SeaWorld needed another death about as much as it needed a hole in Shamu’s tank.
Yet last week, one of the park’s beloved belugas — the curious and playful white whales — died after getting its jaw busted up by another captive whale.
Once again, there is blood in the water at SeaWorld.
And once again, everyone from analysts to activists is weighing in on the future of the theme park.
It underscores a withering reality: The park must evolve.
This is partly for ethical reasons — but certainly for financial ones.
SeaWorld, you see, is also bleeding money.
A few months ago, when Disney and Universal could barely handle all the visitors flocking to their parks, SeaWorld was announcing layoffs.
The job cuts came on the heels of declining profits and plummeting stock prices — and five years of harsh publicity about Dawn Brancheau, the trainer who was snatched, drowned and mutilated by a killer whale.
SeaWorld has die-hard fans who will go no matter what.
It also has its fierce critics who will never set foot in the parks.
In between are the majority of people — the ones who will make or break SeaWorld. These people don’t protest things. They may have no use for PETA. But they are increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of penning up mammoth animals in tiny tanks.
And when these people are faced with a choice between a guilt-free visit to Harry Potter and second-guessing their decision to take the kids to a whale show, more people are opting for the easier choice.
I’m still not completely sure SeaWorld gets that. Company execs still sometimes talk as though anyone with concerns about captive animals has been brainwashed or misinformed.
They need to get past that. If people are paying an extra $1 for cage-free eggs or organic hamburger meat, you can be sure they also care about the animal attractions they’re sharing with their kids.
You don’t have to see “Blackfish” to question SeaWorld’s decision let park-goers hop in the water and play with belugas for $119 a pop.
Still, the negative publicity irks many of those who work at SeaWorld. And I get that. Most of them work there because they love animals.
In fact, I spent a half-hour Tuesday talking with SeaWorld’s top two zoologists about their passion for marine mammals — and their deeply held beliefs that allowing humans to interact is good for conservation.
“Once you touch them and smell them and nurture them, they become part of your family,” said chief zoologist Brad Andrews. “People walk away thinking, ‘I can make a difference.'”
Chris Dold, the park’s vice president of veterinary services, said a trip to SeaWorld when he was a child helped spark his desire to make a profession out of caring for animals.
Both men also stressed that marine animals can suffer bloody deaths in the wild as well — and that conservation is the mission they live to fulfill.
Still, SeaWorld doesn’t exist to help animals. It exists to make money.
It was formed as a for-profit theme park — not a nonprofit conservation fund. Its policies and mission are ultimately guided by stockholders.
That doesn’t make it evil. It just makes it what it is.
You can actually make a solid argument that SeaWorld’s moneymaking allows it to do more good than it could as a nonprofit — that $80 tickets and $18 stuffed animals help subsidize an awful lot of dolphin and turtle rescues, not to mention aiding with this week’s manatee rescue. Still, the park’s bottom line remains its bottom line.
Some of SeaWorld’s perma-critics want that shut down permanently.
I don’t. I would rather see it evolve.
It needs to build upon the state-of-the-art rides and expand on the attractions that allow visitors to watch animals behave more naturally.
It means no more attempting to purchase once-wild whales (as SeaWorld was recently trying to do to get even more belugas) and probably no more breeding.
I’m not delusional. The park can’t simply plop every captive whale in the ocean and expect it to live. But I do think SeaWorld needs to work toward a day where its central attraction isn’t whales that are confined to a space so small it would be the equivalent of sentencing your child to life in a broom closet.
Such a transition will be tough. And painful.
Trust me. I know.
Thirty years ago, if you told a newspaperman that he’d have to focus on something other than the newspaper, he’d call you crazy.
Yet today, we tweet, we blog, we do radio and TV. We’re on Facebook and Twitter. We post news from sunrise to sundown and most hours in between.
These days, the media company that isn’t assaulting readers on every platform imaginable at every hour of the day is falling behind.
Well, SeaWorld is falling behind right now.
It is time for the park evolve, too … to a day where bloody headlines are a thing of the past.
