In recent years, the backlash against SeaWorld for its unscrupulous treatment of Orca whales has landed the theme park in very murky water.
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Shows at the San Diego park will stop by the end of 2016, said CEO Joel Manby, while a “new orca experience” will debut in 2017 with a “strong conservation message”.
The whales at SeaWorld San Diego range from 10 months to 50 years-old, so, even if the measure is passed, it may be decades before the public sees its last whale in captivity. The legislation would outlaw breeding, capturing, importing orca whales for the objective of public exhibition in the U.S. Essentially it’d be the nail in SeaWorld’s Shamu-sized coffin.
According to Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, he believes that the Orca Responsibility and Care Advancement Act will ensure that orcas that are kept in aquatic parks namely SeaWorld will be the last ones to die in captivity which would mean that no other whales will replace them when they die. SeaWorld sent ABC7 a recorded statement and video of employees working with killer whales.
Keeping them in habitats such as the Shamu Theater or the Shamu Stadium allows children and other curious visitors to learn more about this whale species, and gain a deeper understanding of it. As Kermes insists, SeaWorld and other similar organizations are actually “part of the solution, not the problem”.
Although it is impossible to know why Tilikum killed three people, the film suggests SeaWorld’s marine mammals are under a great deal of stress – as they are taken out of their natural environment and forced to live, and perform, in captivity.
SeaWorld has already publicly acknowledged plans to sue the CCC for the right to continue breeding orcas.
SeaWorld has struggled against public scrutiny after the 2013 documentary BlackFish which exposed disturbing conditions for the theme park’s orcas. She added that the new proposed legislation has the potential to create an incentive for SeaWorld to develop a long-term contraceptive for the whales.
“All of the falsehoods and misleading techniques in Blackfish are employed in the service of the film’s obvious bias, one that is best revealed near the end of Blackfish by a neuroscientist with no known expertise in killer whales”.
But SeaWorld officials are unsurprisingly pushed back and have been critiquing these efforts for prohibiting whale breeding as well as captivity.
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The bill is backed by State Assemblyman Richard Bloom (D-Santa Monica), marine biologist and orca expert Dr. Naomi Rose and former SeaWorld trainer Samantha Berg.
