The year 1961 was the beginning of Marineland. The beginning of a cruel mistreating era. Marineland is a theme park that has many activities to do. There were activities like waterslides, spray parks, underwater viewings, marine shows and more. Since then there have been many accusations of cruelty towards their animals that went ignored. John Holer was the founder of Marineland.  Before starting this park he worked for circuses in Europe and had a passion for marine life. The cruelty towards the marine animals is shown by the poor water quality in the marine tanks as well as isolating marine animals in a  “glass jar”. All the marine animals in the park were in distress due to the poor water quality in the tanks. These are the basics of what the animals need to survive and they weren't even able to meet the needs of the animals day to day well being. 

There have been on average 22 deaths of animals at Marineland each year. They captured around 1,000 animals by 1975. 

The world's loneliest orca named “Kiska”  was captured and housed at Marineland. She was named the world’s loneliest orca because she spent the last 12 years of her life completely alone. She received global attention from a video of her banging her head against the tank that went viral in 2021. It caused an outcry and calls for Kiska’s release. She was captured at just three years old and just recently passed away at the age of 47 from a bacterial disease. For decades there had been concerns for Kiska’s well-being.

Why would someone who has a passion for marine life want to be hurting, killing, and abusing marine animals? Why did John Holer create this theme park if there was such a huge possibility of all these legal concerns and problems.

“People are waking up to the fact that putting a whale in a glass jar is just about as cruel as it gets,” says Phil Demers, who worked for 12 years as a senior trainer at Canada’s Marineland.

It’s important to have former employees talking about the animal cruelty going on. They worked at Marineland so they have a very good understanding of the cruelty going on. Having a person talk about the issue who worked so closely with it is super important for the public to hear. Then it comes from a different perspective and not just animal activists that are working to stop it and get the word out, it’s people who would see it first hand. 

Ric’O Barry is a great example of a person who saw the cruelty first hand then it caused him to change what he believed in because what he was seeing was not ethical. Ric’O Barry was on both sides of dolphin captivity; he worked 10 years with the captivity industry and for the past 54 years against it. (from dolphin trainer to dolphin defender). When Kathy the dolphin in the movie flipper died in his arms is when O Barry realized that capturing dolphins and training them to do silly tricks is wrong. From that  moment on he knew what he had to do with his life. He was the founder of the Dolphin Project.

The Dolphin project is the longest running anti-captivity dolphin welfare organization in the world. Their team of people who help by dedicating their time to make sure the projects are successful include backgrounds of people and different roles they play. 

How can you help?

 Educate- You personally can help by recognizing the unseen cruelties that lie within places like Marineland. This issue isn’t thought about because the places these issues occur come across as a happy place for families to visit. By educating yourself and your family of the cruelty that happens at theme parks like Marineland you can help stop the production of new animal cruelty theme parks. 

Support Organizations- You can support organizations by making donations to groups like the Dolphin Project to help raise money for them to rescue as many marine animals as possible. It helps them be able to have a strong party to advocate with. 

Sign this petition- By signing this petition, you are showing your support for advocating for marine animals rights in theme parks like Marineland.