Blackfish

The case against the captivity of humans.

Society has failed you, your parents have failed you, and I’m so sorry you were left in the 10x10 cage they raised you in. Watching behind glass as the insanity creeps in — bashing your head against the walls.

BLACKFISH. Do you remember the documentary? Perhaps you were too young.

In 2013, it dominated every social platform and news media outlet. It was one of the first instances of social uproar loud enough to actually make change in a major company. SeaWorld was boycotted and forced to change many of its policies and breeding programs over the course of the next five years.

Why? Because the public watched in horror at these beautiful majestic creatures forced to live in tiny pools just big enough to swim in cramped circles through a lifetime. They were forced to look at a thousand screaming faces and hear millions or erratic sounds day in and day out, driven to insanity—running into glass walls over and over, committing violence to owners and trainers.

They were forced to live in an environment so sterile and stripped of everything they needed to thrive. Food on demand delivered to their mouths, instead of vicious and exhaustive hunts in the wide-open sea. Isolation and a complete void of love and touch. No family or community — incessantly plagued with anxiety, ADHD, depression and schizophrenia.

Sound familiar? You my dear friend are the blackfish in a glass box. We all are.

Our current culture is one big padded fish tank. Softening every sharp corner as to protect all harm and every feeling. We’re all useless blobs bouncing around the room without consequence. Fear of all pain. Perpetually bombarded by more stimulation in one day than we would normally get in a lifetime. We are stripped of all human connection, feeling and touch. Locked away in our apartment cages receiving food on demand and Deliveroo. We are slowly becoming insane, inducing our own grocery list of mental illnesses and insanities. We are constantly doing tricks for our fish. Making TikTok videos for likes and comments and validation. Surrounded by far too much stimulation mimicking the thousands of faces and sounds at SeaWorld.

Take feeling out of it. We as humans have fallen into the error of thinking we have somehow evolved passed our baseline biology. But we simple haven’t been alive long enough to evolve as fast as technology has. We are BIOLOGICALLY designed to learn from pain and stumbles. To be running around, searching for food, building, looking up at the sky and vast mountains. It is our baseline programming. Whether you’re conservative or liberal or in-between. If you never allow pain, if you never allow a fist fight, a fall off a tree, someone telling you the hard truth, hearing a differing opinion, the pain of doing something uncomfortable in the goal of something bigger. If you block out the sky, the grass under your feet, the feeling of your body moving, running, breathing. If you block out in person human connection. If you annex all of that — You are left with being an un moulded, unfired blob of clay rolling around a padded room, staring at a mindless TV and choking on your own insanity the rest of your life.

Struggle is all around us in nature. Lack of struggle is what is creating your mental health. It is what’s heightening your ADHD, your depression. Tiktok and cellphones are making your mental health worse. YES your mental health is real, and I’m so sorry you’re in pain. I’m sorry you struggle with ADHD and anxiety. If I could hug you for an hour straight I would. If I could remove your pain I would.

But instead, let me tell you a secret. IF you want your mental health to get better, go back to your baseline biology. Human connection, relationships, nature, kindness, and eating clean. You can either strive for those things, or you can sit with your online therapist and your TikTok bubble and continue to be addicted to hearing affirmations and how much of a victim you are. Falling farther and father into the glass box cage you will forever be locked into. An amusement attraction at SeaWorld the world can gawk and stare and laugh at. Is that what you want for your life? For your future?

Society has failed you, and I’m so sorry for that. Your parents stuck screens in front of your face instead of trees in your backyard. They let you have cellphones and social media far too young. You were born into a world where social media and online is forever, always judging and watching you. A million people to compare yourself to. A million people trying to get you to pay attention to their ideas, thousands of trolls leaving nasty comments on your posts. You were born into a society where everyone is clambering over everyone else just to be famous. To be validated in order to fill the empty void, instead of making society better and uplifting the world out of SELFLESS intentions.

But you have a choice to tell social norms to fuck off. You have the choice to break free. You have the choice to CHOOSE to be uncomfortable. Work hard. Meet people, talk to strangers. Be kind. Have conversations. Get off TikTok or at least understand that you’re simply a copy and past version of everyone else. To live your life in a selfless manner and realize that living in a world that revolves around you will only create your own madness. The world does not owe you anything. But you have the opportunity to be kind to it, so it can be kind to you.

So the question is… Are you going to let society put you in a glass water box at SeaWorld? Are you going to let it continue to drive you insane? Or are you going to boycott the park, break the glass, and go swim in the wide ocean blue of peace and potential with a new found purpose and community? I hope you chose the latter. I’m rooting for you.