#they're sacrificing animal welfare in order to fan service yet another questionable animal rights org

[ihazyourkitty]

What Is Wrong With Themed Reality!?

Themed Reality is an….. odd bunch. They are essentially a blog run by a couple animal advocates, focusing in particular on marine mammals.

Joe Kleiman (sp?) to my knowledge is the primary founder/writer for the blog. He has some professional experience in animal husbandry from many years ago, but of late has primarily been a journalist following the many inner workings of the theme park industry— again, marine parks in particular.

From what I have observed, Dr Jenna Wallace, one of the veterinarians formerly employed at Miami Seaquarium, has also been heavily involved with Themed Reality as of late.

Through various FOIA requests, they helped document a lot of things going wrong at Miami Seaquarium, especially where Tokitae was concerned. They’ve been highly critical of the Whale Sanctuary Project for a long time, and are continually trying to hold the people involved with WSP accountable for what happened to animals like Tokitae under their watch.

For Joe Kleiman’s part at least, ostensibly his intent is to just get the truth out there. He hasn't claimed to be overtly pro or anti captivity. Dr. Jenna Wallace is.... another story, let's just leave it at that.

Fine. So what’s the problem here?

You see, for how critical they are of the WSP continually failing to actually get a sanctuary up and running... they (or at least their fans) sure do seem excited by this.

In case you can't access that link, it's their most recent Facebook. First it quotes the French Minister of Ecological Transition, Agnès Pannier-Runacher, on the transfer of the Wikkie and Keijo:

So.... the French Minister's solution to all these incomplete sanctuary projects from different countries is to.......... propose another project? This is expediting the process how exactly? This is like someone setting up a meeting to talk about how we're having too many meetings!

Sea Shepherd France's post is as follows:

TL;DR, it's more of the same. "We don't want these beautiful whales being exploited at another marine park prison, so we're proposing a beautiful sanctuary instead!"

Now, what, pray tell, is the reaction of Themed Reality fans who have long since decried the WSP's alleged scam? This. This is their reaction:

I just.... I cannot... there are no words. NOTHING IS CHANGING HERE! It's just another promise that "don't worry, we promise we're gonna build one, and it's gonna be great you guys!"

And yet the same people who balk at the WSP for not having anything ready are in love with Sea Shepherd France for pledging to do the exact same thing, but... better somehow?

Literally the only thing SS has done is is propose a sanctuary. At least WSP has actually selected a site and been doing environmental analyses (even if they aren't being fully transparent about the results of those). SS hasn't even done that!

To be clear, I'm not the biggest fan of Loro Parque. I think they've made a lot of mistakes in how they've managed their orcas. But they are not some roadside zoo either, and sending them there is still vastly better than sending them to Japan, let alone leaving them in the situation they are in now. These whales needed to moved yesterday!

Whether it's to Sea Shepherd or WSP, if transfers continue to be blocked, these whales would be doomed to stay in a crumbling facility waiting for a sanctuary to be built. I honestly fail to see how these people think building one would be any faster with SS than with WSP. It took the latter years just to get a site selected, because newsflash, one does not simply call dibs on some random bay and go "Yup, imma build it here!"

National Aquarium also pledged years ago to build and send their dolphins to a seaside sanctuary. It too has yet to take fruition, in part because they haven't been able to secure a safe or appropriate site. The people promising to build Corky a sanctuary have also been promising one for years. It's not there.

Sea Life Beluga Trust's sanctuary is literally the only organization that has actually been able to get a decent facility up and running. But somehow, somehow, these people expect Sea Shepherd to just magically be able to build one fast enough for these whales.

See, this is my problem with Themed Reality. At least one of the writers claims not to be pro or anti cap, but they actively court a fanatical anti-cap audience. On top of that, it's not even that productive an anti-cap audience, because they're call foul at WSP, but then applaud SS, even though green lighting either project wold still keep these whales in limbo at a crumbling facility. Oh, but it's fine as long as it's not Loro Parque or WSP, right? (It's not)

Outside the FOIA documents they've been able to obtain about how Friends of Tokitae and The Dolphin Company mishandled Tokitae's "rehabilitation", they're more a Whale Sanctuary Project/Charles Vinick Hate Club than anything else.... one that, ironically, makes a lot of big promises that it fails to deliver on.

Seriously, scroll through their Facebook page. Multiple times they make promises on "We've got a big bombshell of a blog post coming on this new revelation!" .... and then half the time that blog post never drops. Is it behind a paywall or something? I don't know. I haven't been able to find an option to subscribe for additional content. I don't see them on their offshoot blogs like The Flip/Shadow Warriors. All I know is that many of the big posts they've promised to put on their blog are still not there, as of this posting. But their Facebook page sure is rife of weird AI images with Charles Vinick and orcas... you know... for content.

They also did some big "expose" on one of WSP's founder's former affiliation with some kind of satanic church thing. I'm not exactly sure how this person's former spiritual affiliations relate to what WSP is doing now... aside from Themed Reality's broad assumptions that: "This guy was once part of this weird group that rebranded itself, which he allegedly lied about... and now WSP is not being transparent about their finances and site analyses, so AHAH!!! YOU SEE!?"

Seriously, some of their content borders on conspiracy theory style logic. It doesn't keep their audience informed. It's become just more shameless clickbait that satisfies their audience's itch to hate on the Whale Sanctuary Project, while simultaneously painting other animal rights groups in a more sympathetic light, despite them doing essentially the same things as WSP.

And look... there is plenty to criticize about them, but I guess my point here is: Themed Reality isn't part of the solution here. They're part of the problem.