Thursday, February 25, 2010

That, kid, is the circle of life

Okay, the killer whale.

Those poor, poor kids, and their poor, poor parents. Just out to have a fun day at a theme park and look at all the wonderful sea life. And then the sea life kills a trainer. Ooooohhhh. Not good. “Jimmy, this is Dr. Rosenblatt. Show her with the dolls what happened at the bad place.”

On the other hand, score one for the killer whales. I’ve been to Sea World, and I wanted bite somebody after 2 hours. Imagine 6 shows a day with those yappy bastards in the wetsuits and Janet Jackson headsets. Out of the pool, into the pool. Out of the pool, into the pool. Out of the pool, into the pool. Wave at the crowd, Shamu! If I was an orca I’d be thinking, “Hey, you know, I probably have these choppers for a reason.”

Plus, no matter how big one of those pools is, it’s not the open ocean. For an orca, it’s got to be the equivalent of an 8’x10’ cell. You can take a few laps, but eventually it’s all gonna look pretty much the same.

And maybe the killer whale wasn’t even pissed off. Maybe it was just a bad day. No performer is on every show. Sometimes you’re hitting on all cylinders, they laugh, they cry, everything you do is golden. And sometimes you fall on a trainer and squash her. It pretty much was going to happen someday.

Still. In my book, that’s one for Shamu.

4 comments:

victory4angela said...

Tilikum is HUGE too - I can't believe he didn't have a bigger tank at the very least. I'm all for releasing him into the wild, but will he survive after 19 years in captivity? Will he know how to hunt for food? What a conundrum for everyone including the orca.

Some stupid person in the WaPo noted that he must be called a "killer" whale for some reason. That's why I prefer to call them Orcas so no one gets confused.

FirePhrase said...

I can understand. Or change every species that has ever killed a human to "killer": killer dogs, killer tigers, killer cows (stampede!!). Maybe then people will get that they are animals and not fur people. And to try to shove them into some anthropomorpic box is just irresponsible. They all deserve some R.E.S.P.E.C.T. and some room. Especially ones that way more than a family car.

And did you see that orca had been in 2 other fatal incidents? Did those people not see Jaws 3D?

victory4angela said...

Killer birds... (hey, I love that movie!)

Now they're saying that her ponytail may have provoked the attack. I'm pretty sure that as a girl with long hair, she probably wore her hair in a ponytail every day.

Yes, I heard that "Tili" had killed two others but over a period of 19 years. There is some chatter to release him into the wild, but apparently they released Keiko a few years ago and he didn't do so well and died after 4 years. He chased boats and played with his food vs eating it. They should've just left both of them alone where they were. It's probably too late to release Tili but he should not be in any more shows EVER.

FirePhrase said...

Some animals take to zoo life really well. Unfortunately many of the animals that people really want to see (elephants, lions, gorillas, orcas) are used to wide ranges and get very agitated by confined areas. Someday, everyone will be able to visit these incredible species in their own habitats. I hope. I hope we figure it all out before they all disappear.

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