I have promoted people to watch the movie so that we can really understand what's going on about the idea of "Japanese hunting whales/Dolphines." Make sure you watch the WHOLE movie, not just bits and pieces like in the Youtube. Original ideas and facts of the movie will be mended to suit the view of a youtube poster when watched in pieces.
There are many misconceptions of the public while some are very valid.
1)In the movie, it clearly states, the Cove killing is caused by a bunch of "thugs" who get some corrupt local officials to help but not the general view/acts of the
village and government.
2)In the movie, as in any killings, the scenes are horrific.
3)In this movie, it does not say the older generation of Japanese locals there view killing/eating dolphines as their cultural stuff. Many locals interviewed do not even know about the killings of dolphine. The meat just show up there and people start to consume them as just another product-that is, removing them from the shelve cause no traditional/custom confrontation. The super market sells them because some fishermen sell them the products. The junior high school uses them as a regular food because some corrupted officials are with the thugs. It's the two lower level officials who exposed the evil acts of their superior officier-this is in fact against the general traditions of Japanese to not obey their superior.
4)In the movie, the meat or eating dolphines is actually a by-product of how the whole thing started. It's the ocean parks that pay BIG money(many times over the price of dolphine meat) per dolphine that inspire the thugs to collect them. The ones not chosen are then killed to sell as food. Trainers around the world knew how the beloved ocean park animals are collected. It's supply and demand model much like the drug ring. That's why the creator of "Cove" the movie said he regreted to have started the TV show Flipper causing a wild spread love towards dolphines and causing so many ocean parks to buy them as very high price. Do you remember what reason, the creator of the movie said about why Seaworld stopped the funding of this movie? Do you remember he filmed a lot of the ocean parks trainers shopping the dolphines just hour(if not minutes) before the killings?
5)It also showed that Japanese government is slow to react to such issue or even can be called stubborn to correct such criticism.
Facts other than shown in the movie:
1)Japan is NOT the only country who hunts whales/dolphine
2)Japanese is still using funny excuse for their hunting of whales and dolphines.
3)As long as there is demand and money, people will exploit the situtation.
As to conclude, according to the movie, the killings IS NOT A LOCAL TRADITION in the Cove!
