Poll: Peter Bethune: Let him out?

[blankedboy]

http://www.scoop.co.nz/multimedia/tv/world/33523.html - What's going on.

Basically, this guy called Peter Bethune, an anti-whaling activist, deliberately smashed into a Japanese whaling boat, as you can tell by the white-water coming out of his propellers just before the crash. He then climbed aboard and tried to make a citizen's arrest, sinc the Japanese were in New Zealand waters, but the Japanese arrested him in turn (for trespassing) and took him to Japan, where he is now in prison (video is slightly out of date and said that he might be put in).

One side is arguing that he ought to be let out of prison because he's on the side of the whales and has good intentions (in a twisted kind of way), and the other side is arguing that he should be kept in prison, and that he deserves the sentence because of his crimes.

Extra note, Peter Bethune has been almost-arrested several times in the past.

 

[ace_of_something]

Commiting a crime to stop a crime is not okay. That's like hitting someone in the head with a brick to get them to stop poaching deer.

 

[Darktau]

I voted let him out, but with a warning, so one more time and hes in jail, treat him like a kid and tell him he can't do that, and just stick to banners and crap.

 

[Katnap_Devikat]

Lock the wackjob up.

He makes all environmentalists look bad.

 

[WestMountain]

Kudos to him, finally they do something. But he should still get imprisoned but I think they should lower the jailtime because his means were good, IE: if I kill someone that were going to kill someone else I would get less jailtime

 

[reg42]

Isn't whaling, like, illegal? I was under the impression that it was.

 

[Flour]

Isn't whaling, like, illegal? I was under the impression that it was.

Japan is one of the few exceptions. They're allowed to kill a limited number of whales in a year.

On-Topic: Fuck him. Actually, fuck all those anti-whaling bastards. I don't agree with the whole whaling crap, but from what I've seen the anti-whaling idiots are crashing/sinking ships and try to ruin the Japanese whaling boats by dumping all kinds of crap in the ocean.

 

[Frequen-Z]

Keep him in. Can't just go crashing boats to save animals. Sure, if he values animal's lives above humans, let him, but that doesn't mean he can put any lives at risk and not deserve punishment.

 

[Riobux]

Let him rot in jail. He knew what could of happened and ended up with a bad roll. He should deal with it.

 

[Neonbob]

Keep him in.
The anti-whaling part aside, the fact that he ruined such a cool boat while being a dick is enough for me to want him in jail.
And it's just not right for him to get away with that kind of nonsense just because he was doing it for animals.

 

[Lucifron]

Japanese whalers are a hilarious sort. Japans is allowed to kill x whales every years in the name of science, and I recall a commercial for Whale Wars on Discovery/Animal Planet where you could see japanese whalers harpooning and hauling a whale onto their deck, and then holding up signs as they began to butcher it, one could read things like: "Now we are collecting skin samples." "We are now removing meat samples." etc... etc...

 

[Nmil-ek]

Not british oceans so dont care, but fully support the anti-whalers on our seas seriously Japan piss off to your own side of the atlantic wish the government would have the balls these guys do. Not that i support teroristic actions but crossing our seas and breaking our set laws that the public supports heavily should be a criminal offence isntantly.

 

[Grayjack]

I say slap a fine on that jackass and let him out.

 

[Srdjan]

No. That is not working that way.

 

[Srdjan]

No. That doesn't work that way.

 

[Arachon]

Commiting a crime to stop a crime is not okay. That's like hitting someone in the head with a brick to get them to stop poaching deer.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'll be listening to what the detective says.