Marineland in Canada is one of the few remaining places still exhibiting captive orcas for profit. This practice attracts negative publicity because of the suffering of the whales and the danger to trainers. At the moment, Marineland has one orca, a female called Kiska, as well as belugas and dolphins.
Several former trainers have spoken out against orca captivity. The latest was Christine Santos, an ex-trainer from Marineland. She told the press, it seems perfectly truthfully, that Kiska had been bleeding from her tail for months, although the cause was unknown.
Now, Marineland is threatening to sue Santos for more than a million dollars for “negatively affecting Marineland’s professional reputation”
This is a groundless threat. If Marineland doesn’t like the publicity that exhibiting captive orcas so deservedly gets, then the answer is to stop the abuse of highly sentient beings, not try and bully people into silence.
Tell Marineland to stop bullying former staff members immediately.
We the undersigned ask that you immediately withdraw the threat to sue Christine Santos because she told the media about an incident at your park.
Marine biologists generally agree that keeping orcas in captivity is causes the animals immense stress. Keeping highly intelligent, social animals in an unnatural and barren environment is cruel and serves no purpose other than profit for the owners. Training them to perform also puts the lives of trainers in jeopardy and has already resulted in human death.
All the above, unsurprisingly, attracts negative publicity. If Marineland does not like this then the answer is to stop exhibiting whales and dolphins. Trying to silence former members of staff with the threat of immense lawsuits is completely counter-productive.
We ask that you both retract this threat and reconsider exhibiting cetaceans in the first place.
Thank you for your attention.
