A Not-So-Brief Analysis of SeaWorld and the B.S. That Takes Place There

Please pardon the title. My frankness easily offends people. However, I genuinely could not find words for a sentence that would better state the information that I am about to share with you. Feel free to change the inappropriate wording to something more…PG. You could adjust the B.S. to maybe, “morally unacceptable action” or perhaps “ignominious behavior.”

First of all, I would like to share a little bit about my background, so that you can completely comprehend that the POV of this piece is coming from a place of ultimate bias with a one hundred percent disregard for SeaWorld jobs, how SeaWorld affects the economy, and any part of this corporation that has to do with finances. I am solely focusing on my personal moral standing regarding animal rights.

I was raised in the Pacific Northwest. With the San Juan Islands and Mt. Rainier in my very own backyard, I have grown up in the outdoors, and my life has had a tremendous focus on environmental preservation, sustainability, and animal rights. I was the little weirdo that would cry if my cousins tried to burn ants with a magnifying glass, or my little brother would sprinkle salt on a slug to not only protect our garden from slugs, but to watch it fizzle into a pile of slimy, yellow, goo.

I never felt comfortable in zoos or aquariums and I remember one time in particular, my family and I went to the San Diego Zoo (this was the same time we went to SeaWorld) and I saw a huge black panther pacing back and forth behind that thick wall of glass and my heart dropped into my stomach. I knew that there was something so incredibly wrong with what I was looking at. I was absolutely miserable for the whole time that we were there.

In 2015, I saw the documentary Blackfish, and it has since changed my life in so many ways, opening my eyes to not only how genuinely barbaric SeaWorld is, but also making me question motives behind animal agriculture and what in our brains causes us to go along with these unnatural ways of life.

I will summarize Blackfish in order to give you a little bit of background on SeaWorld and orca whales in general. If you already have a background in this information, skip over the next ten paragraphs.

http://www.blackfishmovie.com/

In 1970, ninety orca whales were stalked in the Puget Sound and explosives, speedboats, and air planes were used to herd them into a three acre net. Babies were torn away from their mothers and families were destroyed. Their shrill cries and screams still haunt these hunters to this day. Much like Maternal relations involving humans, orcas are able to feel agony and grief when something happens to their babies. Orca families are tight-knit, similarly to human families, wolf packs, and elephants.
During this event, seven orcas were captured and three were killed. Between 1970 and 1971, ten orcas were captured from Washington and half of those orcas were sent to SeaWorld. All of those who died, died prematurely. In 1976, Washington State sued SeaWorld for violating its permits regarding hunting/fishing in the Puget Sound, so SeaWorld went straight to Iceland where they continued to catch these whales.
There are four SeaWorld locations. San Diego, Orlando, San Antonio, and at Loro Parque in Tenerife Spain. As of today there have been no deaths caused by wild killer whales. Absolutely none. However, dozens of captive orcas have injured people and caused human death.
The most famous killer is one named Tilikum. He was captured in Iceland in 1983, and at only two years old he was already eleven feet long.
During his lifetime, Tilikum killed three humans due to stress and frustration. First was Sealand trainer Keltie Byrne in 1991. After Keltie died, Sealand shut down and SeaWorld bought Tilikum for their breeding program. At this time he was a 12,000 pound bull, the largest on the market, and his sperm was used to create more orcas. Currently, fifty four percent of orcas in SeaWorld have his genes.
Wild orcas swim an average of one hundred miles a day and live for over sixty years. Tilikum was trapped in a tank of water that contained 0.0001 percent of the water that he needed to lead a healthy life. That is literally equivalent to you living in your bathtub. If you were taken away from your family and forced to live in a bathtub for your entire life, I am sure you would show signs of frustration, stress, and psychosis after awhile.
After years of expression aggression toward humans, in 1999, Tilikum killed Daniel P. Dukes and skilled trainer Dawn Brancheau in 2010.
After Dawn’s death, Tilikum was kept in a small enclosure that limited his ability to swim, communicate with other orcas, and have human interaction. He would float at the surface of the water for hours on end, a behavior never before observed in orca whales. He also chewed on the side of his enclosure for hours in a heartbreaking, last effort to escape. His teeth were worn down to nubs.
Because he lived almost his entire life in captivity, it was inevitable that Tilikum would not be able to survive if he were released back into the ocean, however, he could have been put in a protective sea pen that would have allowed him more freedom, the ability to feel the waves and the tides and to communicate with his fellow orca whales. Instead, they kept him at SeaWorld until he died in January of 2017 at only 35 years old.
You can learn more about this by watching the Blackfish documentary or reviewing the Blackfish website, linked above.

