wow I can do that.' There're dolphins all over the Caribbean, and Mexico -- the whole area is like a dolphin theme park with deplorable conditions. When I see them there, I feel directly responsible. I know the TV series helped to contribute to this mess. There are $2 billion in profits that come from the captive dolphins."
Filmmaking 101
At the time, O'Barry was on his way to Taiji, where he's been going several times a year in an effort to stop the slaughter, often with journalists in tow, and he invited Psihoyos to join him. Seeing the filmic potential in the trip, Psihoyos signed on, although the acclaimed photographer first decided to take a three-day filmmaking course.
"We're all professionals, just not at this," says Psihoyos, with a laugh. "I don't know if this movie could have been made by a professional crew. A professional crew would have turned around and ran. A producer would say 'This is nuts. How long is it going to take? How much is it going to cost?' There were just too many unknowns. The risk of getting hurt or jailed was daily. It didn't take filmmakers to make this film. It took pirates."
Indeed, the film depicts two commando missions into the cove, which is surrounded by razor-wire fences and policed by vigilant fisherman, desperate to keep their business out of the spotlight. There were actually 14 cloak-and-dagger operations into the protected cove to accumulate enough footage, and a dedicated runner who every day personally and craftily spirited the film out of town. "The reality was a lot scarier than the film shows," Psihoyos says. "We got ran out of town by the police twice." These days, when O'Barry makes his still frequent pilgrimages to Taiji, he always goes in full-blown disguise.
Clark brought in another diver buddy, actor-filmmaker Fisher Stevens ("Short Circuit"), to produce and comb through the nearly 600 hours of film. Stevens in turn brought in other professionals, including editor Geoffrey Richman ("Murderball" and "Sicko") and writer Mark Monroe.
Stevens insisted that Psihoyos actually become the on-screen narrator of the story, providing a charismatic and handsome figure through which to tell the story. "He didn't want to do it at first," recalls Stevens, who eventually convinced him. "The idea was this is not a just a documentary -- it's more like a thriller."
Psihoyos says that many of his stories for National Geographic had "an activist bent," but he also had maintained the belief that "a journalist is supposed to be a fly on the wall, he's not supposed to be part of the story. Still I realized if nobody gets active, then nothing would get resolved. I felt it was time to stand up."
Psihoyos and O'Barry hope the film will generate awareness and help bring change to the situation in Taiji. As a country, Japan has also opposed extending the international whaling ban to dolphins. Speaking before the film's commercial release, O'Barry noted, "[The Japanese] don't know this tsunami of bad publicity is coming their way. In Japan, they call it 'giatsu,' which translates into external pressure. . . .[This] movie is giatsu on a massive scale."
rachel.abramowitz
@latimes.com
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
A couple of years ago I was listening to a radio talk show host talking about how China slaughters untold number of dolphins. The guy was a racist because he knew it was the Japanese not the Chinese who do this. He was a gay that cried about dicrimination against gays yet was a outright racist at the same time. He especially had a problem with the Chinese because as he publicly let people know that he was outraged how China could have a maglev train, even though it was German made, while the US didn't. So he basically admitted that anyone he saw as inferior could not have anything that a white person didn't have first. So which is why he would frame China for what Japan does.
As for Japan... ain't it just too bad. Unlike the simple-minded Japanese, I have always known Westerners don't make any distinction from Chinese and Japanese or any other Asian regardless. So what happened to the "civilized" club of democratic countries that don't do inhuman acts? I hope this movie reaches down into the hypocritical bone of every Westerner. Because unlike China who can come out fighting if cornered, the West knows they can molest Japan anytime they want and they will be like a deer in the headlights conflicted with their false sense of kinship with the West and especially the Hollywood gods they worship who seems to behind this upcoming assault on Japan. The Japanese psyche is going to explode seeing this assault upon them when they thought they were a part of the elite club where members are suppose to keep a code of silence on each others cultural ugliness. You ain't so white like you think, Japan, afterall.
And I love how the Japanese are being portrayed like North Korea or any other Third World dictatorship where if a Westerner gets caught by them there's no respect for human rights and their lives will be endangered.
Japan, the hypocrite, thinking they could act as if they were humanitarians openly criticizing China as if they thought they were part of the elite club of nations. They love George Lucas in Japan. Now he and the Hollywood they worship are helping in maligning Japan. How ironic. This just goes to show there's no good deed that goes unpunished. The Japanese worship the West and this is how they get treated by them? There's a lesson to be learned about the West. The difference between being accepted by the West or not is the difference between you accepting racism or not. There's no such thing as equality in the mind of a Westerner.
Too bad Japan. I hope the West really pours it on.
Related link: 'The Cove' was covert, dangerous filmmaking - Los Angeles Times
that is the way of the so called "free and liberated".
