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if it's Legal then yea i can see people being against them. i was just going from what i saw on the show and they were making it seem like they were doing an illegal practice.
My understanding is that it is illegal to hunt whales for commercial purposes. It is legal to kill them for scientific research and then sell the byproducts. Essentially, there is a giant loophole in the anti-whaling laws. The Sea Shepherds contention is that these Japanese whaling ships are obviously commercial enterprises, and are not acting in accordance with the research exemption, even if the Japanese government sanctions it as research.
I don't know the depths of what these guys do to stop the whalers, but as long as they don't intentionally assault anyone, I see no problem with them trying to prevent what they believe to be an illegal activity.