Strange...

Certain issues seem to strike certain nerves here in Japan... take the debate over whaling. During a casual discussion on the subject, my Japanese companions started to visibly stiffen, offering only that whale populations are not decreasing, that it is the natural cycle of things, and that whales are only killed for research purposes...

... which is why whale meat is readily available at the local supermarket, I suppose? Which is why whale populations are dwindling? Which is why in the next quarter-century there is every chance that whales will become extinct?

Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of Japanese society for a westerner here is the seeming inability of the majority of Japanese people to engage in a theoretical, opinionated debate. Any hypothetical, Devil's Advocate style discussion seems to be viewed as a personal attack, and most people fall back on the government assertion that whales are not being killed for food, only for "research"...

Unlike cattle and livestock which are farmed for our consumption, whales are not taken from a surplus stock. As such, it seems a bitter shame that one of the oldest and most precious creatures in the earth's history should cease to exist, because of spineless ignorance and the hollow notion of "tradition"...