Richard O’Barry

Richard O’Barry Instagram – Words of Wisdom From Joe Kleiman: “A few things greatly bother me. First, the media circus that surrounded Toki’s removal from the tank all the way through her departure was an embarrassment. And there was the rush to perform a necropsy. NOAA’s killer whale necropsy guidelines are designed for strandings, thus the rush. But that’s not the case here. I spent a number of years doing dolphin and whale necropsies. We had a huge freezer because you can wait a few days and weeks and still get the same results off a thawed body. There’s no reason she couldn’t have been placed in a refrigerated trailer right away and just kept there at the Seaquarium until the Lummi elders had arrived to pay their respects while she was still whole. It’s a continuing disrespect to Sk’aliCh’elh-tenaut and her indigenous relatives from the park in both life and death. And by Eduardo Albor’s logic that he just bought the park and is therefore not responsible for her capture (and I have yet to see him apologize for it), the current ownership of SeaWorld holds no responsibility for what their predecessors did. Corporate responsibility is a real thing. You buy a company, you buy a park, you’re also responsible for the historical baggage you buy with it, regardless of whether your brand is SeaWorld or Seaquarium.”
-Joe Kleiman | Posted on 24/Aug/2023 20:24:06