Blackfish May Have Influenced SeaWorld's Decision to Restructure Their Orca Shows

by N/A, 9 years ago | 2 min read

In a long overdue announcement that has left critics of the theme park impatient, Sea World finally announced that they will no longer be running live orca shows starting early next year. If you're one of the majority, you're probably wondering what on Earth took so long? There's been a massive public outcry about seeing some changes within the park for years now, and only just recently is Sea World truly responding.

At least they've made this step forward, ever so slight as it may be.

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As great as this sounds, Sea World isn't truly giving up that much. Really, it's pretty much business as usual.

The fact is, the announcement made was only in terms of the one park: San Diego. That means that orcas in the other two parks, San Antonio and Orlando, will still be subject to circus tricks, and captivity.

As for the orcas in San Diego, they're not necessarily home free-either. The shows aren't being cancelled, they're simply being restructured. If you reread the announcement the plan is to "phase out" the shows.

Well, who knows what that truly means?! They say it is meant to serve as a more "educational experience" for visitors, in a more real-life state for the orcas.

They can say that, but it seems Sea World is just trying to get by the next wave of this PR nightmare they've been facing for so long. In fact this could just be a response to the state of California ban of the captive breeding of these animals.

So, as part of the ruling, SeaWorld San Diego was given $100 million to expand their killer whale tanks. But, just to reiterate once again, this is only in California.

Other states still permit the breeding of captive animals, so Sea World really isn't facing any real change here. In fact, they have the two other parks that could simply carry on this part of the business for them. They really have dodged a bullet here, but made an announcement that was aimed to make people excited for change.

Unfortunately, that change isn't coming quite yet. Until laws like this pass across multiple states we can still be sure we'll have to see the exploitation of animals like this for the purpose of entertainment.

It was a well-phrased announcement on their part, but it seems the masses see right through what they are trying to do here: get away with changing nothing. Until they decide to make some real changes, the people fighting ho Sea World treats its animals aren't going to back down.

The documentary "Blackfish" has helped raise a number of these issues, although the park says the film is drastically over exaggerated. The fact is, "Blackfish" helped start a dialogue and created public backlash.

Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite had this to say about the announcement from Sea World:

"But it appears that they are not stopping their orca shows at all. Just repurposing them. I'm afraid this is just the latest attempt to survive the PR nightmare that is Sea World."