CUBAN TRANSITIONS

Dolphins play and swim at Varadero's Delfinario

“Lets start a Dolphin Revolution!!” our class yelled as our bus left one of Varadero’s most popular tourist attractions- the dolphin park and show at Delfinario. Little did we know an international animal rights effort against Cuba’s involvement in Dolphin exportation began started in 1998 by a Swiss organization called “Working Group for the Protection of Marine Mammals” (ASMS). Although animal rights activists in the US have helped prohibit dolphin capture for sale in US waters since 1990, unfortunately protestors have had less success in Cuba and the nation remains today’s number one exporter of dolphins- mainly to the Caribbean for popular tourist shows and parks and to Europe for aquariums.

Interesting characters are involved in the Cuban dolphin debate. In 2002 the US Treasury Office launched an investigation into hundreds of thousands of dollars of dolphins purchased by American individuals from the Cuban government to supply dolphin attractions in the Caribbean- effectively violating an aspect of the US’s embargo policy against Cuba. Other players involved are international activists who hope to protect Cuban dolphins by reducing and eventually halting their exportation. Because animal vets have a powerful voice in animal rights campaigns, a group of activists have tried to engage Che Guevara’s daughter, Celia Guevara who is the chief marine mammal veterinarian at Cuba’s National Aquarium, in their struggle. Unfortunately Celia, the Aquarium and Ministry of Science- which licenses dolphin exports- do not seem interested in changing their policies or reducing Cuba’s lucrative dolphin exportation business (dolphins freshly captured can be sold for up to $70,000 each).

Another economic angle of the dolphin debate is that swimming with dolphins has become an increasingly popular tourist attraction in Caribbean destinations, including Cuba. Often advertised as a “life changing experience” and a way to “feel completely free and become one with nature,” many tourists think exactly this and flock to Dolphin parks such as Varadero’s Delfinario for entertainment and their own personal moment of magic.

The dolphin show at Delfinario

Although most of our group left the Delfinario park agitated about the inhumanity of taming and training wild animals, I stayed for the show and had an interesting experience. The show began with a row of loud speakers blasting the crowd with ambient music and messages in both Spanish and English about the ‘special dolphin experience’ and the ecological measures the park took to preserve dolphins’ habitats and health. Interestingly enough, these dolphins were held in semi-captivity, meaning that the fenced off mangrove pens we saw before us were actually open to the ocean and dolphins had freedom to move between the pens and their natural habitat. According to the park, they returned for training and shows because they enjoyed getting easy food.

Our group feeling disgruntled about dolphin rights and brewing a revolution

This raises an interesting question: what are the politics of semi-captivity? Our group as well as animal rights activists felt that semi-captivity is also inhumane. Clearly the park, dolphin show crowds, and tourists who paid high prices to swim with these animals thought that dolphins’ controlled access to the ocean was humane and morally permissible. Personally seeing the incredible tricks the dolphins performed for us during the show- dancing, jumping, basketball, balancing acts- further emphasized their tremendous intellect (dolphin’s brains are 1/3 larger than ours), beauty and power and hence their rightful place in their natural uninhibited environment.

Watch the Delfinario dolphin show on youtube here: 

So, long live the VC Cuban Dolphin Revolution! Be good on your island protests and actually defend these animals and further the Revolution by signing the Declaration of Rights for Cetaceans at http://www.cetaceanrights.org/.