SeaWorld has been capturing killer whales from the waters of Iceland since the late 1970s.  With the proper heavy duty machinery and ginormous netting, teams of men worked together to capture young killer whales from their families and transport them to SeaWorld in Orlando, Florida where they could no longer swim freely with their families and hunt for their food naturally like they should.  Killer whales can live up to forty years of age in the wild while the less fortunate orcas who spend their lives at SeaWorld average a life expectancy of twenty-five years of age.  Questions began to arise after multiple reports of killer whales attacking trainers and other people had been made.  There have been no recorded events where a killer whale has made an attempt to attack a human in the wild, which helped lead to more concern.  Scientists believe that the outrage caused by being separated from their families and sharing small swimming tanks with other killer whales has led to the attacks at SeaWorld.  Killer whales have one of the strongest family bonds in the animal kingdom and become extremely depressed and dramatized when forced to be separated from their family members.  Trainers mentioned that they began acting differently and making noises they have never heard before after being separated from their mothers after breeding.  Already being guaranteed a shortened life span than usual, killer whales at SeaWorld must live separated from their families in small tanks, sad and forced to do tricks for customers in order to get their daily portion of food.  Built up feelings of anger, depression, and pain are the factors that lead to killer whales acting out aggressively towards their trainers or other humans. 

A killer whale named Tilikum was held captive at SeaWorld for close to thirty years where he then died.  Tilikum was the kingpin of SeaWorld’s breeding system for many years, is responsible for more than half of SeaWorld’s orca whale population, and was the whale that starred in the documentary Blackfish.  At a young age, Tilikum was taken from his pod just off the coast of Iceland and brought to SeaWorld to spend the rest of his life in a small tank that did not allow him to swim freely and healthily.  With all of the built up aggression from being mistreated by all of the other orcas for taking up too much space, Tilikum lashed out on a person and two trainers, killing one of them.  It is very shocking that after three attacks, let alone one, Tilikum was not removed from captivity and forced to continue his entertainment career at SeaWorld.  Ingrid Newkirk, the active president of PETA, an animal rights organization, angrily stated in an interview that, “(Tilikum) was trained to eat what he was given and do what he was told.  He was also trained to roll over so that marine park workers could masturbate him with a gloved hand and collect his semen in a container.  The company's announcement that it would end its orca-breeding program came too late for Tilikum, who was bred twenty-one times, and had eleven of his offspring die before him.” (Newkirk 1).  As the president of PETA, these words come harsh to SeaWorld, but prove that it is no place for a killer whale to spend its entire life.  Tilikum is the perfect example for SeaWorld to see that what they have been doing is so wrong.  There are hundreds of other killer whales living similar horrible lives like Tilikum that PETA is fighting for to have removed from SeaWorld so that they can live to see their freedom from the imprisonment that is SeaWorld.  Although SeaWorld announced that the current generation of killer whales would be the last, other amusement parks are still holding orca whale performances for paying customers to come see.  These other amusement parks such as Loro Parque’s Orca Ocean in the Canary Islands of Spain are not seeing differences in the killer whales they have.  A twenty-nine-year-old trainer was killed by a killer whale on Christmas Eve of 2009, two months before Tilikum killed his trainer.  Clearly this is not a one-time event; killer whales do not belong in captivity because it is not the right thing to do and puts the lives of innocent people in danger every day.  There have been over one hundred recorded attacks that all took place in captivity with a small portion of them being fatal.  It is shocking that after over one hundred attacks, these parks continue to tell their guests that it was an error on the trainer’s part and that a killer whale would never intentionally harm a human.  All killer whales from amusement parks all over the world should be released back into the wild as soon as possible. 

