The Hidden Cruelty of Commercial Fishing
When we think of animal cruelty, fish and marine life are rarely the first to come to mind. Yet industrial fishing is one of the most destructive and violent industries on the planet. It’s estimated that over 1 trillion fish and other marine animals are killed each year by commercial fishing operations—a number so vast it’s almost beyond comprehension.
Fish caught by industrial methods endure immense suffering. Long line fishing vessels use lines that stretch for miles, baited with thousands of hooks. Fish may hang on those hooks for hours before being hauled up, terrified and injured. Once pulled from the water, many die slowly from suffocation or suffer from barotrauma—a condition caused by the drastic pressure change that can rupture their internal organs.
The cruelty extends far beyond fish. In the practice of shark finning, sharks are hauled aboard, their fins sliced off, and their bodies thrown back into the ocean—alive. Unable to swim, they slowly sink and die from blood loss, suffocation, or predation. Tuna and other large fish are sometimes mutilated alive before being discarded. Non-target species—known as bycatch—including dolphins, sea turtles, and seabirds, often get caught in fishing lines or nets. Dolphins trapped in tuna nets may be crushed by machinery or drown as they’re dragged onboard.
The Environmental Toll
Industrial fishing isn’t just cruel—it’s ecologically devastating. Techniques like bottom trawling drag massive, weighted nets across the ocean floor, tearing up coral reefs, destroying entire ecosystems, and crushing marine life in their path. These deep-sea habitats are among the slowest to regenerate—sometimes taking centuries to recover, if they do at all.
Trawling also releases carbon stored in seabed sediments, contributing to climate change. Meanwhile, overfishing removes vital species from the ocean, disrupting food chains that took millions of years to evolve. The delicate balance of marine ecosystems is collapsing under the weight of human consumption
Farmed Fish: Not the Solution
Many turn to fish farming (aquaculture) as an alternative, but it too comes with serious ethical and environmental concerns.
Farmed fish are raised in crowded enclosures where they are unable to engage in natural behaviors and often suffer from stress, disease, and injury. To keep them alive, the industry relies heavily on antibiotics and chemicals, many of which leak into surrounding waters, polluting oceans and harming wild marine life.
Waste from these farms can create dead zones—areas in the ocean where little to no life can survive due to oxygen depletion. Additionally, fish farms often use wild-caught fish as feed, perpetuating the very same overfishing problem they claim to solve. And just like land-based factory farming, fish farming poses risks to human health, from antibiotic resistance to contaminated seafood.
What We Can Do
We are not powerless. Our choices can protect marine animals and begin to heal the oceans.
- Choose plant-based alternatives to seafood. Today, there are excellent options: fish-free filets, crabless cakes, and sushi made with vegetables, tofu, or legumes—all satisfying and ocean-friendly.
- Switch to algae-based omega-3 supplements. Fish get their omega-3s from algae, so you can too. Algae oil provides the same essential fatty acids—DHA and EPA—without cruelty, bycatch, or pollution. It’s a sustainable and compassionate alternative.
The suffering of marine animals is not only immense—it’s largely invisible. But science increasingly recognizes their sentience, ability to feel pain, and social complexity. It’s time we expand our circle of compassion to include those who live beneath the surface—and protect the oceans they call home.
Expanding Our Circle of Compassion
Some may wonder why we devote so much attention to the suffering of animals when human suffering is also so widespread. But this isn’t an either-or choice. Caring for animals does not diminish our concern for people—it deepens it
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The capacity to recognize and respond to suffering, wherever it exists, strengthens our empathy across the board. As we learn to see the sentience in marine animals—creatures long overlooked and dismissed—we also stretch our ability to care more fully for one another.
In A Plea for the Animals: The Moral, Philosophical, and Evolutionary Imperative to Treat All Beings with Compassion, author Matthieu Ricard puts it powerfully:
“Loving animals also does not mean loving humans less. In fact, by also loving animals we love people better, because our benevolence is then vaster and therefore of better quality. Someone who loves only a selection of sentient beings, even of humanity, is the possessor of only fragmented and impoverished benevolence.”
When we choose to act on behalf of the voiceless—whether they swim in the sea, walk on land, or live among us—we foster a more just, compassionate world for everyone.
Jo Bighouse, Founder, Serenity Farm Virginia