Whales that roam freely in the ocean do not actively attack humans, but are hunted and killed by humans as a cash cow. Tirikum, the orca star of SeaWorld in Orlando, caused an international outcry in 2010 when he accidentally killed his trainer during a public performance. Three years later, a documentary called "Blackfish" was released, telling the story of the life of a whale who was kidnapped as a child, held captive for years and bred as a stud to please humans in order to feed himself.
Killer whale that claimed 3 lives
Orlando city is located in the central Florida of the United States, where Disney World, Universal Studios, Adventure Island Park, Ocean World four parks, is the most popular tourist destination in the United States. Sea World, the World's most successful Marine park, is home to a group of giant captive mammals known as killer whales. The orca show is one of seaWorld's biggest attractions, arguably its biggest cash cow. From the 1960s to the 1980s, a large number of juvenile killer whales were captured and sent to perform in aquariums and Marine parks around the world.
In 1983, a juvenile male orca was captured off the southwest coast of Iceland. He was just two years old and 3.5 metres long. After spending a year in a tank, the calf was sold to Sealand, an aquarium in Victoria, Canada. Here, the smart orca quickly learns how to survive with humans: if it doesn't obey its trainer, it will be starved and attacked by the same "predecessors" who have been punished with it. As a result, the young killer whale had to "study hard" and quickly became beloved by his trainer, who named him Tilikum, which means "friend."
However, this "friend" turned out to be a killer whale. On February 20, 1991, 21-year-old champion swimmer Kelty Berne became Tiricum's first victim. She was working as a part-time animal trainer when she slipped into the pool where the whales were. Witnesses described Tilikum dragging Bern further and further away as other trainers threw life buoys at her as she tried to climb to shore. She was repeatedly dragged into deep water, and after three struggles to the surface, Bern eventually drowned. Her body was retrieved from the bottom of the pool seven hours later. The star swimmer was killed by a whale, causing Sealands to fall into disrepute and be forced to close.
Killer whales performing at Sea World. Seaworld has announced since 2016 that it would end orca breeding and phase out orca shows, but that may have been an empty promise. The park still has programs that allow visitors to "get up close and personal" with orcas and let them perform their skills.
The following year tiricum was resold for millions of dollars to SeaWorld in Orlando, USA, which desperately needed a breeding whale to beef up its performing team. Although the headline rule in captivity is that "sperm owners have no history of attacking humans," Tilikum's sheer size makes SeaWorld willing to take the risk. At 7 meters long and weighing 5,700 kilograms as an adult, Tilikum is the largest killer whale in captivity in the world. He immediately became the biggest star here, always making a last-minute appearance as the finale star. When a whale rises from the water, the audience wide-eyed and breathless; When it hit the water, it made an earth-shattering noise, a huge splash drenched the stands, and there were screams of delight -- and yes, there was no one who didn't fall for it.
A few years later, however, the accident happened again: one summer day in 1999, a man was found dead on Tilikum's back. The man had visited SeaWorld the day before, but sneaked in at the park at closing time and slipped past security to enter the pool where Tilikum was resting. An autopsy found that the man's body was riddled with bite marks and even his genitals had been bitten off. Despite the cameras surrounding the pool, SeaWorld insists the incident was not recorded. The verdict: a homeless man with a criminal record and suspected mental health problems unwittingly harasses a beloved whale as if he were "suicidal." The matter came to nothing.
On February 24, 2010, the appalling event mentioned above took place. Some visitors later claimed to have noticed that morning that the whales were upset and that the trainers were unhappy. A group performance had to be cancelled after the whales ignored instructions and chased each other. Then came the grand finale of the day: a collaboration between senior female animal trainer Dawn Blanche and Tiricum. All went well, and Tilikum obeyed, making one movement after another. "Maybe he didn't hear the whistle to turn back," the trainers said. Eventually, Tiricum returned, but instead of the expected praise whistle and reward "fish food," Dawn's whistle was "No reward, we move on." By this time, dawn was carrying a bucket that was running low on fish food, and Tiricum knew it. He heard the clatter of ice in the bucket and knew that the show was coming to an end and that he would not get any more food. He waited with his mouth open, but Dawn just patted him and ordered him back into the water. The giant stepped back in frustration and never took its eyes off Dawn again. Then Dawn stepped into the water, smiling and confident, as she waited to paddle with Tilikum, doing what they had done so many times together. Tilikum grabbed her left shoulder and dragged her under the water, slamming into her 60kg body...
An entertainment show turns into a gruesome live broadcast of a murder. Dawn Blanche eventually died of drowning and massive physical trauma: Tilikum swallowed her arm!
Who angered the whales?
The attack on a female trainer to death inspired Us director Gabriella Copperthwaite to explore the effects of captivity on orcas. In 2013, his documentary Blackfish was released, in which he interviewed a number of former seaWorld trainers and revealed the fact that companies, such as Ocean Park, captive and breed orcas for entertainment purposes. These companies have completely ignored the species protection and animal welfare issues brought about by captive farming practices, ignored the personal safety risks of these entertainment shows to the trainers, and continuously covered up the facts and fooled the public.
Early in the history of captivity, the first glimpses of orcas were made. "They are very friendly and often interact with humans," said a 1977 documentary. Although there has never been a case of wild whales actively attacking humans, like humans, they have a strong vengeful nature. Their lifespan is comparable to that of humans, and female whales can live to over 100 years." In recent years, Marine biologist and neurologist Lori Marino has scanned orca brains and found that they have something in common with human brains: a limbic system, including the hippocampus and amygdala, that acts like a mood processor. In other words, orcas are likely to have emotions and emotions, and they express them through behavior. "In fact, they, like humans, can be cruel or kind."
