Killer whale (orca) belongs to the dolphin family and is of order cetacea. People generally assume that whales and dolphins are two different kinds of animals, but they are not and every member in the dolphin family is a kind of whale (Lunis). Cetacea order comprises of dolphins, porpoises, and whales and the largest member of this dolphin family is known as orca or killer whale. The issue of killer whales living in marine parks and trainer deaths has exploded in the public sphere since 2013, when the documentary Blackfish was released. The documentary revealed facts about what is really happening inside the parks and the rigid way that orcas are being treated by the trainers who worked there. At Sea World in California, killer whales have been housed in large saltwater pools (Nielsen). SeaWorld should not capture Killer whales (orcas) anymore because America has numerous problems including deficiencies in American’s national legal protection for orca in captivity, inefficiency to keep the orcas in captivity due to their physical and psychological characteristics and lastly, the incapacity on the behalf of the SeaWorld to add on any contribution to the understanding of the main threats posed by wild orcas. 

When the documentary Blackfish was released, there was a lot of backlash which the public display industry had to face. Tweets supporting Blackfish and criticizing SeaWorld came from all angles. For instance, actress/singer Ariana Grande, having 16.5 million followers; PETA, with 500,000 followers; and of course, the general public, all shared their concern towards saving orcas. Killer whale is one of the world's most intense predators. They devour marine warm blooded animals, for example, seals, ocean lions, and even whales, utilizing their teeth that can be four inches in length. They are known to grab seals right off the ice. orcas are apex predators, at the highest point of the natural way of life. No other creatures (with the exception of humans) can hunt orcas. Killer whales feed on ocean winged animals, squid, octopuses, ocean turtles, sharks, beams and fish. Captures of wild orcas for the captive media outlet has had an everlasting effect on the target population. The size and social structure of the Southern inhabitant populace has still not recouped following their catches in the 1960 to the 1970s. With an expanding consciousness of how orca welfare is seriously bargained through their capture and imprisonment, it is quite shocking to observe that, despite the world knowing the consequences of keeping orcas in captivity, still these are being taken from the wild from their natural habitat.

The most recent years have offered ascend to a totally new level of discernment encompassing the treatment of creatures and the law's part in controlling their care. The Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) was passed in 1972 with the reason for actualizing managerial principles to save and secure amphibian warm blooded creatures and their part in the marine ecosystem. Although the MMPA implies to guarantee marine environment steadiness by ordering a discontinuance on taking or bringing in marine vertebrates, it has turned out to be progressively evident that the Act is loaded with detrimental gaps and flaws. The MMPA gives the public display industry (marine parks) extremely broad control over these standards, which makes it very unlikely that any necessary tightening of the regulations will be possible in the future (Wise). 

The Act's insufficiencies incorporate the faulty open show industry-set norms and the absence of oversight and requirement of these principles, which are confirm and exacerbated through separated office duty and conflicting control reinforcement. One of the biggest loopholes in the MMPA is the business' control of the standards. Public show offices need to maintain uncollected and unapproved "professionally perceived norms" for instruction or preservation programs, which expect them to totally self-regulate (Wise). 

Per the public display industry’s “professionally recognized standards”, public display industry has an unrestricted and expansive control. The instructive and conservational programs require that all organizations have a mission articulation including instruction, a composed training design, and organized training programs coordinated by an expert with instructive programming training. Permit-holding open show offices' training programs must offer "various levels of learning openings, which incorporate propelled training programming for all ages, and in addition educator training." The data that these show offices present to the overall population about marine natural life preservation, the creatures, and their biological communities should likewise be founded on the "best current logical knowledge." It is astonishing that such a high degree of control has been vested in the hands of the industry which tends to play around with the vivid powers according to its own whims and fancies. There is hardly any supervision seen on behalf of the government in order to ensure that the measures are sufficiently met. The regulating agency has absolutely no prescribed process or even the intention to create a process for any form of evaluation of these public display industries as to whether they are meeting the requisite professional standards or not. 

Furthermore, the isolated administrative obligations among the different actualizing organizations add to the deficiencies of the MMPA. Under the Department of Commerce, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) secures whales, dolphins, porpoises, seals, and ocean lions. Under the Department of the Interior, the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) maintains supervisory authority over walruses, manatees, dugongs, sea otters, and polar bears. There is a necessary requirement that facilities have to submit their records to NMFS through which the true statistics could be formulated. The inventories reveal the existence of disturbing deaths, high mortality rates and low birth rates. The reason for this has been that the killer whales (orcas) have not been able to adapt well to the captivity. The results were much expected because when mammals would be forced out of their natural habitat by such public display industries, then they will not be able to adapt the changed environment. At the same time, it is a crucial fact to note that the killer whale (orca) is the largest predator of the dolphin family till date. The quantity of food required for this mammal in order to sustain its life is much more than other mammals. The profit seeking industries have little interest in the welfare of the killer whales and are more interested in earning their share of profits. Since the regulating authorities are latent enough to keep a check on the working, this industry takes advantage and do not provide these whales the requisite food intake (Wise). 

