In reply to Mick Ward: I blogged about Sea Shepherd a while back and had a reply from a bloke who was involved...
http://brianlt.blogspot.com/2007/02/no-need-for-whaling.html
Their methods definitely included chucking Butyric acid onto the decks of the japanese ships. What I don't know is whether it was concentrated or dilute. I suspect the latter, as I believe Sea Shepherd are pretty responsible people. In its concentrated form it's a moderately corrosive acid, like glacial acetic or phosphoric, and will blister the skin if not washed off. Dilute, it's pretty innocuous - might hurt if you get it in the eye, but if dilute enough, wouldn't cause any serious harm. What it does though, is STINK! It smells absolutely revolting, and is a greasy, oily sort of liquid, so tends to cling to surfaces. I think Sea Shepherd intended to make the decks stomach-churningly bad smelling places to be, in the hope the whalers wouldn't be able to work in such an environment. In that, I'm right there with them.
I agree with Dave. As someone who's climbed since the end of the 70s, I think that the old school climbers, the EB and woolly jumper brigade who WERE climbing when I started, would have pretty much unanimously supported Sea Shepherd's actions, and stronger actions too, including ramming or sinking of ships. Climbing was populated with anarchists, people who weren't averse to sabotage themselves, vis a vis the Snowdon railway, for one example.
Nowadays, climbing is mainstream. As mainstream as jogging. I don't thing Dave sought to speak for the likes of Mr Rude, sorry, Root...but he is right, in that the climbing community has moved more to the right over the years. Not everyone of course; climbers run from the far left to the far right, but Blair's Britain and Thatcher's Children are reflected in the main mass of climbers as they are in society in general. The days of climbers being outlaws, outsiders, radicals, people on the fringes of society, are long gone, notwithstanding the small percentage of individuals who still might fit that bill. Climbing is a lifestyle, a marketing phenomenon, a <shudder> sport. It's taught in schools alongside tennis and football. It no longer attracts people for its anarchic extremism. It attracts many people for the same reasons as any other sport.
I've seen people on here moaning about walk-ins, about birds preventing access to 'their' cliffs. People who obviously don't care much about the environment they climb in, just about the climbing. Sad but true, and something you wouldn't have got 30 years ago. So David's right, generally speaking. If Enoch Powell isn't part of the herd, fair enough, same for anyone else, but I've been a climber long enough to have a sense of the demographic.
Oh and Enoch. Get off yer high horse sweetheart and be a bit more polite.