Camille Labchuk

I’m finally back! I was forced to take a blogging hiatus to deal with end-of-semester papers and exams, but I’m happy to report that business is now wrapped up, and I survived my first semester of law school relatively intact. It’s now time to catch up on hundreds of emails, do some holiday socializing, and write a few blog posts on the myriad of issues that are currently on my mind.

Here’s something that utterly infuriated me last night: DFAIT is looking to pay someone $100K to play around on Twitter, Flickr and YouTube to promote clubbing baby seals. This is from the job posting:

Social Media and Online Issues Management for the Seal Hunt

Organized opposition to the seal hunt has been increasing internationally since the Government of Canada announced a five-year management plan in 2006.

Well-organized anti-sealing groups are using digital communications to great advantage – effective use of search engine optimization (SEO) techniques, and leveraging Web 2.0 technologies and platforms to build communities of interest have dramatically increased their share of conversation and digital footprint. Tactics also include posting videos, images and other details (frequently incorrect or disingenuous) on platforms like YouTube and Flickr where sharing and viewership are maximized.

As a result, DFAIT would like to engage a firm to help meet described objectives attached herein.

Opposing the seal kill at Queen's Park last week

That’s right: $100K for some staffer at a rich PR firm to sit on a computer all day and post government lies and propaganda on various social media networks.

What’s most striking about this is that DFAIT spending has been slashed to the bone since the Conservative government seized power. They slashed $639 million from DFAIT’s budget over three years. Foreign service recruitment has been frozen, and staff at many Canadian embassies have been let go. Several foreign missions have been closed, and others have experienced 50% budget cuts. Many foreign policy experts are deeply worried about how an under-resourced DFAIT will possibly be able to help Canada effectively promote itself on the world stage, and export industries industries engaged in international trade are worried this neglect will leave all industries less able to market products abroad.

It is astounding that the Canadian government is not willing to provide even basic resources for some sectors of DFAIT, yet is eager to shell out six figures to promote the seal slaughter online through DFAIT. (Note that this is addition to the efforts of the DFO, which already makes a feeble attempt through YouTube and Twitter to prop up sealing.) Is there no conception of how damaging the seal kill is to Canada’s international image? As Tabatha Southey recently opined in the Globe, “Abroad, increasingly, Canada’s image is seal meat, asbestos and the oil sands.” She’s right. Our insistence on clubbing and shooting baby seals, blocking international climate agreements, and handing over Afghan detainees for torture has helped make a name for us on the international scene — very bad one. Gone are the days when Canadian travelers proudly displayed our flag on their backpacks.

It’s noteworthy that the job posting acknowledges people who care about animals are effective in getting the anti-sealing message out online. Yet the bulk of social media buzz about the seal truly is truly grassroots, and this is why the strategy of paying someone a hefty salary to tweet full-time about the benefits of slaughtering baby seals is doomed to fail. Regular people, including an overwhelming majority of Canadians, are opposed to the commercial seal kill and care enough about it to engage with others online. No amount of artificial social media organizing by the government will be able to counter the honest and organic concern of millions of people in Canada and around the world who oppose the barbaric slaughter.

On a final note, this job posting belies one of the government’s favourite talking points: that animal rights groups are soooo well funded that it’s just, like, so hard for the government to compete with them. As this posting demonstrates, it’s the government that has access to unlimited public coffers and is clearly not shy about using taxpayers’ dollars to prop up this tiny, outdated industry.

The government will undoubtedly continue to waste our money on these misguided efforts, but it is time to wake up and realize the seal kill is a losing game. The overwhelming negative global response to this shameful and bloody practice is why governments around the world are closing their borders to seal products. It’s time to transition sealers into sustainable industries, like coastal ecotourism, and relegate the seal kill to where it belongs — the history books.