OK, this is messsed up- dophin abuse in Europe

[AptaMer]

So ASPRO is a big Spanish corporation ( http://www.asproparks.com/?lang=en ) that operates theme parks all over Europe, most of them waterparks, aquaria and marine mammal entertainment parks similar to SeaWorld in the USA.

One of them is a so-called dolfinarium (that also has sea otters & pinnipeds) located in the Netherlands http://www.dolfinarium.nl/ontdek/

A whistleblower has outed that park for abuse that you can read about in this article

https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/dolphin-sex-abuse-whistleblower-calls-out-aquarium-for-jerking-off-sea-mammals

So it's not just the USA where marine mammal theme parks are doing bad stuff to sea animals.

Do any of you Euro mers know if there is any response or protest brewing about this kind of thing in the EU?

[malinghi]

It's interesting that stories about abuse can put marine mammal captivity in the spotlight, but honestly I think it's abuse just to keep social migratory intelligent creatures in small tanks.

And about this case, is it weird that I don't care that they're jerking off dolphins? I have no idea how cruel that is, but it didn't seem anywhere near as bad as simply having them in captivity in the first place.

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[Echidna]

Sadly, there is very little awareness of this in Europe, maybe because dolphinariums have become scarce and are often only run in zoos, not as major show attractions.
The only organized protest I've seen towards zoos in general and this in particular is PETA.

But it's a glaring issue, especially as all zoos are breeding like crazy, to have cute small animals as audience magnets.
Many of those animals die young or are killed off once they're no longer cute-
one of the reasons why I've always opposed zoos, despite all their "preservation"-claims, they are mainly money making businesses.

[AptaMer]

The reason I de-emphasised the "sperm milking" process (which is the euphemism used in the animal husbandry business) is that it's not the real issue, and you're right not to feel weird about it.

This has gone on in the past, as most recently revealed by Margaret Howe, where she revealed that she did it for a reaserch dolphin she worked with.

Unfortunately the Vice publication was using that as clickbait. The real abuse that is touched upon in the article is that large numbers of dolphins are being cooped up in tanks that aren't big enough for even one dolphin to be happy in.

Also, dolphins are very social and sexual, and one of the ways they maintain good relationships between the pod members is through sexual interactions, much like the famous bonobo apes. This is another aspect of dolphins that tends to get glossed over in popular accounts. If only people could get over anthropomorphising animals, and acting like animals that have frequent sex are "promiscuous" or "salacious"

Anyhow, reproductive management practices are such that the animals are kept in single-sex confinement when they're off their hormonal controls so their sperm can be harvested. Females are always artificially inseminated, rather than allowed to get pregnant by having sex. It may be hard for us to understand what this means to the dolphins, because their sexuality is different from ours, and is so meaningful to them.

These are social, extremely intelligent creatures who are in prisons just as bad as any where humans are locked up.

[Merenneito Nerissa]

In Finland we had this one dolphinarium. Nowadays it's closed and it will stay so, they're going to build some kind of an activity park there. It's still a bit unclear what happens to dolphins, but people have been quite active with insisting that they would be sent to some sort of a "retirement" place. They needed to close the dolphinarium because people didn't visit there anymore, people's attitudes had changed so much that it wasn't profitable anymore :) I hope this will be the case in everywhere else someday.

[AptaMer]

That's so good to hear, Merenneito Nerissa.

Finland is such an enlightened place in so many ways.