For decades in captivity, whales lived miserable lives unknown to the public. Tilikum, for example, spends his days training and performing, and his nights locked in a pod that's barely bigger than his body and in complete darkness. A wild whale can swim hundreds of kilometers a day, while a captive whale can move only a few hundred thousand times as much. The whales didn't want to go into the pod, but they had no choice: they had to go in to get food. "When they can't stand the hunger, they go in." "The trainer recalled. After being shut down for 12 hours, the whales often come out with bruises.
Wild killer whales live in family groups, and their offspring never leave their mothers. Aquariums are designed to create a "harmonious family" by mixing whales from different places together in a small space, but this is a source of conflict between animals. Whales in the ocean have a lot of space and potential to avoid conflict, but here, they have nowhere to run. Both in Sealand and SeaWorld, Tirikum has been bullied by other female whales. Its long display of audience friendliness led many to wonder if it might not have been at fault for the accident.
Facing the camera, the trainers finally told the truth: "We kept lying to the audience during our shows, saying that the whales were better cared for here and they had a better life than the whales in the ocean. We tell the audience that whales are born to make people happy and no one asks them to do it." In addition, the park uses false advertising terms to tell children: "The average life span of whales in the ocean is 30-35 years, and living in the park makes the animals healthier and longer." Dorsal fin failure occurs only about 1 percent of the time in wild whales, but is common in captivity.
After tirikum killed the trainer, SeaWorld still tried to cover it up. They first claimed that "the trainer fell into the water and was attacked", then added a new excuse that "the trainer's long ponytail was attacked", in an attempt to erase everything and get Tirikum back to performing as soon as possible. Unfortunately, it's hard to know exactly what makes an adorable killer whale suddenly turn into a killing machine. Maybe he was just playing, playing pranks, or maybe he was bored and angry. One thing we do know, though, is that all animals in captivity are not doing well, spiritually destroyed and psychologically damaged, like ticking time bombs. In 2016, the California Legislature passed a bill requiring SeaWorld to stop performing orcas and breeding orcas in captivity.
Of course, Tilikum isn't the only captive whale to have attacked humans. On November 23, 1987, at SeaWorld in San Diego, a trainer was killed under the weight of two whales when another whale lunged at him from behind during a show. Ocean Park's public explanation was that it was an accident caused by a miscalculation of timing, and definitely not an attack. Another trainer, who was playing with a whale on the shore, was dragged into the water by his feet and became the target of two whales. A timely rescue drew the whales away, and the trainer survived with a broken and bloody arm. Since whales were bred in captivity in the 1960s, there have been more than 40 incidents at Seaworld across the U.S.
Since 2015, Tilikum has lived alone in a swimming pool, drifting aimlessly and motionless all day. Tilikum died quietly in 2017 at the age of 35, never returning to the ocean.
We have to ask: why go all out to keep this poor guy in captivity? The answer is simple: it's valuable, especially for its semen. Ocean Park continuously extracts his sperm and freezes them to impregnate other females in order to breed more "money makers". More than half of the whales in the Marine park are descended from Tilikum, whose sperm is even used to mate his daughters.
One of the most ruthless pages in recent history
Humans have long recognized the edible value of whales. With the continuous development of European handicraft industry, the excellent performance of each part of the whale body was gradually recognized by human beings, and became an important raw material for many handicraft products in Europe at that time. Whales are full of gems: baleen is used in bras, skirts, umbrellas and fishing rods, oil is used for lighting, washing coarse wool and lubricating machinery, and secretions from sperm whales' intestines are a key source of the precious spice ambergris. In the last 100 years, the rise of zoos has revealed that captive whales for entertainment can be more profitable than ever.
On December 22, 2013, about 80 protesters from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals USA and the Florida Animal Rights Foundation gathered near Ocean Park.
Whaling is an important topic in The history of the United States, American scholar Dolin said: "Whaling has been one of the important driving forces for the evolution of this country, whether literally or figuratively speaking, the Culture, economy and even the spirit of the United States can be said to derive from whales. Beginning in colonial times, American whaling peaked in the mid-19th century, making it the nation's fifth largest economy. According to the U.S. whaling industry, 8,000 whales were killed in 1853 alone, generating $11 million in revenue, and the U.S. Secretary of State called it "an important source of national wealth."
The documentary also shows a precious image of a day in 1970 in Puget Sound, on the west coast of the United States, two helicopters hovering in the sky, a number of speedboats skimming over the sea, in addition to all kinds of high-tech detection equipment, human with a terrible weapon: bombs. They were hunting whales. The men in the speedboat threw multiple bombs into the sea, forcing the terrified pod to flee into the bay. The speedboat men shriek with excitement as the whales are ensnared.
The history of human hunting has taught orcas that humans target their calves! So they split into two groups: adult male orcas swimming toward the bay with their huge dorsal fins exposed, enticing humans to follow. The mothers escape by diving with their calves. But humans have detectors and helicopters! They hunt down the fugitive calves and spread huge nets. After the chicks are picked out, humans trap them in an enclosure, where they are secured with stretchers and ropes. At this time, the free adult whales do not leave, they hover around the boat, repeated desperate cries.
There is no denying that, after countless tragic accidents, the whale still attracts thousands of people to the aquarium to watch its performance. Over the past 60 years, Marine parks in the United States have become a multi-billion dollar industry, and whale shows are a huge source of profit. Today, more than 3,000 cetaceans are kept in commercial aquariums and Marine parks worldwide, and about 93% of the venues offer entertainment performances. It is our selfish love for whales and other wild animals that has led to their tragic lives. Perhaps 50 years from now people will look back and repeat today's exclamation: "What a barbaric age!"
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