It is therefore stated that the MMPA has complete ambiguity in legislating the rules. The situation has turned from bad to worse due to the inadequate division in authority and the lack of supervision in MMPA. This has led the marine parks (public display industry) to take advantage of the laws and legislating their rules which enables them to hunt the orcas at the first place, therefore, leading them in 1960 to trap at least sixty-eight killer whales as sculpture models, for display and as scientific models by marine parks. As a result, these deficiencies are the reason behind SeaWorld death incidents.

The second reason for not letting the killer whales come within an artificial environment are the physical and psychological characteristics of orcas and their inability to afford living in captivity. The physical characteristics of orcas simply corroborate to their feature of being gigantic in size and the psychological characteristics pinpoint their nature of being a ferocious predator. Their nature also includes eating by killing others i.e., by killing living animals. However, at SeaWorld, orcas are provided with dead meat which goes against their killing nature. They basically have no tendency to kill humans, however, when they are extremely hungry, then only they attack trainers and the human watchers. When these killing whales are in their natural habitat, they can pursue such nature wherein the humans are also not harmed. While a few cases of dolphins utilizing wipes as instruments have been accounted for, delphinids have not created device making capacities equivalent to people or gorillas (Anderson).

The last killer whale born in captivity at SeaWorld has recently died at a San Antonio park.

Kyara, the orca born in April to her mom Takara, was being treated by veterinarians for an infection but her health declined as stated by the officials of SeaWorld. It has been time and again stated that the aquatic animals are prone to fall sick if they are removed from their natural habitat. Their psychological and physical characteristics make them unfit to sustain in an artificial environment. In this case also, a similar thing happened. Kyara had faced some very serious and progressive health issues relating to pneumonia. The problem had aggravated so much so, that the animal care and veterinary teams had been aggressively treating and gauging a way out. SeaWorld had also announced last year that it would stop breeding killer whales and end its killer whale shows following years of controversy over the way the company treats the animals, however, nothing has been done till date (Gajanan). 

In one anguishing episode appeared in Blackfish, a SeaWorld orca drags a senior coach more than once to the base of the pool by the foot, toying with him as it may do with a seal. The 40-year-old coach was executed by Tilikum in February 2010 in the wake of being maneuvered into the water. He ripped off her arm at the elbow, scalped her and separated her spine. Tilikum is as yet alive and as yet living at SeaWorld however who – knowing any of this – would need to see him perform? There is most likely that the recreation center's coaches love and watch over the creatures in their charge, yet the entire set-up is profoundly disgusting. It would sense that staring at some sort of orca Guan-tanamo Bay. However, creatures make engaging, uncomplicated casualties. SeaWorld is entirely wrong in keeping the orcas in bondage, where individuals can be in danger by them. It must be an influencing factor to think about the threats they overlook in nature. Assuming this is the case, it's simply one more bit of proof of our human childishness that still these creatures are kept for show off business and for photography purposes (Lewis).  

Furthermore, orcas are those creatures who have highly emotional and enthusiastic lives. Dolphins and whales have a feeling of social bonding that is on another level. This level is much more intricate than other different creatures, including humans. In the wild, killer whales live in matriarchal social orders where males are kept at the edge. Killer whales are not able to cope with the psychological and physical changes which occur due to the changes in their surroundings. For instance, at SeaWorld, Tilikum was at the base of the orca social structure and was being dominated by other female whales. Many-a-times, rakes were also identified on his entire body. Holding these marine warm-blooded animals in captivity is not only dangerous for them, but also to the people with whom these creatures interact with (Wise). Orcas must return to their natural habitat. By this way, these creatures can be safe with their own physical and psychological needs. 

In different parts of the world, human-orca relations have been and keep on being ruled by damaging and exploitative catch, constrainment and preparing techniques, and by the utilization of orcas in diversion programs inside oceanaria. The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society takes note of that hostage orcas are restricted to oceanaria in Argentina, Canada, China, France, Japan, Russia, Spain, and the United States. Russia additionally has a dynamic orca catch industry. SeaWorld's current declarations of the discontinuance of hostage orca reproducing and the utilization of orcas in dramatic exhibitions are promising. 

The third reason that the Killer Whales should not be confined in the habitat provided by SeaWorld is that SeaWorld has itself done little to contribute to our understanding of main threats to wild Orcas (overfishing, pollution, and climate change), and has not contributed much by captivating orcas who suffer from aggressive behavior toward humans.

In a reaction to the documentary Blackfish, SeaWorld has presented a complete press release in order to counter the claims made in the film. SeaWorld primarily holds the argument that it possessing the Killer Whales does nothing but helps science to move further on their research. According to the SeaWorld, keeping Killer whales (orcas) in artificial captivity provides an extraordinary possibility to do important studies. SeaWorld argues that it is not possible to replicate the research if these mammals are left in the wild. 

