Point Loma High School (PLHS) students continued their crusade to convince SeaWorld to stop using marine animals for entertainment, cutting another public-service announcement to invite the local theme park to provide its side of the story regarding the treatment of killer whales portrayed in the documentary “Blackfish,” a controversial documentary that aired recently on CNN.
\nPoint Loma Cinematic Arts Program teacher Anthony Palmiotto and his students invited “Blackfish” director Gabriela Cowperthwaite to answer student questions Feb. 3 during a panel discussion in the school\u2019s cinematic theater, which included student activist Max Guinn, founder of Kids Eco Club, and marine biologist Dr. Toni Frohoff. Although SeaWorld San Diego officials have strongly decried the accuracy of the documentary and defended their animal-care practices in a pushback to the “Blackfish” program, they were invited \u2014 but did not participate \u2014 in the panel discussion.
\n“Blackfish” explores the 2010 accidental death of SeaWorld\u2019s Dawn Brancheau, trainer of the orca Tilikum, and is critical of keeping killer whales in captivity and using them to perform in shows. The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2013, then went mainstream in October when it was featured on CNN and became the subject of several CNN news features.
\nThough they declined to participate in the PLHS panel discussion, SeaWorld officials issued the following statement:?”As we responded a few weeks ago to the filmmaker\u2019s debate challenge, we have no interest in helping promote a film this dishonest and manipulative,” said SeaWorld San Diego spokesman Dave Koontz. “Our position has not changed,” continued the statement. “We did not receive any specific invitation from the school regarding today\u2019s screenings. We would like to thank Kearny High School for inviting us to provide a SeaWorld presentation to their students last week. We applaud the school\u2019s desire to provide its students information on both sides of the issue to help them make a more informed decision. It\u2019s unfortunate that we did not receive invitations from the other schools to provide a SeaWorld presentation to their students.”
\nDuring the Feb. 3 panel discussion, Cowperthwaite described herself as a “mom who\u2019d taken her children to visit Sea World,” saying she didn\u2019t set out with any preconceived notions or to do an expose on the marine park.
\n“I was making a documentary about trainers and their relationships with apex [top] predators, almost a philosophical film,” Cowperthwaite said. “It wasn\u2019t going to be controversial.”
\nBut as she delved deeper into the story, “I began peeling back the onion and started to realize, shockingly, the truth,” Cowperthwaite said.
\nMarine biologist Dr. Toni Frohoff said scientists “have an obligation when we find dolphins and whales we\u2019re studying are dying and languishing in captivity to speak out. It\u2019s not a matter of being animal-rights activists. It\u2019s a matter of scientists being responsible to populations of animals and the habitats they live in.”
\nAsked if “Blackfish” has caused SeaWorld to make any changes in its business model, Cowperthwaite replied, “We sometimes hear rumblings that they might be changing the environment of the sea lion pool or making nicer waterfalls. [But] so far, they\u2019re standing their ground, saying they\u2019re proud of their history and to look at all the good things they do [animal rescues, conservation, public education].”
\nCowperwaite likened challenging SeaWorld\u2019s business model to “poking the dragon.”
\n“Nobody\u2019s talked about any of these things [orca treatment] for 40 years,” Cowperthwaite said.
\nShe added that she and others challenging Sea World\u2019s methods are being branded by some as “crazy activist scientists.” “The Kids Eco Club teaches environmentalism and this is a really big issue, and we thought it was important for kids to hear both sides of the argument so they can decide who\u2019s right or wrong,” said Guinn, when asked why he organized the “Blackfish” panel discussion.
\nFrohoff said orcas in the wild are “some of the most peaceful of all social species,” adding she felt captivity may cause some of them to become stressed and “pathological.”
\nFrohoff said it\u2019s impractical to try and take orcas that have lived their entire lives in captivity and unleash them into the wild where they wouldn\u2019t know how to take care of themselves without human care. But there might be a middle ground, she suggested, through the creation of “sanctuaries,” fenced-off, more natural habitats where people could observe them, but where orcas and other marine mammals wouldn\u2019t be forced to perform like circus animals for human entertainment.
\nA student asked Cowperthwaite who they should believe in the orca debate \u2014 SeaWorld or their critics.
\n“Don\u2019t trust either of us,” she said. “Go and do your own research. I want to encourage you all to do your own critical thinking.”<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Point Loma High School (PLHS) students continued their crusade to convince SeaWorld to stop using marine animals for entertainment, cutting another public-service announcement to invite the local theme park to provide its side of the story regarding the treatment of killer whales portrayed in the documentary “Blackfish,” a controversial documentary that aired recently on CNN. […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":267755,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11559","_seopress_titles_title":"A (killer) whale of a controversy divides students, SeaWorld","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11559],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-267754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beach-bay-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=267754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/267755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=267754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=267754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=267754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}