Leilani Munter Battles Japan Dolphin Massacre

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

Race car drivers are almost always involved in some kind of charity work, and it usually involves causes that are strategically uncontroversial, like disabled children or breast cancer. While it’s great that those worthy charities benefit from the motorsports involvement, it’s also kind of cool to see drivers who follow specific passions to support something a little more edgy. Leilani Munter, who drives in both the ARCA series and IRL, has never let up on her hardcore commitment to green living and animal protection. But for her, it’s not just a matter of writing a check: she recently traveled to Taiji, Japan, the scene of the gruesome annual dolphin slaughter made infamous by the Oscar-winning documentary The Cove, to get right up in the hostile, shouting faces of the “fishermen” responsible for the barbarism. Good for her–it’s a great cause, and one that any one of us can support simply by not giving our consumer dollars to captive swim-with-dolphins programs or marine-mammal exhibitors like Sea World–the corporations whose expensive purchases of captured display dolphins are what’s making the massacre possible in the first place. Read Munter’s account of her experience at Taiji here, and check out SaveJapanDolphins and SeaShepherd to learn more about the dolphin slaughter. Via Ecorazzi.