Keeping cetaceans in captivity for entertainment has increasingly been recognized as incompatible with their welfare needs. Understanding the evidence supports informed decisions about marine park attendance.
Captive cetacean welfare fails at fundamental levels that cannot be addressed within commercial marine park constraints. The space available is categorically incompatible with animals that evolved to range thousands of miles. Social groupings of unrelated animals from different cultural backgrounds create chronic conflict - captive orca aggression causes injuries that would not occur in cohesive wild family groups. Forced performance removes the agency and predictability that support psychological wellbeing. The abbreviated lifespans of captive orcas compared to wild counterparts reflect cumulative physiological and psychological stress that compounds across decades. No management intervention within a marine park context can address these fundamental incompatibilities.