Dolphin & Whale more like people than we thought: Curious, playful, affectionate, sharing things, blowing water jets

Robin Williams with dolphins in the wild

The historical origins of ‘whales as people’. In 1850, an anonymous letter, now known to have been penned by a Nantucket whaling captain, written in the voice of a polar whale pleading for it’s species survival, was published in the Honolulu Friend, stating:
I write in behalf of my butchered and dying species. I appeal to the friends of the whole race of whales. Must we all be murdered? Must our race become extinct? Will no friends and allies arise and revenge our wrongs?"

(quote)

Wildlife photographer Dafna Ben Nun braved temperatures of minus 2 degrees to photograph the beautiful creatures in the White Sea, north-west Russia. The white beluga whales - which weigh around 3,000 lbs and measure up to 12 foot long - can be seen amazingly blowing water jets from their mouths.

The 31-year-old photographer spent almost an hour in the water with the two female whales. She said: 'If they don't want to do something they won't, but they are so friendly, I was playing with them and then they just starting spouting the water from their mouths, it was very funny. When you get in the water with them they are very curious and kept coming up to my camera. If I held onto their nose they would even lift me out of the water.'

The historical origins of ‘whales as people’

In an attempt to garner attention and raise awareness regarding the problematic use of orcas and other marine mammals in captivity for entertainment, PETA, an animal rights group, has sued Sea World, a corporation that builds and manages aquariums and marine parks. PETA is suing Sea World for violating these oceanic dolphin’s constitutional rights under the 13th amendment.

The 13th amendment to the United States Constitution explicitly outlaws slavery or involuntary captivity:

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

PETA’s argument is that the 13th amendment doesn’t specifically apply to human beings, and that keeping marine mammals in captivity is tantamount to slavery. Jason Goldman has a good write-up on why this is not a 13th amendment issue. What most of the commentary is missing, and what Goldman missed the mark on, is that the 13th amendment is written in such a way as to not explicitly refer to people precisely because any institutionalized system of slavery necessitates the dehumanization of the slave class, so as a function of the nature of slavery, slaves must be thought of as less than human. The question PETA raises, and one that I will not be addressing here, is how far does the 13th amendment extend?

Whales and dolphins are intelligent, social animals, and the idea that they are sufficiently advanced enough to be considered for person-hood is not new. Last year, several groups argued that dolphins should be considered non-human persons and given a certain degree of legal protection. This ignores the fact that, thanks to the Marine Mammal Protection Act, whales and dolphins currently do have more legal protection than any other non-primate animal.

The idea the whales and other marine mammals have a special position near humans on the scale of consciousness and intelligence is much older than this recent revival. As far back as 1850, people, specifically whalers, were making the argument that whales were more like people than we thought. In 1850, an anonymous letter, now known to have been penned by a Nantucket whaling captain, written in the voice of a polar whale pleading for it’s species survival, was published in the Honolulu Friend, stating:

I write in behalf of my butchered and dying species. I appeal to the friends of the whole race of whales. Must we all be murdered? Must our race become extinct? Will no friends and allies arise and revenge our wrongs?

source

Ironically, it was the whalers who first rose the alarms about the future of whale species. At this point in history, the Steller Sea Cow had already gone extinct, the Atlantic Right Whales were no longer abundant enough to justify a hunt, and the whaleships of Nantucket and New Bedford, once able to fill their holds with oil during a 3 month voyage, were now at sea for up to three years and regularly circumnavigating the world in a hunt for the last few whales. The thoroughly western concept that whales are not only equal to humans, but in some cases surpass us, has its philosophical roots in the most American of all novels, where the great white whale is not only just an equal to the captain and crew of the Pequod, but god himself, Moby Dick. This complex and compelling personification of an individual whale has woven itself into American literature and history forever altering our collective understanding of the whale.

(unquote)

Photos courtesy Caters News Agency