Why we need to rethink cultural traditions
Cultural traditions perpetuate our use of animals for food and pleasure. We can stop the cruelty without losing our identity.
Since starting my Nature in Mind blog, my research on wildlife conservation and animal welfare has left me reflecting on why we justify cultural traditions that exploit animals and why that needs to change.
Cultural traditions are passed on through generations, perpetuating our use of animals for food and pleasure. In upholding religious festivals and food practices, medicinal ‘cures’, and superstitious beliefs, animal abuse continues without question. We can be reluctant to let go of cultural traditions, seeing change as a rejection of our culture, or even an attack on our identity.
It seems irrational that we welcome technological progress that changes the nature of cultural traditions — such as machinery, yet we reject the moral progress in rethinking the tradition entirely.
Hunting marine mammals such as dolphins and whales, now known to be intelligent social beings, is an example of this self-serving thinking.
Taiji dolphin hunt
The annual dolphin hunt in the Japanese town of Taiji is defended on the basis of tradition and culture and…
