Hunting Down a Stub Post

My most recent project has been to turn a Wikipedia stub article into an article that meets the requirements to be a good article on Wikipedia.  This last week made me appreciate how much effort and time has gone into making Wikipedia what it is today.  Continuing the trend on hunting from my last post, I decided to create a stub article on Turtling, or the hunting of turtles, into a full fledged article.  The complete Wikipedia entry can be found here.  Creating the Wikipedia article was no where near as easy as I had anticipated, and took hours of research on the subject, and another while choosing the most relevant information.  The time that took the most amount of time though was learning to navigate Wikipedia's system and creating the article itself.  Once I had started creating the article I was determined to make a piece that I would consider to both informative and complete, and I feel that I accomplished my goal.  In much the same way as Curtis Vieville, who also transformed a stub article, I am finding myself becoming attached to my article. Below is a picture of a typical green turtle.  My research found that around 22 000 of these green turtles have poached around Mexico each year for the past decade.

             WikiMedia Commons: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/
Retrieved on March 22 2012          

After completing my article, I realized how the information I had created was accessible on the Wikipedia site almost immediately.  While I have been told that Wikipedia should not be used for literary sources, I had thought that the work uploaded was looked at to see if it contained relevant information, which I now know at least does not happen instantly.  I usually use Wikipedia several times a week for personal questions and also to complement my school textbook.  Completing this assignment has made me realize that perhaps Wikipedia is not as reliable as I had once thought.

I found it interesting that I completed my first section of my article less than a day ago, and someone has already been through the article and made slight adjustments to my work.  One of the adjustments that was made was removing the stub article listing at the bottom of the page.  At first I felt exhilarated that my article had been approved by Wikipedia, I later realized that none of my grammatical errors I had left in the article to fix on my return were corrected.  After viewing this persons profile in anticipation that it was in fact a Wikipedia creator, I realized that the profile was in part controlled by a bot that uses Autowikibrowser and automatically makes repetitive edits that would take humans hours of work.  After further researching this profile, I noticed several awards at the bottom of the page about the contributions of this person, and I also noted that all of the contributions made were on the topic of turtles.  While my article was not completely edited, I felt proud that someone/something had at least noticed my changes and made me aware of how big the Wikipedia community really is!

While I now know that Wikipedia is not as reliable as I had previously thought, I will still continue to use Wikipedia.  However, I will now check the references at the bottom of the page to see if it links to primary sources before I rely on the information.  Maybe in the future I will continue to transform stub articles and give back to the system that has helped me so much.

Take care,

Josh Perryman
 

The Way Propoganda can Guide our Opinions.

Canadian Seal Hunters and Their Catch (2011).  Retrieved
on March 1st 2012 from http://www.msnbc.msn.com

It is coming to that time of year again when the Canadian Seal Hunt will begin, and hundreds of thousands of seals will be hunted and their pelts sold, creating a profit of over 15 million dollars for local fisherman and their families.  Over the next few months, media of all forms, will once again turn towards Canada as animal right groups speak of animal cruelty and the Canadian government will speak of the economic benefits of this age old tradition.  In much the same way as everyone else who has not participated in the Canadian Seal Hunt, the only knowledge I have of this sport, or massacre, are photographs of hundreds of dead seals piled on top of one another with blood stains blanketing the arctic as far as the eye can see.  As with most forms of propaganda, there is a certain truth behind the photo, but not all cases of seal hunting are on such a large scale or done inhumanely.  There are regulations for the Canadian Seal Hunt, limiting the amount of seals allowed to be killed, and also all animals must be killed humanely.  It was reported, that last year 98% of all known seals that were hunted were killed humanely, with either a single shot or swing with a hakapik.  While the average of 15 million dollars of profit that the seal hunt brings into Canada may seem relatively small, fisherman argue that the sale of seal product is what supports their families throughout the year.  I myself do not hunt, but those who I speak to about hunting often eagerly await the chance to go into the bush in pursuit of deer and other game.  On one hand, if seal hunting is no different than hunting deer, then why should it draw so much attention.  On the other hand, I find myself wondering then how Canada is one of the many countries that oppose Japan and the dolphin slaughter it practices year round.

There are five freedoms to animal welfare; the freedom from hunger, thirst and malnutrition, freedom from fear and distress, freedom of movement, freedom from discomfort and freedom from pain, injury and disease.  These freedoms, which create many animal protection acts, are put in to place for animals which are held in captive, but should also be respected while hunting.  While some may disagree, on the most part these five freedoms are adhered to with the seal hunt.  The seals live in their natural environment so therefore humans on the whole do not have an impact on the freedoms of these animals.  So long as the seals are hunted humanely and their distress is kept to a minimum the laws are not being broken.  While I myself do not support the Seal Hunting industry, nor would partake in it should I have the chance, I believe that so long as the seals are treated respectfully and humans are not wasteful of the seal that there is no problem with seal hunting. However, just because I can force myself to understand the reasons for the seal hunt, does not mean to say that it does not sadden me to know that seals are being killed by the hundred weekly.

Myself and a dolphin (2012). Photo
taken by Motiejus Osipovas.

I did not intend on spending so much time discussing the Great Seal Hunt as I did, but with such a controversial topic I feel I could finish this post on it.  However, I would also like to discuss something that relates this.  This time last week I was in Cuba, where I opened myself up to another culture and went on several excursions.  Before going to Cuba, I researched using the internet and even Twitter feeds using the hashtags, suggested trips that I could go on to enjoy myself.  One of excursion that was recommended to me, and one that I ended up going on was a catamaran trip that included going to a private beach, snorkeling and where I would be able to swim with dolphins.  Unfortunately, when reaching the dolphins I realized that the dolphins were held captive within a small facility.  In hindsight, the marketing of the excursion and how they did not say the dolphins were in captivity was very clever.  I continue to be amazed at how different ways of communicating can impact the way people think.  At first, I felt guilty that I supporting a form of what I perceived to be animal cruelty.  However, sitting there for a few minutes I immediately began to think of the five freedoms of animal welfare and how they were all being met.  I would have much rather seen the dolphins in the wild, and while I still feel sad to see such an intelligent animal in captivity, I soon forgot about my original hesitation and really enjoyed the excursion.

Animal right groups oppose all forms of animal captivity and sometimes even animal consumption.  For Cuba, the tourism industry is of huge economic importance.  The dolphin that I interacted with seemed to be treated well by the staff.  In much the same way as people may view this as cruel, it is no different than the Canadian Rodeo, in which many Canadians, including my colleague Nicole Briggs who has been a participant, consider to be a great importance.  I'm beginning to wonder if the only reason the Canadian Seal Hunt is considered to be so much more inhumane than normal hunting, and other ways we use animals, is because of the way it is advertised.  Morale of the story being, make sure we don't blindly agree with and follow whatever we see and hear on the television or internet and look at everything critically!

Until next time,

Josh