Studies have shown that killer whales have an extra part to the brain that humans do not have that contributes to the sophisticated language used on an everyday basis between each other.  Animals with such intelligence are very rare to find in the animal kingdom.  Being so intelligent, it is definite that killer whales are fully aware of their surroundings and what is going on.  What SeaWorld has failed to notice in all of their “research done with killer whales,” is that they have similar feelings to humans.  The strange behaviors and noises demonstrated after a killer whale is separated from its pod or family can only support this information more.  In an article written in the Journal of Animal Ethics, “Animals and Moral Agency: The Recent Debate and Its Implications,” author Grace Clement touches deeply into how the correct way to treat killer whales and every other animal is demonstrated: the same way one human is expected to treat another.  Rebekah Humphreys wrote a similar article, “Dignity and Its Violation Examined Within the Context of Animal Ethics,” that too supports the belief that animals should receive the treatment they deserve.  In other words, morals should not be set only for humans, but for the animals that share the same planet with them.  Humphreys preaches, “But if dignity does have a use, as many people seem to think it does, then in order to avoid charges of speciesism and inconsistency it is worth examining whether it can be applied to animals and in doing so evaluate some further reasons why animals are not usually considered to be beings to which the concept can be applied,” (Humphreys 146-147).  It is morally wrong to treat any animal the way hundreds of killer whales are treated every day by being forced to live in the conditions they do in amusement parks.  A better definition of the word dignity could be what saves the current generation of killer whales from confinement in Humphreys’ eyes.  The Swiss Ethics Committee on Non-Human Gene Technology (ECNH) and the Swiss Committee of Animal Experiments (SCAE) are two organizations that Humphreys mentions are making efforts to create a more diverse definition of the word dignity.  She successfully supports these organizations efforts by saying, “… to the lower the status of the being or degrade it, and insofar as beings can be humiliated by, for example, excessive manipulation of their appearance to the extent that they are treated other than they are or treated in a way that goes against their own nature or belittles them, then the humiliation category may be applicable to animals,” (Humphreys 151).  Here, Humphreys is reassuring that animals have the same sense of humiliation and uncomfortableness that humans feel when they are put into unfamiliar situations they do not belong in.  This could not be more spot on from the situation the active killer whales are in performing at SeaWorld.  Part of the problem is that some are looking at the situation as “they’re just animals” when they should have better knowledge of what they are dealing with.  Ending the breeding system is definitely stepping in the right direction, however, it does not solve the problem of the killer whales still in confinement.  It is unfair that the few killer whales left still have to suffer the rest of their shortened lives at SeaWorld and make it the last place they will get to swim before they die.

Unfortunately, the decision has been made; yes, there will be no more capturing killer whales from Iceland and bringing them to amusement parks, but the current orcas still at amusement parks are being kept there until they eventually die against their will.  With the decision already made, there is no way anyone or any animal based organizations can change it and free the killer whales being held in captivity.  The only factor we can change is the living conditions for the these unlucky few.  First, it would be ideal to give them bigger tanks.  Killer whales can grow up to eight thousand pounds in weight and sharing a tank with two other whales is not their ideal comfortable environment.  The article “How to Keep Captive Killer Whales Happy” by Stephanie Pappas was written for this particular manner.  Pappas suggests how SeaWorld could have succeeded in keeping the killer whales there to perform, but now that a decision has been made, it can be used to keep the only ones left happy.  Two researchers at the University of Glasgow in Scotland suggested the ideas of adding more toys to the tank and creating a feeding system that requires all of the orcas to work together in order to eat like they do in the wild.  They also wanted to create a communication system where these whales can communicate with other captive whales.  They referred to this idea as a “Skype” for killer whales.  It is true that most animals being held captive by zoos or aquariums have a better life then they would in the wild.  Because this is not the case with killer whales and other animals at SeaWorld like dolphins and seals, they are typically the only ones brought to attention.  With better living conditions, not only are organizations such as PETA happy, but the killer whales and SeaWorld itself would be much happier.  It would help believers of both sides of the argument benefit.  Happier killer whales would decrease the chance of an attack and help remove some the guilt of keeping them confined considering it is the best possible scenario.   

Built up feelings of anger, depression, and pain are the factors that lead to killer whales acting out aggressively towards their trainers or other humans.  The right decision was made to end the breeding systems at SeaWorld, but the battle to free the killer whales still confined at SeaWorld and other amusement parks continues.  It is unfair that the killer whales still in these amusement parks should still have to suffer and live the rest of their lives in captivity where they certainly are not happy.  It is the right decision to make because no human should have to live like that, so why should an orca be forced to. 
