plans to chasing off Japanese fishing fleets using highly destructive drift nets in the North Pacific. The action of most note is the raiding of a Reykjavik whale processing plant and the harbor and subsequent sinking of whaling ships operating under the guise of "research". The Sea Shepherd activities not only attracted media; its militant activities also succeeded in influencing the environmental movement as a whole. The Sea Shepherd movement, after the events of Reykjavik, proved they could be successful in the war on commercial whaling. The "ecological awakening" felt by the Icelandic people as an direct result of the raid was proof that radical environmentalism was affecting people in ways the leaders of the mainstream environmental movement never dreamed of. The ability of the Shepherds to win the support of a number of people, including celebrities, despite of or perhaps because of its militancy, who might otherwise have been reluctant to endorse ecotage. 6. Though both groups share common feelings about environmentalism, their actions are at opposite ends of the spectrum. Deep Ecology is basically theologic in its approach, whereas Earth First! is an activist group. An analogy to the Irish Republican Army may be made that Deep Ecology represents the Sein Fein faction while Earth First! represent the armed radical faction of an army of activist environmentalists. Deep Ecology is based on a respect or a reverence for the life community which consists of innumerable individuals interacting in a variety of ways. It is ecological, recognizing that life depends on life, that some suffering and pain is inherent in nature, that death is not evil. It is naturalistic, believing that nature knows best, going beyond good and evil to simply letting being be. Deep Ecology has tried to keep to the perception that makes the environmental crisis a subject of discourse: the deep feeling people have that nature is under siege...
