Can't be true, everyone in Japan is too polite for this

Secret film will show slaughter to the world
Covert operation finally exposes Taiji's annual dolphin horror
By Boyd Harnell
From the Japan Times

For the first time ever, graphic feature-length footage of the annual slaughter of some 2,500 dolphins in Taiji, Wakayama Prefecture, has been captured during a unique yearlong covert operation.

...local police warned the whalers and their supporters off any repeat of violence or threats of violence such as had happened before. In fact, Nigel Barker, a former Australian resident in Taiji, says he was threatened with bodily harm for providing The Japan Times with details of the whalers' brutal methods. In another incident, [photographer] Psihoyos said he, too, was threatened by whalers, who said, "We will kill you."

This can't possibly be true in Japan. Now were it a non-Japanese threatening to kill someone, I could believe it. As far as the supposed depiction of the slaughter of dolphins goes, how could that be true with the uniquely unique relationship with nature? And if this is true, why haven't we seen stories and film of the dolphin kill on Japanese TV? (At least I haven't seen it.)

3 April: It is not that killing an animal for food is wrong. I heard one guy criticize the Japanese because many think the dolphin or whale is just another animal. Aren't they? I think the question is whether or not the species is threatened or endangered; whether or not they are killed as humanely as possible and whether or not the meat is actually used for food. (It is, although heavily contaminated with mercury.) Arguing cuteness or intelligence is going to be a tougher sell.