The stands propounded by SeaWorld comes out to be a mere fabrication to save one’s business and nothing of such sort happens. In fact, even if SeaWorld would not have been into existence, it does not mean that the human would not have been able to gauge or research on these species. SeaWorld hasn’t contributed much to our understanding of the main threats to wild orcas: overfishing, pollution, and climate change. Even though SeaWorld has tried to expandsynthetic insemination which is the use of cryopreserved whale sperm, researchers factor out that captive orcas ought to be trained to donate or accept sperm; no one ever attempted to impregnate a wild whale. The research does no longer provide any remedy for the hassle of captive killer whales. Despite their 24/7 access to killer whales, SeaWorld-affiliated researchers have published very few orca research. Out of the four-dozen orca-associated papers co-authored with the aid of SeaWorld-sponsored researchers over the netics to polar bears’ listening to; none centered on orcas. SeaWorld additionally touts its SeaWorld & Busch Gardens Conservation Fund as evidence of its funding in killer-whale science and conservation. 

Additionally, SeaWorld pledged to spend extra $10 million on orcas’ studies after releasing Blackfish, it has been stated that from all papers co-authored via SeaWorld-baked researchers over the past forty years; most of them had been posted before 1990 and they're not that specialized in captive orcas (Gajanan). These funds were supposed to aim on studying killer whales and researching on them by doing a complete analysis in which the SeaWorld has failed miserably and has not added anything new with its studies (Raja). The amount which has been pledged by the park does no good because research has not been substantive. Therefore, even if such hefty amount has been spent, it has not contributed or added in the already existing research.

Talking about protection, killer whales (orcas) can best be protected when they are in their natural habitat. Taking an example of the human-made zoos, animals such as lions and tigers are carnivores and have the nature of killing the weaker species in order to sustain in their own life. This is how they are born and if they are confined and kept into captivity then slowly and slowly they will turn into endangered species and finally be extinct. The same situation applies to that of killer whales. They are also possessing the nature of killing the weaker and smaller species and eating them as food in order to live further. So, when the news comes of the fact that killer whales have been responsible for killing two to three humans (trainers), one cannot blame these aquatic species to be cautious. For example, the male orca, Tilikum has been into captivity from the very inception of his life and has been held responsible for the deaths of two trainers of the SeaWorld (Kirby). Killer Whales as the name suggests, are dangerous and are of the nature of killing for their own needs. Humans cannot possible claim a mammal’s nature to be the problem. Whale’s aggressive behavior towards humans is natural and bound to exist. 

Orcas are indeed a standout amongst the most astute marine animals, particularly because of their intense abilities of sight and hearing. Their excellence has left people astounded for ages, yet for some, imprisonment of orcas restrict their flexibility and delight in life. It not just harms the physical and emotional well-being of these creatures, but also poses a threat to coaches. One such incident happened with Annette Eckis. She was convinced by the public relations team of the SeaWorld, to put on a bikini and ride around on the back of a killer whale for local newspapers and television stations. However, the publicity stunt proved to be harmful for Annette wherein the whale had surged on to her legs through her sharp teeth because of which her legs were completely damaged. She had to be treated with 200 stitches. Such a happening proves that SeaWorld wants nothing but profits and would do just about anything for advertising. Keeping killer whales in captivity further promotes the evil motive of the media outlets to seek profits on the cost of safety (Kirby). Despite of this fact, individuals keep on profiting from these executioner whales. 

The atrocities are not only being committed by the SeaWorld, but there have been many instances which have portrayed as to how orcas are being captured and used by the media houses all over the world. In 2010, a youthful female Norwegian orca, known as Morgan, was discovered alone and withered off the Netherlands drift. She was caught with the expectation of restoration and discharge, yet was rather sent in captivity in Tenerife, where she now performs traps for angle. Instead of treating her and sending her back into the sea, she has been captured to entertain the general public. Similarly, in 2012 and 2013, a total of eight Russian orcas were captured for media outlets. Out of these, two orcas, a female known as Narnia and a youthful male, are being held in captivity in Moscow and two orcas have been sent to China. 

It has already been proved that killer whales in captivity are nothing but a commodity and unseasoned propaganda of the SeaWorld for its own profit seeking motives. Orcas are being used by the advertising and media outlets for their own profit. It has also been found that killer whales have been facing the wrath of death due to their sickness of living in an artificial environment. It has been seen that there are frequent deaths due to pneumonia only (Gajanan). This protection concern isn't only for the welfare of those orcas held captive for show purposes, but for individuals from the entire population of this species who are abandoned. Captures not only affect the physical and passionate prosperity of the bigger populace, but also influence the overall populace development. 

At the same time, it is an accepted fact that along with killer whales, human can also not be put at risk in order to save some other species. It is because of these reasons that it can be rightly said that killer whales belong to their natural habitat. By keeping them in their natural environment, killer whales (orcas) would not have to be tamed and would remain to be of their natural instinct, and also the trainers who are at risk because of such dangerous species would also be relieved from such danger. 

It can be surely concluded that more and more animals are classified as endangered every day. Fifty years ago, orcas were living without any serious threats, but humans have become a major threat for them, thus leading them to be classified as an endangered animal. Therefore, each individual has a duty to protect these mammals and to save the ecosystem. Also, it must be noted that humans destroy the life of mammals like orcas. Moreover, due to frequent deaths for both trainers and whales in SeaWorld, it is time that the truth must come out to the general public so that they can decide if they want to contribute to the destruction of an aquatic life form and its ecosystem or actually save it.
