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Tuesday, September 2, 2014

Killing Keiko

Earlier this year, I shared a post about the now-released book Barle's Story, describing the life of a young polar bear rescued from life in a Mexican circus.  Today, I thought I'd share another story about another upcoming book - Killing Keiko.  The animal in question in this book is far more famous than Barle, but is usually better known by the name that he appeared in on the big screen: Free Willy.  Keiko's story, told by one of the biologists that monitored his release, is an important lesson about who should make decisions based on what is best for animals, not agendas.

What follows below is an excerpt from an article on Live Trading News.

Did Hollywood Kill Free Willy?


Did Hollywood Kill Free Willy?

Posted by Shayne Heffernan

It’s a scene etched in the minds of movie-goers: a captive killer whale vaults over a jetty to the open ocean, free at last to join his family in the wild.

In real life, however, Free Willy‘s fairy-tale ending never came true.  Despite international attention and tens of millions donated to his release, Keiko — the killer whale whose story inspired the Warner Brothers movie and its three sequels — suffered an excruciating, lonely and completely avoidable death.

“The public has been misled about Keiko, and I’m not ok with that,” said veteran animal behaviorist Mark Simmons, author of Killing Keiko, a new book available August 14.  Simmons led the Animal Behavior Team charged with Keiko’s release and spent years working in Iceland to prepare Keiko for his return to the wild. Ultimately, the team’s success would prove to be undone by management’s agenda to disregard behavioral science and elevate an urgent need for a timely and Hollywood ending.

“What’s so shocking about this story is that animal-rights activists put their publicity driven agendas over the life of this whale,” said Simmons, one of only a handful of people who’ve had nearly three decades of up-close interaction with killer whales.

Simmons continues, “Keiko endured a long, slow and physiologically punishing death caused by illness, starvation and dehydration.  He did not successfully integrate with other whales.  He did not learn to forage for food.  He never stopped longing for human interaction — something he’d been accustomed to for 20 years.”

Read the rest of the article here.

2 comments:

  1. Mark Simmons has an industry to protect, as he runs a captive dolphin swim with program. He needs the world to believe cetaceans are better off in captivity to stay in business. That and the fact that he left Keiko when funds ran out and didn't stay with him until he died is making it difficult for me to believe a word he says.

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  2. Mark Simmons has an industry to protect, as he runs a captive dolphin swim with program. He needs the world to believe cetaceans are better off in captivity to stay in business. That and the fact that he left Keiko when funds ran out and didn't stay with him until he died is making it difficult for me to believe a word he says.

    ReplyDelete