Paul Watson was awarded the Outstanding Humanitarian of 2007 Award at the benefit. The videos are great and a lot of fun. Captain Paul Watson speaking in Melbourne 1 hour before leaving for Antarctica to stop the Japanese whale slaughter (4 parts altogether):
Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADijaIe1A1M&mode=related&search=
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKWf-0GGOuU&mode=related&search=
Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YLe6xAIFAY&mode=related&search=
Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1SzMdK8PVw&mode=related&search=

Born: Toronto, Ontario – December 2, 1950

Marine Wildlife Conservationist, Environmentalist, Master Mariner, Author and Writer, Professional Dive Master, University Instructor and Public Speaker

For 28 years, Captain Paul Watson has been at the helm of the world's most active marine environmental organization – the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.

Sea Career
Paul Watson's career as a Master Mariner began in 1968 as a seaman in the Norwegian merchant marine. His early voyages with the Norwegian, Swedish, British and Canadian merchant marine provided him with experience on all the world's oceans, including weathering typhoons in the South China Sea, North Atlantic storms in the iceberg-strewn northern latitudes of the Atlantic and navigating the war zones of the Persian Gulf. He served in the Canadian Coast Guard for two years in the early seventies on weatherships, buoy tenders and on a search and rescue hovercraft. Paul has served as Master on seven different Sea Shepherd ships since 1978. He currently commands the 657-ton Canadian-registered research ship Farley Mowat and the Canadian-registered research and patrol ship Sirenian.

Education and Presentations
Paul majored in communications and linguistics at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia. He has lectured extensively at universities around the world, and was a professor of Ecology at Pasadena College of Design from 1990 through to 1994. Paul also was an instructor in UCLA’s Honors Program for 1998 and 1999. Currently, Paul is a registered speaker with the Jodi Solomon Speakers Bureau of Boston, and regularly gives presentations at colleges and universities in the United States, and at special events throughout world. As a unique figure in the environmental movement, he is highly qualified to speak on its origins, history and future.

History of Activism – Environmental Pioneer
In 1969, Paul joined with other members of the Sierra Club in organizing a voyage to protest nuclear weapons testing in the Aleutians. The group they formed was the Don't Make a Wave Committee. In November 1971, Paul joined the crew of the Greenpeace Too for a voyage into the nuclear test site at Amchitka Island. In 1972, Paul, along with several of the other crewmembers from that landmark expedition, established the Greenpeace Foundation in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Between 1971 and 1977, Paul served as First Officer on all the Greenpeace voyages. Utilizing his Canadian Coast Guard experience, he organized the operation of zodiacs to intervene between the harpoons and the whales. During a confrontation with a Russian whaler in 1975, a harpooned and dying sperm whale loomed over Paul's small boat. Paul recognized a flicker of understanding in the dying whale's eye. He felt that the whale knew what they were trying to do. He watched as the magnificent leviathan heaved its body away from his boat, slipped beneath the waves and died. A few seconds of looking into this dying whale's eye changed his life forever. He vowed to become a lifelong defender of the whales and all creatures of the seas.

In 1976, he led the first Greenpeace expedition to protect Harp seals on the ice floes off Newfoundland. Paul and fellow Greenpeace co-founder David Garrick were instrumental in elevating the issue of protecting the helpless baby seals to the level of international concern. In 1977, he led the second Greenpeace campaign to Labrador to protect seals, this time bringing Brigitte Bardot to the ice floes to focus international attention on the seal slaughter. During this campaign, Robert Hunter and Paul Watson stopped a large sealing ship in the ice by standing on the ice in its path. Watson’s account of the campaign was published in the Georgia Straight newspaper and entitled “Shepherds of the Labrador Front.” It is this article that inspired the name “Sea Shepherd.”

In 1977, Paul left Greenpeace because he felt the original goals of the organization were being compromised, and because he saw a global need to continue direct action conservation activities on the high seas by an organization that would enforce laws protecting marine wildlife.

Founding of Sea Shepherd
To answer that need, that same year, Paul founded the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society –dedicated to research, investigation and enforcement of laws, treaties, resolutions and regulations established to protect marine wildlife worldwide. In December 1978, with the assistance of the Fund for Animals, Paul purchased a North Atlantic trawler in Britain and converted her into the conservation enforcement vessel Sea Shepherd.

Activism
Over the years, Paul has exhibited a remarkable diversity in his activism. Aside from being a co-founder of Greenpeace in 1972 and Greenpeace International in 1979 and founder of Sea Shepherd he was active in many issues. In 1973, Watson and David Garrick represented Greenpeace during the occupation of Wounded Knee, South Dakota by the American Indian Movement. Both men served as volunteers for AIM, with Watson working with the medics and filing stories back to Robert Hunter at the Vancouver Sun. In 1977, Paul was a Field Correspondent for Defenders of Wildlife between 1976 and 1980. He was a field representative for the Fund for Animals between 1978 and 1981, and a representative for the Royal Society for the Protection of Animals in 1979. He co-founded Friends of the Wolf in 1984 and the Earthforce Environmental Society in 1977. Paul’s first affiliation with the Sierra Club was in 1968 and he has remained a Sierra Club supporter ever since. In April 2003, Paul was elected to the National Board of the Sierra Club USA. He will be a director until 2006.

Politics
Paul’s involvement with politics includes running for Member of Parliament for Vancouver Centre in the Canadian Federal elections. He ran twice for the Green Party. He also ran on the Green Party ticket for Vancouver Parks Board in 1987 and for Mayor of Vancouver in 1995.

Awards and Commendations
In 1996, Paul was awarded an honorary citizenship to the French town of St. Jean Cap Ferrat. Previous to that he was made an honorary citizen of the Florida Keys in 1989. Other awards include Toronto City TV’s Environmentalist of the Year Award for 1990, the Genesis Award in 1998 and he was enrolled in the U.S. Animal Rights Hall of Fame in 2002. He was also awarded the George H. Bush Daily Points of Light Award in 1999 for his volunteer efforts with conservation activism. He was chosen by Time Magazine as one of the environmental heroes of the 20th Century in the year 2000.

Published Works
Paul Watson is a prolific author. His titles include: Shepherds of the Sea (1979), Sea Shepherd: My Fight for Whales and Seals (1982), Cry Wolf (1985), Earthforce! (1993), Ocean Warrior (1994) and Seal Wars (2002).

Personal
Paul’s childhood was spent in the towns of St. Andrews and St. Stephen in the Canadian Province of New Brunswick. He is from an Acadian Maritime family on his father’s side and from a Danish, German and American background on his mother’s side.

Paul is married to Allison Lance Watson. He has one child, Lilliolani Paula Lum Watson, (born in 1980), from a previous marriage.