For nearly four years now I’ve been faithfully writing for CHRISTIANITY TODAY, seeking to challenge believers to apply Christian truth to current events. But now it’s summer, and I’m told that many CT readers are off on vacation or sabbatical or washing the family car. Thus I thought it was an opportune time to write about a pet peeve that has been bothering me, but that I have been able to keep submerged—until the whales.
You remember the whales: those three poor, cold, gray mammals in Barrow, Alaska, that brought the civilized world to its knees for two weeks during the 1988 U.S. presidential election.
Trapped by early freezing during their annual migration south, the whales were noticed by Eskimo fishermen, who sounded the alarm—and network executives, looking for a break from the dismal bilge of the presidential campaign, sent 5,000 reporters to Alaska. And it was these unlucky correspondents, swaddled in layers of long johns, some wearing fur-trimmed parkas made from some other innocent animals that nobody even mentioned, who presented the whale tale to the rest of us.
Night after night we witnessed the woes of the whales, heard their tortured breathing as they surfaced in their narrow, icy air holes. We mourned as the smallest of the three finally succumbed and made his way to whale heaven. We held our collective breath as helicopters dropped huge cement blocks through the ice to break a pathway of breathing holes to the sea. Skeptics worried we would kill the whales rather than rescue them.
Then, in their continuing efforts to break the ice in U.S. relations, the Soviets came to the rescue in a massive icebreaker.
Well, after some anxious moments, the whales managed to make their way to the open sea; I assume they are safely vacationing somewhere off the coast of Mexico, drinking plankton margaritas and toasting the Soviets. We’ll probably never see them again unless they show up as guests on the Geraldo Rivera show.
Whale Harassment
Since the celebrated Alaskan case, I’ve started a whale file. In it is the Associated Press story about the Austrian tourist who was fined $1,500 after pleading guilty to harassing whales off the coast of Hawaii.
A man named Peter Gottwald sailed to a protected area in ocean waters near Maui to get a good look at the whales who hang out there. I’m not sure just who reported Gottwald, but the U.S. magistrate who fined him sputtered in ire, “It seems perfectly clear that he was chasing the whales. Were he a U.S. citizen, he would spend several nights in jail.”
Poor Mr. Gottwald concluded wistfully, “This is not the aloha spirit.”
You can imagine my horror. Here I am, pouring my life into prison ministry and criminal justice reforms. Prisons across the country are extremely overcrowded—and now here is a federal magistrate trying to use up scarce prison cells for whale molesters. Fine them if you like, beat them severely with wet blubber, but please don’t put them in jail. What will it do to our national statistics and whales’ well-being the world over if they recidivate?
Drawn in by now, I started staying up late poring over animal press clippings. My wife, Patty, who stuck with me through Watergate, for the first time began to worry. She even shipped our goldfish, Pinky, off to the vet for her own protection.
I have expanded my study from those who blubber over whales to those who will do so over just about any animal. I’ve discovered that animal-rights groups consider bacon and eggs the “breakfast of cruelty.” I had long realized that bacon required a pig’s ultimate commitment, but had assumed chickens somehow got over the loss of their potential children.
Not so. Losing their eggs produces a severe postpartum depression in impressionable chickens; some have even been known to commit poultricide by standing in heavy rains with their beaks uptilted till they drown.
Some 10 million Americans contribute to animal-rights groups whose goals range from protection of endangered species to the banning of woolen clothing because sheep are sometimes nicked in the shearing process.
We have all heard stories of the Animal Liberation Front’s break-ins at medical labs in order to free laboratory animals.
And recently a group stormed a Chinese restaurant in Maryland, liberated six lobsters from their holding tank, spirited them to the Maine coast, and set them free.
From whales to chickens and pigs and their parts, it seems there’s a lot of emotion and eloquence expended on animal issues these days. I guess I hadn’t noticed; I had been preoccupied with caged people rather than animals.
Balanced Stewardship
The furor leaves me with two thoughts, however.
One, I hope that the fearsome silliness of the animal-rights extremists won’t deter us from recognizing our responsibility before God to be good stewards of our environment. We must exercise compassion and wisdom in how we care for our planet and the beasts that fill it. Not because animals have “rights”—but because such care is consistent with the human dignity and character to which God calls us.
And second, caring for our furry friends and rescuing trapped whales are indeed worthy causes. But the enormous effort in Alaska last fall, which cost millions of dollars and untold man-hours, is a tragic picture of our often-misplaced priorities as a people.
At the same time those trapped whales were headlining the evening news each night, homeless people huddled on street corners and grates across America. Abused and hungry children went to bed fearful and neglected; hopeless young men and women were trapped in our inner cities.
The point is simple. Characteristically, Americans have big hearts. We throw ourselves into emergency efforts and expend our energies unreservedly on pet causes.
That is all well and good. But should not at least similar outpourings of compassion, money, time, and energy be expended in sustained, daily effort to help people in need?