Moving on, as infuriating and morally incorrect as Tilikum’s story is, the thing that really grinds my gears is SeaWorld’s reaction to the Blackfish documentary. Obviously, after viewing the film, many, many people were outraged. So, SeaWorld decided to take a new approach to how they run things. This is where the analyzing comes in.

SEAWORLD BULLSHIT:

After looking at the SeaWorld website, I found some information that really, really pissed me off. Without doing any research, I thought that SeaWorld had ended their breeding program in an effort to stop the abomination and exploitation of animals. I was so wrong.

SeaWorld is claiming that they will no longer continue with their breeding program, but instead of releasing the animals into the habitat that they deserve, they will be continuing to make money of of these creatures until they die off.

By changing their advertising strategy to be more “natural” and “educational,” rather than theatrical shows, SeaWorld states on their website, “Everything about the new orca experience reflects the natural world and focus on the research, education, care and respect that align with our mission to advance the well-being and conservation of these beautiful creatures.”

WHAT THE HELL

129 orcas have died in captivity since 1961. ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY NINE. At least sixty-two of these orcas have died at SeaWorld, and not one of them due to old age. I don’t see SeaWorld doing anything to contribute to the conservation of these creatures.

Furthermore, in a video titled, “SeaWorld’s New Inspiring Orca Encounter,” a lot of weird stuff was said and it so contradicts all actions that SeaWorld has demonstrated in the past. Lindy Donahue, a current SeaWorld trainer is trying to talk up SeaWorld by claiming that “we are animal people and we want to educate people about animals.” Now, that’s all well and good and I am not saying that captive animals don’t help further educate people about wildlife, but in my experience with children, they know a hell of a lot more about dinosaurs, than they know about zoo animals or killer whales. You can learn about killer whales by going on whale watching tours, watching videos, and reading books about them, without exploiting them.

She goes on to ask, “Have you ever wondered why a killer whale breeches?” Well a lot of people have seen these breeches in our shows in the past and you can also see a whale doing that behavior in the wild in order to communicate.

Yes, Lindy, I have wondered that. So I friggen googled it and found out for myself. If I wanted to, I could go on a whale watching tour at the San Juan’s for the same price or less than going to an eighty dollar show at SeaWorld thank you very much.

“This is a very positive change,” she says, “…and getting to present them (the whales) in a more natural way, is very special to us.”

What the hell does this even mean. There is nothing natural about the environment at SeaWorld. So maybe they put up a few fake trees and some fountains, but as far as I know, the size of the pools have not changed, the whales are still placed with other whales that they cannot communicate with, they can’t hunt, and they are still continuing to be exploited.

This video is absolutely laughable and I cannot help but roll my eyes every time I watch it.

https://seaworldcares.com/en/Future/Educational-Encounters/

Maybe it’s our Western culture and religions that cause us to have little connection with these majestic mammals. The idea that animals cannot have spirits justifies the idea that it is morally acceptable to take them from their families and their homes and keep them in a bathtub for their entire lives.

It is crucial that we remember the views of ingenious people, who believe that killer whales are sacred beings, mighty animals that protect the waters. They are not here so they can be put in captivity to “educate people.”

After learning more about orcas and studying more of their behaviors, it is obvious to me that they have more similarities to humans than differences. They are social and emotional creatures. They feel love, pain, grief, and many of the emotions that humans feel. They connect with one anther, have the ability to form bonds, and they can form strategies with each other. I genuinely believe that if humans had the ability to understand what orcas are saying, SeaWorld and places like it would never exist in the first place.

Don’t go to SeaWorld. Educate yourself and your families about orca whales by using videos, books, and documentaries like Blackfish to understand the grace and characteristics of these creatures.

Go on a whale watching tour so you can experience the emotional side of their wild beauty as opposed to their staged shows at SeaWorld.

Most of all, open your mind to the idea that these animals might not be so different from you and with your awareness of what is happening to them, they could be taken off the federal endangered species list.

-Reganne

Also, a lot of this information contradicts itself, it was hard for me to find exact answers during the research so if something is factually incorrect, please don’t hesitate to correct me!

http://www.blackfishmovie.com/

Findhttp://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/seaworld-killer-whale-orca-theme-park-john-hargrove-blackfish-kasatka-tilikum-dawn-brancheau-animal-a7903051.html Out more Information from the Following Websites

https://www.seaworldofhurt.com/orca-capture/

https://orcaspirit.com/wildlife/orcas-killer-whales/

http://www.orcahome.de/incidents.htm

https://www.seaworldofhurt.com/features/30-years-three-deaths-tilikums-tragic-story/

https://www.petalatino.com/en/blog/blackfish-exposes-seaworld/

https://www.thedodo.com/62-orcas-have-died-at-seaworld-580775893.html

https://sciencing.com/meaning-pacific-northwest-native-american-orca-design-8139.html

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earth-talks-killer-whales/