Angela Layh's letter to the editor dated May 21 concerning school children's trips to Sea World was responsible and reasonable with one major fault — the comparison of Sea World to a zoo. Sea World is not a zoo.
Firstly, zoos are mostly non-profit and are carried on by communities in an attempt to educate the public about the natural habits and habitats of wild animals. Sea World on the other hand, is a profit-making corporation that gives shows with animals in them. The killer whales' habitat at Sea World where they can swim around in small circles is nothing like their natural habitat where they can swim hundreds s of miles each day. As a result the death rate for whales in captivity is 2.5 times higher than whales in the wild. The whales' collapsed dorsal fin shows how miserable they are in this habitat.
Secondly Zoos don't have their animals performing circus-type shows. This is a large part of the opposition to Sea World. Taxing captive whales by making them perform these physically unnatural behaviors is inhumane. And these performances have no bearing on educating the viewer about the natural behaviors of whales who would never jump straight up in this manner or carry riders around on their backs. The whales have responded negatively to this by becoming aggressive and even sometimes killing their trainers.
This is why school trips to Sea World are discouraged by many animal rights groups. It's a bad idea to support this type of enterprise.