URGENT! Help protect whales.

[Camy]

To all at Awesome Dude.

I've just signed an URGENT petition to protect whales. Read more below, or click this link to join me in signing:

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/whales_last_push/98.php?CLICKTF

In one week, the International Whaling Commission will hold its final vote on a proposal to legalize commercial whale hunting for the first time in a generation.

The outcome rests on whose voices are heard most clearly in the final hours: the pro-whaling lobby -- or the world's people?

More than 650,000 of us have signed the petition to protect whales -- but it's time to reach 1 million! At the whale summit in Morocco, an Avaaz team is setting up billboards, front-page newspaper ads, and a giant, constantly-updating petition counter -- all to ensure that delegates, from the moment they step off the plane until they cast their votes, will see from our explosive numbers that the world will not accept legal whale slaughter.

Let's soar past a million. Click to sign, and then forward this email to everyone you know:

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/whales_last_push/98.php?CLICKTF

Thanks to the worldwide outcry, many governments have already pledged to oppose the proposal. Each time the Avaaz whale petition added 100,000 signatures, it was sent again to the IWC and key governments -- and some, like New Zealand, thanked all of us who had signed on.

But pressure from the other side has been relentless -- and now other governments, especially in Europe and Latin America, may abstain... or even support the proposal. The vote could go either way.

Citizen pressure is our best hope. After all, it was an explosive worldwide social movement in the 1980s that led to the commercial whaling ban we're now trying to protect. As the International Whaling Commission meets in Morocco -- on June 17, and vote less than a week later -- let's make sure the world's voices are there to greet them:

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/whales_last_push/98.php?CLICKTF

After the global ban was first implemented on commercial whaling, the number of whales killed each year plummeted from 38,000 per year to just a couple of thousand. It's a testament to the power of humanity to move forward. As we move to confront the other crises of the modern age, let's cherish this legacy of progress -- by joining together now to protect our majestic and intelligent neighbors on this fragile planet.

With hope,

Camy

P.S.: Despite the ban, Japan, Norway, and Iceland have continued whaling -- and are now pushing to make the IWC proposal as lenient as possible. Expecting permission to catch more whales than ever, Japan is reportedly planning to buy its largest whaling ship yet. Click here to sign the petition against commercial whaling: https://secure.avaaz.org/en/whales_last_push/98.php?CLICKTF

SOURCES:

"IWC whaling proposal 'offensive'", New Zealand Herald:

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article....jectid=10640398

"Conservationists condemn 'peace plan' allowing for limited whaling", Guardian:

http://www.avaaz.org/guardian_whales

The other side: IWC Chairman defends whaling proposal

http://www.avaaz.org/commercial_whaling_support

[Cole Parker]

I signed it.

C

[Merkin]

I cannot see how any new limited "compromise" agreement as proposed by the current IWC chair to allow Japan, Norway, and Iceland to continue their unregulated commercial whaling industry would serve any conservation effort whatsoever. Except for the already allowed whale taking for subsistence purposes by indigenous peoples, whaling of any sort is an abominable practice. I should think that the people of Iceland and Norway and Japan would share our horror at this practice.

James

[colinian]

A while back a friend of mine posted a request to sign on my Facebook wall and I did so. The Japanese are strongly behind the move to legalize whale hunting (read: slaughter).

Colin

[Trab]

Success!

http://www.ifaw.org/ifaw_canada_english/me...mp;auid=6532749