Cetacean Captivity

[apache1]

True. It seems that orcas evolved to live in family groups, and swim hundreds of miles hunting for food. Not an environment we can replicate in captivity.

I think the film said that most orcas in sea parks are now born in captivity. So if we keep this up for another 25,000 years or so, we may breed the wild instincts out of them. Just like we've domesticated dogs, chickens, cattle, etc.

The wild instincts have never been totally bred out of me!

 

[jayem]

The wild instincts have never been totally bred out of me!

You're not alone. That was the moral of Lord Of The Flies. Under a thin veneer of civilization, many of us are savages.

 

[Standing_Ultraviolet]

The ethics of keeping wild animals captive are extremely complicated. I would say that there isn't anything generally wrong with it, but it can get rapidly problematic under certain circumstances.

Large and highly intelligent animals like orcas should only be kept in captivity for as long as is strictly necessary for their own benefit, because of their tendency to develop stress-related mental illnesses. Parks like Sea World that hold them for commercial purposes with no other justification should be shut down. Smaller and/or less intelligent animals (or animals that can't be safely returned to the wild for whatever reason) should be kept in zoos that at least seriously try to meet the AZA accreditation standards (I'm a realist, that's why I say "seriously try"; I've been to an AZA accredited zoo, and its exhibits would just not have been possible for a smaller park).