It's been about two and a half years since “Blackfish” premiered in the United States, and after watching the documentary I was left wondering if the film would make as big of an impact as I was hoping it would. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, it’s available on Netflix. “Blackfish” tells the story of SeaWorld and the controversy behind the captivity of the orcas. After seeing the film, I was horrified to learn that the beloved aquarium was actually hurting its killer whales. For the average person going to the park it seems like it's a great park. The animals all look like they have plenty of space and that they are loved and healthy, but in actuality the tanks are far too small for the large whales.
The documentary talks about how harmful captivity could be to not only the killer whales, but to humans as well. As the film points out, in the wild, orcas are normally playful and there have not been any known attacks against humans. Meanwhile, in captivity, there have been over 100 reports of violent behavior. From something as little as chomping their jaws to reports of four deaths.
For an animal to transform from a gentle and seemingly sweet creature into an aggressive creature should raise red flags. I think that the trainers really do connect and love the whales, but who wouldn’t go crazy living in a closed space their entire lives? Many of the trainers that the filmmakers interviewed revealed that the reason that they did say they loved the whales so much was because they were unsure of who would take care of the animals.
As a young girl I told my parents that I wanted to be a trainer at Seaworld. I was so in love with the idea of being one of the trainers and being able to swim with Shamu every day. When I was younger, I believed that SeaWorld’s trainers would have to go through extensive schooling to become a marine biologist, but found out that they’re in fact just performers. They don’t have much training. They watch videos and have a few training courses but the main purpose for them is to entertain. The trainers and other park employees, like the tour guides, are said to lie about some facts. SeaWorld tells its visitors that a killer whale's lifespan is much shorter than the actual life expectancy, that the average life expectancy in the wild is actually 30 to 50 years old, but killer whales can get as old as 100 years old. The average killer whale death age at SeaWorld is 13. SeaWorld also tells its visitors that it's common for Orcas to have a collapsed dorsal fin but it's actually very rare in the wild to find an Orca with a collapsed fin and IS a sign of an injured whale.
Looking into the tanks holding the whales, we would think that the tanks look big and pretty spacious, but in actuality it would be like sitting in a bathtub. In the wild the killer whale swims up to 100 miles a day. They would have to swim over 1,000 laps in the tank to swim that much.
After watching "Blackfish," I was so upset with how SeaWorld was treating its animals. I couldn’t believe that they would put the animals and its trainers at risk day after day. "Blackfish" blew up and it started many different conversations on what should go down. So in the past two years, has anything actually changed? Along with three class-action lawsuits, many companies have dropped SeaWorld. Airlines canceled their deals and Barbie stopped making the SeaWorld trainer Barbie. OSHA cites SeaWorld for failing to properly train their trainers, and their profits dropped 84 percent. It doesn’t come as much of a shock but attendance has also significantly dropped.
In the past two years, SeaWorld has made many attempts at redeeming their name, but have continued to fail. The movie caused a major uproar with angry visitors and has permanently earned SeaWorld a bad name. It’s going to be hard to come back from this: until SeaWorld is completely shut down or totally transforms, there will be people against them. One of the biggest victories is that the SeaWorld in San Diego is ending the Shamu show. I encourage all that haven’t seen the film to watch it and help end the animal cruelty in the parks.
