In a recent CNN interview, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe defended the traditional killing of dolphins, saying the annual hunting is part of Japanese culture and a way of life for fishermen.

Abe was responding to the remarks by Caroline Kennedy, US Ambassador to Japan, who criticized the savage slaughter of the mammals off the coast of Taiji, Japan. The killing season runs from September to March.

The issue first received global attention with the 2009 award-winning documentary “The Cove,” which depicted the bloody hunt of dolphins in a cove near the seaside village.

The killing process goes like this: After chasing migrating dolphins into the bay, fishermen startle the animals by creating a racket, sending them into panic.

Then begins the selection: the most intelligent ones are weeded from the group to be sold to aquariums, and a few are spared. The rest are indiscriminately hacked, slashed, or stabbed to death with harpoons or knives. Blood turns the seawater crimson. The carcasses are then sold at meat markets or to food companies for processing.

Since the documentary received global acclaim, the dolphin hunt has been relentlessly blasted from many quarters. But the Japanese have dug in their heels and refused to budge.

Shocked at the gruesome pictures of the carnage, many Chinese have joined global conservationists in slamming Japanese cruelty to animals, seemingly oblivious to the fact that some countrymen, famous for their gluttony for rare endangered species, have weakened their case for moral outrage.

Taste for exotica

The Chinese appetite for monkey brains, bear paws. bear bile, and shark’s fin is as much a lightening rod for indignation as the butchering of dolphins.

Xinhua yesterday quoted South China Morning Post as saying that there is a slaughterhouse in Zhejiang Province that processes around 600 whale sharks annually into non-essential life props such as lipsticks, face creams and health supplements.

A few years ago, on a trip to Yixing City, Jiangsu Province, I came across a slain pangolin (scaly anteater), skinned and coiled in a plastic basin, ready to be processed in an eatery near a famous scenic spot. There were rows upon rows of such family-run eateries. A conversation with the owner revealed that diners ate one pangolin on average per day. Pangolin is a protected species in China.

When outsiders accuse us of inflicting cruelty on animals, such as raising moon bears for bile, or harvesting sharks for their fins, we sometimes take up the weapon of culture and tradition to defend our gluttony.

But today, we are way past the stage of eating to live, and there is already a proven, effective substitute for traditional medicine such as bear bile. So nothing explains the killing and torturing better than the need to satisfy our taste for exotica.

Behind the exploitation, a euphemism for killing and enslavement, lie enormous profits. For instance, a dolphin considered smart enough to perform can sell for well over US$5,000.

When killing becomes an established trade, it will be a lot harder to attack it, let alone shake it up, by just wielding the moral baton.

Whenever some conservationists jab their fingers at Japanese for their whaling and dolphin hunt, or confront Chinese on consumption of dog meat, the accused will denounce their detractors as hypocrites, arguing that the only morally consistent option is to stop eating meat altogether.

Oftentimes, the conservationists would argue in their defense that some animals, such as dogs, have special connections to human beings, unlike farm animals raised commercially for human consumption. But this argument represents cruelty of another kind.

What perishes together with the dolphins, sharks and other creatures is our innocence and conscience. In subjecting other species to our bruality and excesses, we are becoming apathetic, and disrespectful to Mother Nature.

Since the existence of mankind is an act of cruelty per se Ñ we sustain our lives with the lives of others Ñ our false sense of superiority over ÒbarbarousÓ eaters often blinds us into convenient finger-pointing against others.

But in fact, there is a savage streak in every people and every culture, as evidenced by the ritualized killing across the world, such as Spanish bullfighting and the annual Canadian hunt for harp seals, when thousands of pups are bludgeoned to death for their pelts and fat. Whale hunts are also carried out by Norway and Iceland.

Ritualized killing

These carnages are a constant reminder of the animal still left in us.

When an indigenous eating habit is under attack by foreigners for perceived cruelty to animals, the knee-jerk reaction of the native population is to justify the killing as cultural heritage.

An attack on local food is equated with an attack on identity. Naturally, many people become indignant and assert their Òrights.Ó

When identity is at stake, debates become highly politicized, which is detrimental to true understanding of the issue Ñ why it makes us better men to stop killing for kicks rather than for survival.

What perishes together with the dolphins, sharks and other creatures is our innocence and conscience. In subjecting other species to our brutality and excesses, we are becoming apathetic, and disrespectful to Mother Nature.

In his 1975 seminal work ÒAnimal Liberation,Ó philosopher Peter Singer compared humane treatment of animals to the emancipation of women and African Americans.

Humane treatment of animals speaks volumes about advanced civilization, as we develop empathy for the suffering of animals dying for our perceived needs and become less liable to do to them what we donÕt desire for ourselves.

This ethical awakening is most profound in people who once took pleasure in killing animals just for sport.

Painful reflection

In 2012, bullfighting was banned in Catalonia, Spain. Although the ban was met, not surprisingly, with some opposition on culture grounds, it was enacted anyway, not under global pressure, but as a result of Spanish soul-searching.

Animal rights advocacy groups protested the ritualized killing as a blot on Spanish ethos, and argued it was shamful to cash in on a national stain.

The Catalonian ban on bullfighting is a sign that the era of human beings taking liberties with animals as their self-appointed masters is gone.

Again, this is a result of social progress, where painful reflection begins on ritualized killing thatÕs become so typical of certain peoples. This is a global trend, not a question of indigenous cultures being threatened by homogenizing ÒenlightenedÓ Western values, as some cultural apologists say.

The cultural excuse Abe promoted is actually doing a disservice to Japan. Japan is the one of the few countries that hunt dolphins and continues commercial whaling, under the ludicrous pretext of scientific research.

Japanese defiance in the face of global criticism only backfires, because few subscribe to AbeÕs argument. Will Japan lose ÒJapanesenessÓ if the country stops whaling? Absolutely not.

As for those fishermen, they certainly can land other livelihoods, at the price of perhaps earning only a bit less.

As such, greed is the true motivation for killing, not some ostensible cultural identity excuse.

Most of us will remain carnivores, to be sure. So castigating others for eating the ÒwrongÓ animal does smack of hypocrisy. But wholesale killing of dolphins, and similar human barbarity for that matter, has no effect other than exposing the ugly beast in us.

This column is named after the head-butting bird that feeds on pests.