A Letter to Ric O'Barry: No More Fish Stories Please!

No more hyperbole please

All Eyes are on Ric O'Barry.
There are 40 synonyms for exaggeration.

The latest biggest Taiji news we see is not that Ric was NOT arrested, it's that, the prick from Texas, was right: Ric's statements on Dolphin Project's Blog were false. It hurts when friends lie. It makes you wonder why.

Contrary to Ric's statements, Ric was never offered the title of Ambassador of Ito City last week for his Dolphin work or ANYTHING else by Mayor Hiromi Tsukuda or ANYONE else.

When we investigated Ric's similar claim in The Cove...it turns out that Ric was never given the "Keys to the City of Taiji" either, as stated in the film.

Maybe they were both just figures of speech...you know, "having the keys to the city" and being the “Ambassador of Ito City” are like saying that we are like "best buds". That could be, but unfortunately for Ric, Ito City Mayor took the twisting of his words at face value, meaning a lie and complained to everyone who would listen, which thankfully included Cara Sands, the Dolphin Project .net web manager, and the falsehood has been taken down, but there is an uncomfortable accumulation that has prompted our letter to you today.

Dear Ric:
We love you as the tough Dolphin loving warrior you chose to be when one of the Flipper Cast, became the only Dolphin in history fully documented by you to choose to stop breathing. We know the Japanese in power may not like you. We are now reasonably certain that the Taiji police have it in for you...but you have a good team there in Taiji and 1000's of people standing with you to keep on keeping on...you don't need to exaggerate your titles or police brutality (torture for a night in jail) for us to keep loving you...You don't need to lose your passport or drink before you drive or drive your car off the road to get attention.

You don't need to hype the radiation in dolphin meat before you test it either. The Tesla-Drive-to-DC-to-Deliver-a-Million-Signatures-to-Obama-to-Announce-a-Cove-Japanese-Rights-Buy-Back-Paid-For-With-New-Donations Event so the Japanese will finally see the truth, was a boast beyond reason or reality with no apparent follow-up...No tall tales! No lies please! Just you. We love you just the way you are.

What the world needs is good people observing the hunt and reporting it in photos and videos, tweets and posts to the world. That's the base. From there we need increased international pressure like with the Australia for Dolphins WAZA Lawsuits. Let's put more money into real pressure. 

We also need real negotiation if we are actually going to see an end of the Dolphin hunt. Next time we have an actual negotiation with people on the side of the hunters and people on the side of the activists, please support it instead of ending it. With great media attention, comes great responsibility. We need solutions. We need you there in Taiji.

The more you are there, the more the "Eye of Sauron" will not be on the Sea Shepherds, for they are doing the heavy lifting every single day of the season, year after year, without the drama. Dozens really have gone gone through regular Taiji police interrogations for years. They have even stoically gone to jail in Taiji and been found innocent.

If the police do arrest you, we are confident that you too will be found innocent of whatever crime the Taiji Keystone Cops can dream up. You are a better man than this. Your cause...our cause...the Dolphin Cause is just. The hunt will end. You don't need to try to do it alone.

We can do it together.

Sincerely,
Steven Thompson

The opinions expressed here are mine alone based on my own research and experience. The intent here is to improve Dolphin activism with constructive criticism.

There are at least 40 synonyms for "exaggeration". One in this list need not be.
They are: baloney, excess, fabrication, falsehood, fantasy, hyperbole, misjudgment, misrepresentation, untruth, aggrandizement, amplification, boasting, caricature, coloring, crock, elaboration, embroidery, emphasis, enlargement, exaltation, extravagance, fancy, hogwash, inflation, jazz, line, magnification, overemphasis, overestimation, pretension, pretentiousness, rant, ric o'barry, romance, stretch, whopper, yarn, figure of speech, fish story, flight of fancy, and tall story.