2y ago

Kept in captive isolation for nearly 53 years, Lolita the orca dies amidst plans for release

www.salon.com

According to a statement from the Miami Seaquarium, she died due to a suspected renal condition

24 comments

Poor animal. Sensitive and intelligent creatures, locked in isolation for this long would drive any human completely insane. WHY are humans such god awful miserable bastards?
- Money.
- I mean... It is Florida. Conservatives fucking hate animals. If they can profit from torturing an animal to death, they will. And they did.
Fuck each and every person involved in this tragedy
Tragic. But at least these places are all finally closing down. Hopefully this never happens again.
End orca captivity immediately.
- How many are still in captivity? Is there orca rehab as well that would count towards it? Wiki says 55, where are they?
  
  Probably a bunch at the various Sea World parks, but there's plenty of other aquariums globally.
- Counter point:
  Humans are the most effective predators ever. If we don't actively protect all "large" animals, we will just murder them all with our lifestyle. By accident.
  Now, how do we get people to care about all these wonderful creatures?
  My answer is that we make sure that all humans respect and expect to care for animals. That means that children need to see these animals.
  To me, that's a zoo. Yes, that's enslaving the animals, but seeing an elephant makes me much more likely to give two shits about keeping it alive.
  
  The problem with this attitude is my kids already love elephants and hate zoos.
  My daughter cried the first time she saw an elephant at the zoo, and asked me why they were all in cages.
  She called it an animal prison and I kinda agree.
  The younger generation gets plenty of world information from the internet now, they don’t seem to need or like the idea of zoos like we did growing up, before you could just see any animal any time you wanted with a pocket computer.
- Why do those sentient animals not deserve a chance but all others do?
  
  Because both these species literally domesticated themselves.
  Dogs are Wolves that chose to live with humans, and cats are... Cats.
  Orcas are significantly more intelligent than either cats or dogs.
  
  Well, I actually think dogs and cats come out on top. So I think they are using their chance to the maximum. My cat’s almost got nicer shit than me.
  
  There are three times as many puppies born each day as humans.
  I think they took their chance and are running with it already, and doing quite well.
  
  Arbitrary reasons. All the reasons people gave you are abritrary and I am sorry no one here told you the brutally honest truth. Cows are slaughtered by the millions in one country but are sacred and protected in another. It is all justifications humans come up with so we can live with our choices.
  
  if my cat wanted to run away, there isn't actually anything stopping him.
…she shared her small enclosure with a male orca named Hugo for the first decade of her captivity. In 1980, Hugo died from a brain aneurysm after an extended period of banging his head against the tank's spectator glass during fits of depression.
We tortured her to death. A slow, lingering death in a tiny prison.

24 comments