Marine Animals v. BP

Marine Animals v. BP is a trial which began with a lawsuit filed in 2010 following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. This trial is considered a landmark case in law, as it was the first-ever case with a non-human plaintiff: in this case, all the world's marine animals, trying to take down BP for their crimes against the natural environment.

While it remains undecided, it is worth nothing some of the interesting developments in the lawsuit.

History

Following the oil spill that began on April 20th, 2010, an estimated 780,000 cubic metres of oil was released into the Gulf of Mexico. While this had an effect on BP's revenue, and on the world at large, the clear larger effect was on marine life, with reports of a much higher-than-average death rate for fish and dolphins. Everyone began to question what this meant for marine animals. And the animals themselves questioned the humans' motives, the dolphins in particular.

“ Well, they ignored our messages for 30 years. And now, they're turning on us? You know, we wanted to talk about the fish. Why don't you care? ”

After discovering elements of human law, they decided to file a technical lawsuit against BP, having realised that they were responsible, and that the company were mass marine life murderers.

By 2012, despite the Federal Government already having cost BP at least US$40 billion for settlement, it was far from over, and a dolphin plaintiff suddenly appeared in court that year. Wishing to take charges directly against BP chair Carl-Henric Svanberg, he was somewhat disappointed at the result. Not only did BP refuse to acknowledge the marine animals, one lawyer stating he wanted to 'support these little fish' was consistently laughed out of court. Unfortunately, this wasn't because dolphins are mammals.

Having called on several environmental lawyers at this stage to defend their rights, BP stated in an official release, some offending words:

“ A clean environment is a violation of human rights. You are not human. ”

Obviously, marine animals are much more determined than BP, so, continuing to believe in their charges, a new subgroup is founded: the Fish Strike.

The Fish Strike (composed of actual fish, mind, and no dolphins) hired a famous New York-based advertising agency to bring ads onto the streets of many major world cities announcing in bold letters 'BP DESTROYS. YOU DON'T HAVE TO', 'OUR HOME... OUR OILY HOME', 'SENSIBLE PEOPLE STICK UP FOR FISH' and other slogans telling brave citizens to boycott the company.

Unfortunately, it didn't seem to work either, given that BP's statement of revenue for FY 2012-13 wasn't that much lower than before. If anything, it was higher. And this was in between the ad campaigns, the huge settlements to be paid, and all the other money necessary to leave their chests. Did humans want to support these mass murderers? What if they had killed millions of humans in the oil accident? Marine life as a collective kingdom watched in disgust.

Today...

The case remains undecided. However, given the power of capitalism, and the marine animals' lack of money (and lack of understanding the concept of money), BP will probably use their charm and cash to win out in the end.