Dear Prime Minister Harper, ladies and gentlemen;

In the coming months Canada will partake in the annual seal hunt for commercial purposes. Every year Canadian payers subsidize this undertaking so Newfoundland may gain less than 1% of their economy. In recent years, the banning of seal products in the European Union, Russia, and the United States has decreased the value of pelts, making the culling of hundreds of thousands of seal pups every year unnecessarily cruel.

Although seals are believed to have a large impact on the fishing community it has never be verified that their slaughter would help recoup fishing populations. In fact, cod is only 3% of the seals' diet, and it has been discovered they eat cod’s predators. Moreover, due to the barbaric way in which sealers kill, large businesses (over 3,600) through out America have been boycotting seafood from Canada. This has cost the maritime economy billions of dollars.

In the 1970s, Canada had successfully ended the hunting of whales, and gained a multi-million dollar industry through whale watching. Eco-tourism could just as easily be achieved through seals as they participate in largest migration of marine life ever year.

Disregard that babies, as young as 12 days old, are clubbed and skinned alive in front of their mother, who traveled from Norway to give birth. Consider that this industry hemorrhages money, every year, whilst eco-tourism gains massive profits. Regard the alternative with some thought. Canada has been prized for retaining its natural beauty, yet we brutalize Canadian wildlife.

We are on the cusp of a new era. Senseless destruction and violence against nature and animals is no longer met with cheers, but abject horror. Canada has maintained a peacekeeper role for decades, leading the way for better relations amongst mankind. Yet, our peaceful attitude changes when it comes to our wildlife. How can these two concepts exist within one nation? The peaceful Canadian, the bludgeoner of a baby?

Please let this shameful massacre come to an end. There are other ways, there has to be.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” – Mahatma Gandhi