About two weeks ago, I was on a trip with a large group to San Antonio. One of our excursions around the town was a free trip to Sea World. Normally, I would never be caught dead in the walls of that amusement park and would protest even the idea of going, but because of the large group I didn't want to create trouble for everyone. I made the decision and go along to see how bad it really was. That really is the only way to get to the truth on a subject like this one.
I am going to try to stay as unbiased as I can with this. My personal opinion on the matter is that the animals are treated inhumanely and should either be released or moved to a better environment if they aren't able to live safely in the wild. I don't have a problem with aquariums or things like them, as long as they aren't endangering the animals or hurting them for show. In fact, I think they are very educational and think that they can introduce kids to the aquatic world or marine biology which can lead to careers in sciences or conservation. But I will still tell you what I saw without bias and then give some comments in the end. I saw...product placement. A sponsor here, a sponsor there. Hey buy this drink! Hey buy this commemorative Shamu the whale bubble blower toy for the low price of $25.99! If your parents don't buy it, they don't love you. Ok, maybe I added that last part but really the amount of things being thrown at you to buy was overwhelming. To that point I still hadn't even seen a living animal. After you dug through the plush whale dolls and souvenir tee shirts for the tourists what you saw next was...roller coasters! WOOOOO catch some G-Forces on our crazy rides with their twists and turns. Finally, after getting past those, without wasting any time in the ridiculously long two-hour wait, we got to the first viewing of real live animals, the sea lion show. The crazy thing about it was it wasn't mostly about the sea lions, it was more about the bad actors trying to rip off High School Musical with an aquatic theme. Yeah the sea lions were there and did the little tricks they are drilled relentlessly to do, but still they were not the stars.
After dodging the roller coasters and products to buy, we got to the only exhibit that wasn't a huge production. The penguin and puffin exhibit. It was actually nice which surprised me. They had plenty of room to slide, walk, swim both on the surface and deep, and climb some rocks that were put in there. It was both educational and exciting to see the animals in an environment that is very close to where they'd be in the wild and that is all you really need. After that we went to the world famous and controversial killer whale show. This was the one I was most jazzed up to see because of the different reports of poor treatment and living conditions of the killer whales. When I say they were in complete damage control from different whistle blowers and movies like "Blackfish" (which is on Netflix and I recommend that you do watch it), I mean that all they talked about on the videos leading up to the event was how they have completely changed from how they used to be and they are doing all these new rescue programs to save animals, not just to bring them into the park. Then even a trainer stood up and talked about how they have changed the whale program and after these whales pass they are discontinuing it. Then the whales arrived. They were absolutely mesmerizing. They were huge and yet still beautiful and graceful in the water. But then I noticed the flaccid, flopped over dorsall fins that Sea World claims is quite common in the wild but in actuality is very rare. It brought me back to the real world and reminded me that this beauty should not be confined to a pool and be forced to do flips for thousands of gawking tourists that decide to come by.
After that we tried to go to the beluga show which I heard was very impressive, but were too late so we left shortly after. Honestly, I left with the same point of view I came in with. Yes, the animals are beautiful and the tricks are fun to watch, but at what cost do they do these tricks? How many trainers have to be killed or baby whales ripped from their mothers before someone says that this is wrong and should not be allowed? To those who say, "Well some kids go to Sea World and learn about the animals and decide to go into marine biology or something like that and discover what they love," I say that there are so many better and more effective ways for kids to learn about aquatic life where animals aren't kept in confined or dangerous ways. Or maybe we could make something even better than Sea World for those kids to learn. Honestly, I want to hear what you think. Please text me or email me or comment below so that I can talk about this with other people and see what their opinions are on this subject. But if you decide to go to Sea World know this, you are going to an amusement park focused on riding rides and selling souvenirs, not at all focused on animals or learning about them.
