Ocean trash is probably not your fault. That’s my biggest takeaway from this neatly packaged bundle o’ reality horror. Because that is the sole positive to be taken from Seaspiracy, a documentary every bit as bleak as An Inconvenient Truth and about twenty years too late to do anything about it. (Yeah, like we did anything in the wake of Truth besides draw up sides and tell lies to ourselves.)
It turns out our failure to recycle straws isn’t nearly as bad as some would have you believe. Oh, it’s still not a good idea to abuse plastic waste, but you know that Texas-sized lethal floating garbage dump in the Pacific Ocean? It is not entirely comprised of straws and unrecycled coke bottles. In fact, the majority of the material is fishing related, having been abandoned by fishing folk. In fact, almost half of the Texas-sized waste is cast off plastic fishing nets, not only environmentally suspect, but -unlike straws- they are literal weapons designed specifically to hinder natural creatures. Unless you’re a fisherman, that ain’t your fault. Not directly at least.
Now, don’t get me wrong … while the plastic straws are literally a drop in the ocean, all humans -and I’m looking at you, Warren- are guilty of contributing to environmental disaster. That goes quadruple for Trump voters – if you “conservatives” can reflect upon the callous shit show from that self-serving rapemaster and decide you want more, it’s clear the only thing you wish to conserve is power.
I digress. Today’s movie is about the guilt of the world, not red state Americans alone. When it comes to destroying the oceans and –consequently- the sustainability of the livable planet, every country who has a sea border is to blame. This was not the thesis director Ali Tabrizi started with; Li’l Jacques Cousteau here just wanted to know what was up with whale hunting yet even the most shallow investigation brought him to some fairly awful conclusions. For one thing, that “dolphin safe” logo on the side of your can of tuna? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. That must be a hoot at Starkist or Bumblebee or the home offices of any of those other tuna canning jerks. In Japan, folks actively kill dolphins. Why? Less competition. Those selfish bald big-brained sea mammals are taking all the finned gold for themselves.
I wish I could stop there. I wish Seaspiracy stopped there. Well, I wish Seaspiracy was named something else; that’s a terrible portmanteaux. And I wish this film had pulled a John Oliver – just one problem at a time, fellas. By the time you get to the end of this harangue, you might have forgotten about dolphins entirely. This film is an over-facted look at a Marianas Trench sized volume of ugliness when it comes to human behavior with respect to the sea. So dolphins, dudes, you are neither stupid, nor defenseless. Fight back and good luck. The keepers of ocean integrity have bigger fish to fry, so-to-speak.
“Overwhelming” and “grotesque” are the best words I have for describing this documentary. I could hit you with a volume of alarming facts, every one of which can be backed by genuine evidence (despite the immense backlash from the companies it attacks). I won’t. I’m gonna summarize the film
with one anecdote. Think about Deepwater Horizon. You know the name. You know what happened. BP created a huge oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico near Louisiana. Such was the direct result of corporate greed and the “drill, baby, drill” mentality espoused by capitalist assholes. Consider for a moment that the sea was better off after that disaster by comparison to what humans do to it on a daily basis. It’s hard to imagine, right? But for that moment and the brief period that followed, that portion of the Gulf of Mexico was left untouched and allowed to grow on its own … and it did much better during that time.
Seaspiracy is more important than it is good. And it’s fairly alarmist, which you take with a grain of salt – my thought on this are similar to my thoughts on An Inconvenient Truth: even if the whole thing were an exaggeration, IT’S NOT GOOD, it might create some catastrophes you WILL care about, and there’s no scientific reason to believe the trend will improve. Ali Tabrizi is not just making stuff up. We are overfishing. Dolphins do die at human hands. Sustainability is a joke. There is fishing-related slavery. And all of this pales with comparison to the general health of the ocean which humans do not and will not consider. Pointing all this out means Ali has a knack for getting doors slammed in his face. His tack is frustrating and smacks of “gotcha” journalism when – in fact- all these companies do have some giant secrets to hide. And we let them get away with it because, I suppose, it’s easy to blame “capitalism” and leave it at that. That answer isn’t necessarily wrong –powerful and rich people have chosen to hide their shame and they’re damn good at it but –when it comes down to it- no matter how noble or ignoble our intentions, there’s almost nothing we can do as a people and we know it. It’s just a matter of time before we destroy the sea, and consequently, ourselves. Yeah, there’s a pretty big connection there. Watch the film.
Ali is a man with a tail
Who wanted to see many a whale
This shape of water
Found endless slaughter
A Pandora of humanity fail
Rated TV-MA, 89 Minutes
Director: Ali Tabrizi
Writer: Everyone from Charlie the tuna to Billy Joel’s “Downeaster Alexa”
Genre: Depressed yet?
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: SJWs
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Anyone who earns a living from the sea
